There is a great deal of confusion as to what is marketing, and what a marketer can do for a company.
The Chartered Institute of Marketing define marketing as: "Marketing is the management process responsible for identifying, anticipating and satisfying customer requirements profitably."
Marketing by definition is a trade that encompasses many different skills, many now seen as specialist areas, such as public relations or PR, e- or web-marketing, direct marketing, packaging, new product development, and the popular impression of marketing - advertising.
It does, however, not include sales. One of writers, Thom Poole, has used the analogy that 'Marketing provides the salespeople with the ammunition they need to do their job well, be that a good product/service, the correct pricing, the right level of promotion or the right level of general product acceptance.'
The Chartered Institute of Marketing have identified a series of traits that certain levels of marketers should attain, and be expected to provide to companies, which we have developed into a checklist:
For marketing support assistants: Support checklist download (Word document - 44KB)
For marketing practioners: Practioners checklist download (Word document - 48KB)
For marketing managers: Managers checklist download (Word document - 48KB)
For senior/professional marketers: Professional checklist download (Word document - 44KB)