Recently I was talking to a friend who's busy hunting for new marketing job, and we wound up talking about how the word "marketing" gets used in job listings: as a synonym for "sales."
Consider this job listing (details changed):
Marketing Manager to communicate ConfusedCo's capabilities to sell our expert consulting services and expand business. Liaison between clients and operations personnel; resolve client concerns/issues with ConfusedCo work. Schedule and accomplish 14-20 on-site prospective client calls per week. BA preferred. Marketing/Business Degree requested. 5+ years professional level sales. Selling to insurance claim centers and/or law firms preferred. Must show entrepreneurial capability; ability to meet and associate with potential clients. Must attend client/prospect business related events and social functions.
What's fascinating to me about this "marketing manager" position is that in that list of duties, there's no marketing responsibilities. The job is pretty clearly calling on potential and existing clients and scaring up business. And the background they're looking for is... sales.
Which is a really important job, if the company wants to make payroll, but it's not a marketing job. So why call it that? For some reason, a lot of companies think that changing the word "sales" to "marketing" magically makes the job better.
But if sales is what the "marketing manager" does, I have to wonder if anyone at the company is actually doing marketing... or even knows what marketing is.
1 comment:
"Come into my parlor," said the spider to the fly....
I think marketing is perceived as less difficult/less scary than sales. Sweet young things who would be put off by "sales" may be attracted by the word "marketing."
While this ad does show confusion between the two fields, all in all I don't think it's a bad idea for marketing pros to have some sales experience along the way.
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