Benjamin Julien Hartmann

Unboxing marketing : creating value for consumers, firms, and society

How can marketing create value for consumers, firms, and society? What are the major societal trends that shape contemporary marketing? How and why has marketing become so influential that consumption now defines our entire culture? How can marketing practices contribute to shape society in a more positive way? These are examples of questions that are discussed and answered in this book. Unboxing Marketing problematizes and enriches marketing as it is taught in introductory courses. To do this, the authors use the metaphor of unboxing, which means to unwrap marketing like it was delivered in a closed box created by traditional marketing textbooks. The book builds on the latest scientific research to first unbox some of the major forces affecting society and marketing today, such as globalization, sustainabilization, and polarization. Then the unboxing moves on to how markets are made and remade, the role that value plays, and how contemporary consumer culture operates. Finally, the areas of marketing strategy, marketing research, and marketing in the digital era are unboxed.