Recently I was in a new business meeting and someone asked me "What is marketing to you?" Right then, I realized no one has ever asked me that question before. The part that struck me was the "to you". I have always ass-u-me-d when I sit down to talk about marketing with someone they know what it is.  This made wonder... does she think I don't know what marketing is? Or maybe she doesn't know what it is and she is simply trying to find out? I think this person was trying to find out what I thought it was.

This got me to thinking how much there is to marketing and how, depending on who you ask, there will be a different answer to that question. To me, marketing is communicating with your target customers in a thoughtful and meaningful way across a variety of avenues so they will buy from you not just once, but for a lifetime. However, with that said, marketing's meaning depends on your goals. What is marketing to you?