Description
Since the 1950s various concepts about corporate-wide marketing have captured the imagination of scholars and practitioners (corporate identity, corporate branding, corporate image, corporate reputation, and corporate communications.).
COMMENTARY
Corporate marketing
Integrating corporate identity, corporate
branding, corporate communications,
corporate image and corporate reputation
John M.T. Balmer
Bradford School of Management, Bradford, UK, and
Stephen A. Greyser
Harvard Business School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
Abstract
Purpose – The aims of the paper are to examine the nascent area of corporate marketing.
Design/methodology/approach – The paper draws on some of the key literature relating to the
history of marketing thought.
Findings – The study reiterates the case that corporate identity, corporate branding, corporate
communications, and corporate reputation should be integrated under the umbrella title of corporate
marketing. The paper introduces the 6Cs of corporate marketing.
Originality/value – The paper integrates British and US perspectives on the area and draws on
Balmer’s work vis-a` -vis corporate marketing and Greyser’s historical overview of marketing written
for the Marketing Science Institute (MSI)
Keywords Organizations, Marketing strategy, Corporate identity, Corporate branding,
Corporate communications, Corporate image
Paper type Viewpoint
Introduction
Like the Roman God Janus, we gain perspective by looking both backward and
forward. In looking forward we conclude that marketing is undergoing another
paradigm shift and is increasingly characterised by having an institutional-wide focus.
Balmer (1998, 2001, 2006) in observing the above, has given the label “corporate
marketing” to the area.
Since the 1950s various concepts about corporate-wide marketing have captured the
imagination of scholars and practitioners (corporate identity, corporate branding,
corporate image, corporate reputation, and corporate communications.). Each of these
concepts has its own intellectual roots and practice-based adherents. While individual
corporate-level concepts provide a powerful, and radical, lens through which to
comprehend organisations, these individual perspectives are necessarily limited. For
this reason an integrated approach to marketing at the institutional level would seem
to be highly desirable and thus the need for what Balmer calls “corporate marketing”
and what we in our book, Revealing the Corporation (Balmer and Greyser, 2003),
termed corporate-level marketing.
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/0309-0566.htm
EJM
40,7/8
730
European Journal of Marketing
Vol. 40 No. 7/8, 2006
pp. 730-741
qEmerald Group Publishing Limited
0309-0566
DOI 10.1108/03090560610669964
In our commentary, we marshal the literature relating to the historiography of
marketing and use this as a platform for our examination of the embryonic area of
corporate marketing.
We explain that a corporate marketing philosophy represents a logical stage of
marketing’s evolution and introduce a revised corporate marketing mix (the 6Cs) as an
illustrative framework representing the key concerns that underpin this expanded
viewpoint of marketing. In addition, we explain why marketing (rather than other
areas of management) represents the logical disciplinary domain relating to the
territory we are treating.
In this article we draw on a range of sources including our own scholarship on the
area. This is not for purposes of self-aggrandisement but for purely practical reasons.
In truth, the canon of work on the area is modest and we hope that our observations
will engender interest in what (we believe) is likely to emerge as a progressively vital
area of marketing. In looking backwards we brie?y re?ect on how marketing has
evolved to its present state. Such retrospection not only provides a platform to look
ahead but also gives us permission – intellectually, and perhaps psychologically – to
speculate about the nature of corporate-level marketing.
From the outset, we acknowledge that any discussion of marketing is beset by a
number of dif?culties including the lack of consensus as to its nature. We note that
Crosier (1975) found no less that 50 de?nitions within the literature, which broadly
envisioned marketing in terms of a process, a philosophy and as a business orientation.
Similar discussions are likely to characterise on-going discussion relating to corporate
marketing as it has in relation to more traditional notions of marketing (see
Gummesson, 1991). From our perspective we regard corporate marketing’s strengths
as principally in terms of a philosophy rather than as a function.
Marketing: re?ections on the past
What is marketing’s historiography? What eras have passed in reaching the present?
Of course, the importance of having a customer focus has long been recognised and
pre-dates the emergence of marketing as a cognate area of management. For instance,
Frank Taussig, a former President of the American Economic Association stated back
in 1912 that, “ We must accept the consumer as the ?nal judge” (The Economist, 2006).
In a seminal work by LaLonde (see Greyser, 1997) the existence of company-wide
consumer orientation was traced back to the 1920s. However, it was during the 1950s
and 1960s that the marketing philosophy and function began to be elucidated by
scholars and adopted by managers. Key proponents of the above include Drucker
(1954), Levitt (1960) and Kotler and Levy (1969). In terms of the marketing mix the
contributions made by Borden (1964) and McCarthy (1960) are noteworthy. From a
practitioner perspective, Jack McKitterick (then vice president of General Electric) is
credited as providing the ?rst articulation of the marketing concept. Speaking at a
meeting of the American Marketing Association in 1957 he remarked that:
[. . .] the principal task of [. . .] marketing [. . .] is not so much to be skillful in making the
customer do what suits the interests of the business as to be skillful in conceiving and then
making the business do what suits the interest of the customer (McKitterick in Greyser, 1997).
In a similar vein, Robert Keith (in Greyser, 1997) writing in the Journal of Marketing,
and making reference to his own organisation’s historical development, made a clear
Corporate
marketing
731
distinction between having a production/manufacturing orientation, a sales focus and,
?nally, a truly marketing orientation. Greyser (1997) re?ecting on Keith’s tripartite
categorisations (and the more recent relationship marketing perspective) observed that
each is underpinned by a central question/concern which he detailed as follows:
.
Production and manufacturing orientation: “Can we make it?”.
.
Sales orientation: “Can we sell what we can make?”.
.
Marketing orientation: ”Can we determine what consumers, or a group of
consumers, want that we can make and sell pro?tably within our zones of
skills?”.
.
Relationship marketing orientation: “Can we generate continuing business
(loyalty purchasing) via consumer/customer satisfaction with what – and how –
we make, sell, and service?”.
To us, corporate-level marketing represents a further stage of development, that of
corporate-level marketing orientation: “Can we, as an institution, have meaningful,
positive and pro?table bilateral on-going relationships with customers, and other
stakeholder groups and communities?”. From the outset we wish to make it clear that
corporate marketing has a general applicability to entities whether they are
corporations, companies, not-for-pro?t organisations as well as other categories such
as business alliances, cities and so on. A key attribute of corporate-level marketing is
its concern with multiple exchange relationships with multiple stakeholder groups and
networks. Another feature is the importance accorded to the temporal dimension with
there being ?delity not only to present relationships but those of the past and those
prospective relationships of the future. (Such a perspective has traditionally
characterised mutual entities such as building societies, co-operatives and
partnerships; John Lewis is one such example.)
From practice to power relationships
Again, taking another retrospective and drawing on his collaborative work with the
legendary Raymond A. Bauer (late Harvard Business School Professor), as well as that
of his own, Stephen Greyser offered a tripartite analysis of marketplace relationships
between marketers and consumers, especially with regard to power and in?uence
(Greyser, 1997).
The three types of relationship have been termed:
(1) manipulative (a critic’s model);
(2) service (a pro-business model); and
(3) transactional (an exchange-based model).
Each model employs different assumptions about the power/balance in the
marketplace, the origin of consumer needs and desires, the type of consumer power
exercised, the “warning” to consumers or business that pervades the marketplace, and
the role of the marketer. To us, corporate marketing represents a logical fourth stage in
terms of the above. We call this stage: expectational (a stakeholder-institutional model).
The table provided by Owens and Greyser (Greyser, 1997) relating to the above has
been adapted by us in Table I so as to accommodate the above (see also Table II).
EJM
40,7/8
732
Models
Assumption about
The
manipulative
model
The transactional
model
The service
model
The corporate
model
Power balance in
the marketplace
Marketers
dominate
Consumer-
marketer balance
Consumers
dominate
Consumers and
stakeholders dominate
Origin of
consumer
needs/desires
With marketers With consumers
and marketers
With consumers With consumers and
stakeholders
Type of consumer
power
Forces consumer
choice
Consumer choice Consumer
sovereignty
Consumer and
stakeholder
sovereignty
Marketplace
warning
Caveat Emptor
Buyer beware
Caveat Omnes
All beware
Caveat Venditor
Seller beware
Caveat Societas
Company beware
Role of marketer To
persuade/seduce
consumers
To work with
consumers
To service/cater
to consumers
To work with
consumers and
stakeholders
The consumer’s
adversary
The consumer’s
partner
The consumer’s
servant
The stakeholder’s
servant
Source: Balmer (2006) adapted from Owens and Greyser in Greyser (1997)
Table I.
Comparing and
contrasting the four
models of power
relationships in
marketing
Major components of corporate
marketing (Balmer, 2001)
Major components of marketing
(McGee and Spiro, 1990)
Orientation Stakeholder
Understanding present and future
stakeholder (including customer)
wants, needs and behaviour.
Customer
Understanding customer’s wants,
needs and behaviour
Organisational
support
Co-ordinated organisational activities
Undertaken to support stakeholder’s
orientation elicited above
Co-ordinated organisational activities
Undertaken to support customer
orientation elicited above
End-focus Value creation
Pro?t orientation is a primary but is by
no means the only focus. It includes
business survival and meeting societal
needs as detailed below
Pro?t orientation
Focus on pro?t rather than on sales
(needs to be adapted to not-for-pro?t
organisations)
Societal application Present and future stakeholder and
societal needs
Balancing current stakeholder and
societal needs with those of the future.
Showing sensitivity to the
organisation’s inheritance where
applicable
Community welfare
An obligation to meet customers’ and
society’s long-term interests
Table II.
Comparing the major
components of corporate
marketing
Corporate
marketing
733
Corporate marketing: towards a new Gestalt of the corporation
Balmer’s (1998) historical analysis of corporate-level constructs since the 1950s reveals
the ascendancy of various concepts during different time frames. Each has attracted
the attention of scholars and practitioners alike and appears, in part, to re?ect the
Zeitgeist of a particular epoch. For instance, the concern with corporate image during
the 1950s and 1960s and the current interest in corporate brands, which dates back to
1995, are illustrative.
This is also re?ected in the special editions of the European Journal of Marketing
that have appeared in 1997, 2001, and 2003 and have focussed on concepts such as
corporate identity, corporate brands, corporate communications, corporate image and
corporate reputation. These special editions have provided a forum for different
ontological and epistemological issues to be aired relating to the above.
The integrative approach adopted here in relation to corporate marketing is not
without parallel: the latter is most conspicuous in the ?elds of communication. This
can be seen in the growing interest in integrated marketing communications by
authors such as Schultz et al. (1992) and Nowak and Phelps (1994). Of particular
signi?cance is the integration of institutional-level communications. Such a
perspective informs the corporate communications domain with the work of
Bernstein (1984), Cornelissen et al. (2001) and Van Riel (1995, 2003) being noteworthy.
Such advances are signi?cant but are necessarily narrower in conceptualisation in
what we advance here.
Raising the corporate marketing umbrella
What we ?nd to be enormously exciting is that when the broad topography of the area is
contemplated, the synthesising of corporate-level concepts such as corporate identity,
corporate branding and corporate communications and so on offers the promise of a
critical breakthrough in the conceptualisation of organisations by marketing scholars.
This leads to the need to raise the umbrella of corporate-level marketing.
For us, corporate marketing provides a vortex that is not only pristine but also
powerful and practical in addition. This is a vortex that synthesises myriad corporate
level perspectives, and concepts, that have emerged from the 1950s onwards Balmer
(1998). The orchestration of these concepts provides the cornerstone of Balmer’s
corporate marketing mix.
Figure 1 depicts the six elements (6Cs) of Balmer’s (2006) corporate marketing mix
cited above and elucidates the importance of each element by ascribing a key question
which underpins each of the six elements. The disciplinary foundations for each of the
six elements are additionally outlined. Again, we reiterate that we regard corporate
marketing as more of a philosophy rather than a function. For this reason the mix
elements should be seen as informing an organisational-wide philosophy rather than as
encompassing a mix of elements to be orchestrated by a department of corporate
marketing. In essence, the philosophy of corporate-level marketing should permeate
how people in the organisation think and behave on its behalf. (Table III compares the
6Cs of the corporate marketing mix with the more extended 11Ps model of the mix).
Character
Those factors that, in their totality, make one entity distinct from another. These
include key tangible and intangible assets of the organisation as well as organisational
EJM
40,7/8
734
activities, markets served, corporate ownership and structure, organisational type,
corporate philosophy and corporate history.
Culture
This refers to the collective feeling of employees as to what they feel they are in the
setting of the entity. These beliefs are derived from the values, beliefs and assumptions
about the organisation and its historical roots and heritage. Individuals may, in part,
de?ne themselves in terms of organisational membership and may, in turn, feel that
they, as individuals, share common values with the organisation. Culture is important
since it provides the context in which staff engage with each other and with other
groups such as customers: employees represent the “front line” of the organisation.
Communication
Corporate communications relates to the various outbound communications channels
deployed by organisations to communicate with customers and other constituencies.
At its most comprehensive (total corporate communications) it also takes into account
the communications effects of management, employee and product behaviour and of
word-of mouth and media/competitor commentary (see Balmer and Greyser, 2003,
p. 125).
Figure 1.
The 6Cs of corporate
marketing
Corporate
marketing
735
Conceptualisations
This refers to perceptions (conceptualisations) held of the corporate brand by
customers and other key stakeholder groups. The latent perception of the organisation
held by the above will affect their view of and their behaviour towards the
organisation. Such conceptualisations of the organisation will, of course, differ between
different groups and account needs to be taken of this.
Constituencies
Corporate marketing recognises takes that many customers also belong to one or
indeed many organisational constituencies or stakeholder groups (employees,
investors, local community, etc.) and also comes with a realisation that the success
of an organisation (and in some cases a “license” to operate) is dependent on meeting
The 6Cs of corporate
marketing
(Balmer, 2006)
The 11Ps of
corporate marketing
(Balmer, 1998)
adapted Explanation
Character Philosophy and ethos How the organisation is constituted. What the
organisation stands for, the way it undertakes its work
and activities
Product What the organisation makes and does
Price The emotion and capital assets of the organisation. The
valuation of its brands (corporate, services and
product). What it charges for its products and services.
The share price. Staff salaries
Place Distribution and organisational relationships in terms
of the selling and distribution of products and services.
(Franchising, outsourcing, licensing)
Performance Quality of products and services. Standards vis-a` -vis
issues of governance, ethics and social responsibility
Positioning The organisation’s position relative to its competitors
(size, geographical coverage, product and service
range)
Culture Personality The critical role of personnel vis-a` -vis corporate
marketing activities. The shared (as well as
differentiated) meanings accorded to the organisation
by personnel including strength of identi?cation with
the organisation)
Communication Promotion Co-ordinated corporate communications (corporate
advertising, corporate PR, visual identi?cation etc.)
Constituencies People In addition to customers: the organisation’s internal
and external constituencies and communities (the latter
boundary spans constituencies)
Conceptualisations Perception The images and reputations held of the organisation by
groups, communities and by individuals
Covenant Promise The expectations associated with the corporate brand
(stakeholder perspective) and the promise
underpinning the corporate brand (organisational
perspective)
Table III.
Comparing the 6Cs of
corporate marketing
EJM
40,7/8
736
the wants and needs of such groups. Also see Arthur W. Page’s legendary statement on
public permission and approval in Greyser et al. (2006, p. 904).
Covenant
A corporate brand is underpinned by a powerful (albeit informal) contract, which can
be compared to a covenant in that customers and other stakeholder groups often have a
religious-like loyalty to the corporate brand. Whereas legal ownership of a corporate
brand is vested in an entity, its emotional ownership (and therein its substantial value)
resides with those who have a close association with the brand (Balmer, 2005). Of
course, different groups and individuals may have different expectations associated
with the institutional brand.
Marketing claims on corporate marketing
In recent years scholars from management disciplines other than marketing have
become interested in key corporate-level concepts such as corporate brands and
corporate identity. Often their work is underpinned by a ?rm theoretical and empirical
base, and can provide meaningful insight to thinking on the larger corporate-level area.
While we acknowledge the contributions of other management disciplines and
recognise that a multi-disciplinary perspective on the area is ef?cacious, we wish to
note why marketing has strong claims on this nascent area. We contend (Balmer and
Greyser, 2003, pp. 349-50) that marketing’s claims on the area are related to its:
.
inheritance;
.
prescience;
.
expedience; and
.
assemblance.
Inheritance
Of all the disciplines that have made a contribution to the corporate-level constructs
detailed earlier, marketing has been the most conspicuous. Consider communication,
image, reputation, and branding. These are key concepts within the marketing domain,
although marketing scholars and practitioners frequently incorporate others, such as
identity. To date, the above concepts have tended to be narrowly conceived by
marketers in terms of products or services rather than corporations (or organisations
generally.)
Prescience
The notion that the marketing should concern itself with corporate-level concerns is far
from new. In the 1960s, Kotler and Levy (1969) had the prescience to articulate that the
marketing concept should be broadened so as to encompass any entity and that it
should be able to be applied to all areas of business and not just product-dominated
organisations.
More recently, Webster (1992) advanced the view that it was de rigueur for
marketing to affect a paradigm shift away from products and ?rms to people and
organisations. As such, there was a requirement for greater scrutiny to be accorded to
phenomena which traditionally have been the preserve of psychologists,
Corporate
marketing
737
organisational behaviourists, political economists, and sociologists. In terms of
corporate-marketing the insights gleaned from identity theory as employed by
organisational theorists and behaviourists can be in?uential in the conceptualisations
of marketing (see Bhattacharya and Sen, 2003).
Marketing’s entre´e into the corporate domain has, already, become a reality. This
has been re?ected in the rise of “new” areas of marketing interest such as relationship
marketing (Gummesson, 1994), the marketing of services (Lovelock, 1983; Booms and
Bitner, 1992), internal marketing (Berry, 1981), marketing for non-pro?ts (Kotler and
Andreason, 1996), green marketing (Meffert and Kirchgeorg, 1993), and in relation to
corporate brand management (Balmer and Gray, 2003; Knox and Bickerton, 2003),
corporate communications (Van Riel, 1995) and corporate image and reputation
(Kennedy, 1977; Dowling, 2001). Kotler’s (1986) notion of megamarketing with its
recognition of groups “beyond customers”, the importance accorded to political power
and public opinion, and the importance attached to marketing networks in their
various guises (Achrol, 1991) all resonate with our comprehension of corporate
marketing.
Expedience
Marketing has been particularly effective in demonstrating its utility to managers.
Baker (1999) observed that marketing is a synthetic discipline in that it distils insights
gained from other ?elds (both business and non-business) into a body of knowledge
with an immediate and practical relevance. In other words, marketing is adept in
operationalising theories. It should be noted that the corporate-level constructs
mentioned in this article all have a strong applied nature and are in common parlance
in business and consultancy contexts. This has not been without its critics however;
the over-reliance on the marketing mix is case in point (O’Malley and Patterson, 1998).
Assemblance
Marketing is, and always has been, a repository of insights and theories marshalled
from other disciplines. Traditional marketing draws heavily from a number of
management and non-management disciplines such as psychology, economics, and
strategy. The assemblance of diverse perspectives to form a uni?ed whole has been a
basic tenet of marketing. Indeed, Borden (1964), who ?rst devised the marketing mix,
was profoundly in?uenced by the work of Culliton (1948) who had envisioned the
marketer to be ?rst and foremost a mixer of ingredients, in other words an
orchestrator. To some degree the corporate marketing mix outlined here follows in this
vein but we are sensitive to the fact that any list of attributes underpinning a
marketing mix or philosophy are likely to be limited (Gro¨nroos, 1993; Gummesson,
1994).
Conclusion
In bringing our short commentary to a close we are mindful that for the last 50 years, or
more, marketing scholars, as well as practitioners, have realised the crucial importance
of corporate-level concepts, beginning with the concept of the corporate image and the
pioneering work of the English economist Kenneth Boulding. We celebrate the 50th
anniversary of the publication of his book, The Image this year (Boulding, 1956).
Whereas the marketing concept as applied to products and services has achieved wide
EJM
40,7/8
738
acceptance, the same cannot be said, alas, in relation to the application of the marketing
concept to organisations in their totality. While scholarship relating to individual
corporate-level marketing constructs is developing apace we note that integrative
perspectives still remain the exception rather the rule. However, we hold that it is
dif?cult to examine one concept without recourse to another: corporate communication
is one prime example of this. In terms of management, although we hold that corporate
marketing is extrinsically a boardroom and CEO concern, responsibility for corporate
marketing should be institution wide and should not be assigned to a particular
department or directorate. In short, all staff are corporate marketers.
What of the future? We acknowledge that for some the very notion of corporate-
level marketing is likely to be contentious especially the notion that marketing should
have a more strategic and institutional-wide role. However, we are of the ?rm view that
the ascendancy of corporate marketing concerns and concepts (corporate brands being
illustrative) is inexorable. We opened this article by observing that we gain perspective
by looking forward and backward. In bringing this commentary to a close we are
reminded that Theodore Levitt (1960) fashioned the phrase “marketing myopia”. In this
century, such myopia could reside at the institutional level. As Janus would no doubt
have mused “what goes round comes around”.
References
Achrol, R.S. (1991), “Evolution of the marketing organization: new forms for turbulent
environments”, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 55 No. 4, pp. 77-93.
Baker, M.J. (1999), “Marketing-philosophy or function?”, in Baker, M.J. (Ed.), The IEBM
Encyclopaedia of Marketing, International Thomson Business Press, London, pp. 3-17.
Balmer, J.M.T. (1998), “Corporate identity and the advent of corporate marketing”, Journal of
Marketing Management, Vol. 14 No. 8, pp. 963-96.
Balmer, J.M.T. (2001), “Corporate identity, corporate branding and corporate marketing: seeing
through the fog”, European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 35 No. 3 and 4, pp. 248-91.
Balmer, J.M.T. (2005), “Corporate brand cultures and communities”, in Schroeder, J.E. and
Salzer-Morling, M. (Eds), Brand Culture, Routledge, London, pp. 34-49.
Balmer, J.M.T. (2006), “Comprehending corporate marketing and the corporate marketing mix”,
working paper, Bradford School of Management, Bradford.
Balmer, J.M.T. and Gray, E. (2003), “Corporate brands: what are they? What of them?”, European
Journal of Marketing, Vol. 37 Nos 7-8, pp. 972-97.
Balmer, J.M.T. and Greyser, S.A. (2003), Revealing the Corporation. Perspectives on Identity,
Image, Reputation, Corporate Branding and Corporate-level Marketing, Routledge,
London.
Bernstein, D. (1984), Company Image and Reality: a Critique of Corporate Communications,
Rinehart and Winston, Eastbourne.
Berry, L.L. (1981), “The employee as customer”, Journal of Retail Banking, Vol. 3 No. 1, pp. 33-40.
Bhattacharya, C.B. and Sen, S. (2003), “Consumer-company identi?cation: a framework for
understanding consumer’s relationships with companies”, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 67,
April, pp. 76-88.
Booms, B.H. and Bitner, M.J. (1992), “Marketing strategies and organisations structures for
service ?rms”, in Donnelly, J. and George, W.R. (Eds), Marketing of Services, American
Marketing Association, Chicago, IL.
Corporate
marketing
739
Borden, N. (1964), “The concept of the marketing mix”, Journal of Advertising Research, June, pp. 2-7.
Boulding, K. (1956), The Image, University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, MI.
Cornelissen, J.P., Lock, A.R. and Gardner, H. (2001), “The organisation of external communication
disciplines: an integrative framework of dimensions and determinants”, International
Journal of Advertising, Vol. 20 No. 1, pp. 67-88.
Crosier, K. (1975), “What is marketing?”, Quarterly Review of Marketing, Vol. 1 No. 2.
Culliton, J.W. (1948), The Management of Marketing Costs, Harvard University Press, Boston, MA.
Dowling, G. (2001), Creating Corporate Reputations, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Drucker, P. (1954), The Practice of Management, Butterworth-Heinemann, Oxford.
(The) Economist (2006), 14 January, p. 80.
Greyser, S.A. (1997), “Janus and Marketing”, Re?ections on the Future of Marketing, Marketing
Science Institute, Boston, MA.
Greyser, S.A., Balmer, J.M.T. and Urde, M.(2006), “The monarchy as a corporate brand. Some
corporate communications dimensions”, European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 40 No. 7/8,
pp. 902-08.
Gro¨nroos, C. (1993), “Quo vadis, marketing?”, Journal of Marketing Management, Vol. 3 No. 5,
pp. 347-60.
Gummesson, E. (1991), “Marketing-orientation revisited: the crucial role of the part-time
marketer”, European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 25 No. 2, pp. 60-75.
Gummesson, E. (1994), Relationship Marketing-From 4Ps to 30Rs, Stockholm School of Business,
Stockholm.
Kennedy, S.H. (1977), “Nurturing corporate images: total communications or ego trip?”, European
Journal of Marketing, Vol. 11 No. 3, pp. 24-33.
Knox, S. and Bickerton, D. (2003), “The six conventions of corporate branding”, European
Journal of Marketing, Vol. 37 Nos 7/8, pp. 998-1016.
Kotler, P. and Andreason, A. (1996), Strategic Marketing for Nonpro?t Organizations,
Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ.
Kotler, P. (1986), “Megamarketing”, Harvard Business Review, March-April, pp. 117-24.
Kotler, P. and Levy, S.J. (1969), “Broadening the concept of marketing”, Journal of Marketing,
January, pp. 10-15.
Levitt, T. (1960), “Marketing myopia”, Harvard Business Review, July-August, pp. 45-6.
Lovelock, C.H. (1983), “Classifying services to gain strategic marketing insights”, Journal of
Marketing, Vol. 47, Summer, pp. 9-20.
McCarthy, E.J. (1960), Basic Marketing: A Managerial Approach, Irwin, Homewood, IL.
McGee, L.W. and Spiro, R.K. (1990), “The marketing concept in perspective”, Business Horizons,
Vol. 31 No. 3, pp. 40-5.
Meffert, H. and Kirchgeorg, M. (1993), Marktorientiertes Umweltmanagement, Poeschel-Verlag,
Stuttgart.
Nowak, G.J. and Phelps, J. (1994), “Conceptualizing the integrated marketing communications
phenomenon: an examination of its impact on advertising practices and its implications for
marketing research”, Journal of Current Issues and Research in Marketing, Vol. 16 No. 1,
pp. 49-66.
O’Malley, L. and Patterson, M. (1998), “Vanishing point: the mix management paradigm
re-visited”, Journal of Marketing Management, Vol. 14 No. 8, pp. 829-51.
EJM
40,7/8
740
Schultz, D.E., Tannenbaum, S. and Lauterborn, R. (1992), Integrated Marketing Communications,
NTC Business Books, Lincolnwood, IL.
Van Riel, C.B.M. (1995), Principles of Corporate Communications, Prentice-Hall, London.
Van Riel, C.B.M. (2003), “The management of corporate communications”, in Balmer, J.M.T. and
Greyser, S.A. (Eds), Revealing the Corporation, Routledge, London, pp. 161-70.
Webster, F.E. (1992), “The changing role of marketing in the corporation”, Journal of Marketing,
Vol. 56, October, pp. 1-17.
Further reading
Balmer, J.M.T. (1995), “Corporate branding and connoisseurship”, Journal of General
Management, Vol. 21 No. 1, pp. 22-46.
Balmer, J.M.T. (Ed.) (2001), European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 35 No. 3 and 4,special issue on
corporate identity and corporate marketing, pp. 248-484.
Balmer, J.M.T. (Ed.) (2003), European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 37 No. 7 and 8, special issue on
corporate and service brands, pp. 972-1141.
Balmer, J.M.T. and Van Riel, C.B.M. (Eds) (1997), European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 31 No. 5
and 6, special issue on corporate identity, pp. 396-422.
About the authors
John M.T. Balmer is Professor of Corporate Brand/Identity Management at Bradford University
School of Management (BSM), England. His research focuses on a range of corporate-level
marketing issues and has a particular interest in the management of corporate brands and
identities. His work has been published in leading journals such as California Management
Review, Long Range Planning, European Journal of Marketing, and International Studies of
Management and Organizations. With Stephen Greyser he co-authored Revealing the
Corporation (Routledge, 2003). He has served as a special advisor on corporate identity issues
for the BBC, Mercedes Benz, the WPP Group and other organisations. Along with Professors
Greyser (Harvard) and Urde (Lund University) he is involved in a major study on monarchies as
corporate brands and unprecedented access has been given to Their Majesties the King and
Queen of Sweden, The Crown Princess, and to Senior Courtiers. At BSM he conceived and
developed the MBA elective on Corporate Marketing.
Stephen A. Greyser is the Richard P. Chapman Professor of Business Administration
(Marketing/Communications) Emeritus at Harvard Business School, where he specializes in
brand marketing, advertising/corporate communications, sports management, and non-pro?t
management. His long-time association with the Harvard Business Review included ?ve years as
an editor and research director, and subsequently Editorial Board Secretary and as Board
Chairman. For eight years he was also Executive Director of the Marketing Science Institute. He
is responsible for 16 books and monographs; is a frequent contributor to journals on marketing,
and has published some 300 case histories. He has served on numerous corporate and non-pro?t
boards, including Opinion Research Corporation. He is past national vice-chairman and a
director of the Public Broadcasting Service (the US non-commercial television system). At
Harvard Business School (HBS) he conceived and developed the HBS MBA elective on the “new”
Corporate Communications. In almost 40 years of teaching, he has never missed a class.
Corporate
marketing
741
To purchase reprints of this article please e-mail: [email protected]
Or visit our web site for further details: www.emeraldinsight.com/reprints
doc_166840619.pdf
Since the 1950s various concepts about corporate-wide marketing have captured the imagination of scholars and practitioners (corporate identity, corporate branding, corporate image, corporate reputation, and corporate communications.).
COMMENTARY
Corporate marketing
Integrating corporate identity, corporate
branding, corporate communications,
corporate image and corporate reputation
John M.T. Balmer
Bradford School of Management, Bradford, UK, and
Stephen A. Greyser
Harvard Business School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
Abstract
Purpose – The aims of the paper are to examine the nascent area of corporate marketing.
Design/methodology/approach – The paper draws on some of the key literature relating to the
history of marketing thought.
Findings – The study reiterates the case that corporate identity, corporate branding, corporate
communications, and corporate reputation should be integrated under the umbrella title of corporate
marketing. The paper introduces the 6Cs of corporate marketing.
Originality/value – The paper integrates British and US perspectives on the area and draws on
Balmer’s work vis-a` -vis corporate marketing and Greyser’s historical overview of marketing written
for the Marketing Science Institute (MSI)
Keywords Organizations, Marketing strategy, Corporate identity, Corporate branding,
Corporate communications, Corporate image
Paper type Viewpoint
Introduction
Like the Roman God Janus, we gain perspective by looking both backward and
forward. In looking forward we conclude that marketing is undergoing another
paradigm shift and is increasingly characterised by having an institutional-wide focus.
Balmer (1998, 2001, 2006) in observing the above, has given the label “corporate
marketing” to the area.
Since the 1950s various concepts about corporate-wide marketing have captured the
imagination of scholars and practitioners (corporate identity, corporate branding,
corporate image, corporate reputation, and corporate communications.). Each of these
concepts has its own intellectual roots and practice-based adherents. While individual
corporate-level concepts provide a powerful, and radical, lens through which to
comprehend organisations, these individual perspectives are necessarily limited. For
this reason an integrated approach to marketing at the institutional level would seem
to be highly desirable and thus the need for what Balmer calls “corporate marketing”
and what we in our book, Revealing the Corporation (Balmer and Greyser, 2003),
termed corporate-level marketing.
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/0309-0566.htm
EJM
40,7/8
730
European Journal of Marketing
Vol. 40 No. 7/8, 2006
pp. 730-741
qEmerald Group Publishing Limited
0309-0566
DOI 10.1108/03090560610669964
In our commentary, we marshal the literature relating to the historiography of
marketing and use this as a platform for our examination of the embryonic area of
corporate marketing.
We explain that a corporate marketing philosophy represents a logical stage of
marketing’s evolution and introduce a revised corporate marketing mix (the 6Cs) as an
illustrative framework representing the key concerns that underpin this expanded
viewpoint of marketing. In addition, we explain why marketing (rather than other
areas of management) represents the logical disciplinary domain relating to the
territory we are treating.
In this article we draw on a range of sources including our own scholarship on the
area. This is not for purposes of self-aggrandisement but for purely practical reasons.
In truth, the canon of work on the area is modest and we hope that our observations
will engender interest in what (we believe) is likely to emerge as a progressively vital
area of marketing. In looking backwards we brie?y re?ect on how marketing has
evolved to its present state. Such retrospection not only provides a platform to look
ahead but also gives us permission – intellectually, and perhaps psychologically – to
speculate about the nature of corporate-level marketing.
From the outset, we acknowledge that any discussion of marketing is beset by a
number of dif?culties including the lack of consensus as to its nature. We note that
Crosier (1975) found no less that 50 de?nitions within the literature, which broadly
envisioned marketing in terms of a process, a philosophy and as a business orientation.
Similar discussions are likely to characterise on-going discussion relating to corporate
marketing as it has in relation to more traditional notions of marketing (see
Gummesson, 1991). From our perspective we regard corporate marketing’s strengths
as principally in terms of a philosophy rather than as a function.
Marketing: re?ections on the past
What is marketing’s historiography? What eras have passed in reaching the present?
Of course, the importance of having a customer focus has long been recognised and
pre-dates the emergence of marketing as a cognate area of management. For instance,
Frank Taussig, a former President of the American Economic Association stated back
in 1912 that, “ We must accept the consumer as the ?nal judge” (The Economist, 2006).
In a seminal work by LaLonde (see Greyser, 1997) the existence of company-wide
consumer orientation was traced back to the 1920s. However, it was during the 1950s
and 1960s that the marketing philosophy and function began to be elucidated by
scholars and adopted by managers. Key proponents of the above include Drucker
(1954), Levitt (1960) and Kotler and Levy (1969). In terms of the marketing mix the
contributions made by Borden (1964) and McCarthy (1960) are noteworthy. From a
practitioner perspective, Jack McKitterick (then vice president of General Electric) is
credited as providing the ?rst articulation of the marketing concept. Speaking at a
meeting of the American Marketing Association in 1957 he remarked that:
[. . .] the principal task of [. . .] marketing [. . .] is not so much to be skillful in making the
customer do what suits the interests of the business as to be skillful in conceiving and then
making the business do what suits the interest of the customer (McKitterick in Greyser, 1997).
In a similar vein, Robert Keith (in Greyser, 1997) writing in the Journal of Marketing,
and making reference to his own organisation’s historical development, made a clear
Corporate
marketing
731
distinction between having a production/manufacturing orientation, a sales focus and,
?nally, a truly marketing orientation. Greyser (1997) re?ecting on Keith’s tripartite
categorisations (and the more recent relationship marketing perspective) observed that
each is underpinned by a central question/concern which he detailed as follows:
.
Production and manufacturing orientation: “Can we make it?”.
.
Sales orientation: “Can we sell what we can make?”.
.
Marketing orientation: ”Can we determine what consumers, or a group of
consumers, want that we can make and sell pro?tably within our zones of
skills?”.
.
Relationship marketing orientation: “Can we generate continuing business
(loyalty purchasing) via consumer/customer satisfaction with what – and how –
we make, sell, and service?”.
To us, corporate-level marketing represents a further stage of development, that of
corporate-level marketing orientation: “Can we, as an institution, have meaningful,
positive and pro?table bilateral on-going relationships with customers, and other
stakeholder groups and communities?”. From the outset we wish to make it clear that
corporate marketing has a general applicability to entities whether they are
corporations, companies, not-for-pro?t organisations as well as other categories such
as business alliances, cities and so on. A key attribute of corporate-level marketing is
its concern with multiple exchange relationships with multiple stakeholder groups and
networks. Another feature is the importance accorded to the temporal dimension with
there being ?delity not only to present relationships but those of the past and those
prospective relationships of the future. (Such a perspective has traditionally
characterised mutual entities such as building societies, co-operatives and
partnerships; John Lewis is one such example.)
From practice to power relationships
Again, taking another retrospective and drawing on his collaborative work with the
legendary Raymond A. Bauer (late Harvard Business School Professor), as well as that
of his own, Stephen Greyser offered a tripartite analysis of marketplace relationships
between marketers and consumers, especially with regard to power and in?uence
(Greyser, 1997).
The three types of relationship have been termed:
(1) manipulative (a critic’s model);
(2) service (a pro-business model); and
(3) transactional (an exchange-based model).
Each model employs different assumptions about the power/balance in the
marketplace, the origin of consumer needs and desires, the type of consumer power
exercised, the “warning” to consumers or business that pervades the marketplace, and
the role of the marketer. To us, corporate marketing represents a logical fourth stage in
terms of the above. We call this stage: expectational (a stakeholder-institutional model).
The table provided by Owens and Greyser (Greyser, 1997) relating to the above has
been adapted by us in Table I so as to accommodate the above (see also Table II).
EJM
40,7/8
732
Models
Assumption about
The
manipulative
model
The transactional
model
The service
model
The corporate
model
Power balance in
the marketplace
Marketers
dominate
Consumer-
marketer balance
Consumers
dominate
Consumers and
stakeholders dominate
Origin of
consumer
needs/desires
With marketers With consumers
and marketers
With consumers With consumers and
stakeholders
Type of consumer
power
Forces consumer
choice
Consumer choice Consumer
sovereignty
Consumer and
stakeholder
sovereignty
Marketplace
warning
Caveat Emptor
Buyer beware
Caveat Omnes
All beware
Caveat Venditor
Seller beware
Caveat Societas
Company beware
Role of marketer To
persuade/seduce
consumers
To work with
consumers
To service/cater
to consumers
To work with
consumers and
stakeholders
The consumer’s
adversary
The consumer’s
partner
The consumer’s
servant
The stakeholder’s
servant
Source: Balmer (2006) adapted from Owens and Greyser in Greyser (1997)
Table I.
Comparing and
contrasting the four
models of power
relationships in
marketing
Major components of corporate
marketing (Balmer, 2001)
Major components of marketing
(McGee and Spiro, 1990)
Orientation Stakeholder
Understanding present and future
stakeholder (including customer)
wants, needs and behaviour.
Customer
Understanding customer’s wants,
needs and behaviour
Organisational
support
Co-ordinated organisational activities
Undertaken to support stakeholder’s
orientation elicited above
Co-ordinated organisational activities
Undertaken to support customer
orientation elicited above
End-focus Value creation
Pro?t orientation is a primary but is by
no means the only focus. It includes
business survival and meeting societal
needs as detailed below
Pro?t orientation
Focus on pro?t rather than on sales
(needs to be adapted to not-for-pro?t
organisations)
Societal application Present and future stakeholder and
societal needs
Balancing current stakeholder and
societal needs with those of the future.
Showing sensitivity to the
organisation’s inheritance where
applicable
Community welfare
An obligation to meet customers’ and
society’s long-term interests
Table II.
Comparing the major
components of corporate
marketing
Corporate
marketing
733
Corporate marketing: towards a new Gestalt of the corporation
Balmer’s (1998) historical analysis of corporate-level constructs since the 1950s reveals
the ascendancy of various concepts during different time frames. Each has attracted
the attention of scholars and practitioners alike and appears, in part, to re?ect the
Zeitgeist of a particular epoch. For instance, the concern with corporate image during
the 1950s and 1960s and the current interest in corporate brands, which dates back to
1995, are illustrative.
This is also re?ected in the special editions of the European Journal of Marketing
that have appeared in 1997, 2001, and 2003 and have focussed on concepts such as
corporate identity, corporate brands, corporate communications, corporate image and
corporate reputation. These special editions have provided a forum for different
ontological and epistemological issues to be aired relating to the above.
The integrative approach adopted here in relation to corporate marketing is not
without parallel: the latter is most conspicuous in the ?elds of communication. This
can be seen in the growing interest in integrated marketing communications by
authors such as Schultz et al. (1992) and Nowak and Phelps (1994). Of particular
signi?cance is the integration of institutional-level communications. Such a
perspective informs the corporate communications domain with the work of
Bernstein (1984), Cornelissen et al. (2001) and Van Riel (1995, 2003) being noteworthy.
Such advances are signi?cant but are necessarily narrower in conceptualisation in
what we advance here.
Raising the corporate marketing umbrella
What we ?nd to be enormously exciting is that when the broad topography of the area is
contemplated, the synthesising of corporate-level concepts such as corporate identity,
corporate branding and corporate communications and so on offers the promise of a
critical breakthrough in the conceptualisation of organisations by marketing scholars.
This leads to the need to raise the umbrella of corporate-level marketing.
For us, corporate marketing provides a vortex that is not only pristine but also
powerful and practical in addition. This is a vortex that synthesises myriad corporate
level perspectives, and concepts, that have emerged from the 1950s onwards Balmer
(1998). The orchestration of these concepts provides the cornerstone of Balmer’s
corporate marketing mix.
Figure 1 depicts the six elements (6Cs) of Balmer’s (2006) corporate marketing mix
cited above and elucidates the importance of each element by ascribing a key question
which underpins each of the six elements. The disciplinary foundations for each of the
six elements are additionally outlined. Again, we reiterate that we regard corporate
marketing as more of a philosophy rather than a function. For this reason the mix
elements should be seen as informing an organisational-wide philosophy rather than as
encompassing a mix of elements to be orchestrated by a department of corporate
marketing. In essence, the philosophy of corporate-level marketing should permeate
how people in the organisation think and behave on its behalf. (Table III compares the
6Cs of the corporate marketing mix with the more extended 11Ps model of the mix).
Character
Those factors that, in their totality, make one entity distinct from another. These
include key tangible and intangible assets of the organisation as well as organisational
EJM
40,7/8
734
activities, markets served, corporate ownership and structure, organisational type,
corporate philosophy and corporate history.
Culture
This refers to the collective feeling of employees as to what they feel they are in the
setting of the entity. These beliefs are derived from the values, beliefs and assumptions
about the organisation and its historical roots and heritage. Individuals may, in part,
de?ne themselves in terms of organisational membership and may, in turn, feel that
they, as individuals, share common values with the organisation. Culture is important
since it provides the context in which staff engage with each other and with other
groups such as customers: employees represent the “front line” of the organisation.
Communication
Corporate communications relates to the various outbound communications channels
deployed by organisations to communicate with customers and other constituencies.
At its most comprehensive (total corporate communications) it also takes into account
the communications effects of management, employee and product behaviour and of
word-of mouth and media/competitor commentary (see Balmer and Greyser, 2003,
p. 125).
Figure 1.
The 6Cs of corporate
marketing
Corporate
marketing
735
Conceptualisations
This refers to perceptions (conceptualisations) held of the corporate brand by
customers and other key stakeholder groups. The latent perception of the organisation
held by the above will affect their view of and their behaviour towards the
organisation. Such conceptualisations of the organisation will, of course, differ between
different groups and account needs to be taken of this.
Constituencies
Corporate marketing recognises takes that many customers also belong to one or
indeed many organisational constituencies or stakeholder groups (employees,
investors, local community, etc.) and also comes with a realisation that the success
of an organisation (and in some cases a “license” to operate) is dependent on meeting
The 6Cs of corporate
marketing
(Balmer, 2006)
The 11Ps of
corporate marketing
(Balmer, 1998)
adapted Explanation
Character Philosophy and ethos How the organisation is constituted. What the
organisation stands for, the way it undertakes its work
and activities
Product What the organisation makes and does
Price The emotion and capital assets of the organisation. The
valuation of its brands (corporate, services and
product). What it charges for its products and services.
The share price. Staff salaries
Place Distribution and organisational relationships in terms
of the selling and distribution of products and services.
(Franchising, outsourcing, licensing)
Performance Quality of products and services. Standards vis-a` -vis
issues of governance, ethics and social responsibility
Positioning The organisation’s position relative to its competitors
(size, geographical coverage, product and service
range)
Culture Personality The critical role of personnel vis-a` -vis corporate
marketing activities. The shared (as well as
differentiated) meanings accorded to the organisation
by personnel including strength of identi?cation with
the organisation)
Communication Promotion Co-ordinated corporate communications (corporate
advertising, corporate PR, visual identi?cation etc.)
Constituencies People In addition to customers: the organisation’s internal
and external constituencies and communities (the latter
boundary spans constituencies)
Conceptualisations Perception The images and reputations held of the organisation by
groups, communities and by individuals
Covenant Promise The expectations associated with the corporate brand
(stakeholder perspective) and the promise
underpinning the corporate brand (organisational
perspective)
Table III.
Comparing the 6Cs of
corporate marketing
EJM
40,7/8
736
the wants and needs of such groups. Also see Arthur W. Page’s legendary statement on
public permission and approval in Greyser et al. (2006, p. 904).
Covenant
A corporate brand is underpinned by a powerful (albeit informal) contract, which can
be compared to a covenant in that customers and other stakeholder groups often have a
religious-like loyalty to the corporate brand. Whereas legal ownership of a corporate
brand is vested in an entity, its emotional ownership (and therein its substantial value)
resides with those who have a close association with the brand (Balmer, 2005). Of
course, different groups and individuals may have different expectations associated
with the institutional brand.
Marketing claims on corporate marketing
In recent years scholars from management disciplines other than marketing have
become interested in key corporate-level concepts such as corporate brands and
corporate identity. Often their work is underpinned by a ?rm theoretical and empirical
base, and can provide meaningful insight to thinking on the larger corporate-level area.
While we acknowledge the contributions of other management disciplines and
recognise that a multi-disciplinary perspective on the area is ef?cacious, we wish to
note why marketing has strong claims on this nascent area. We contend (Balmer and
Greyser, 2003, pp. 349-50) that marketing’s claims on the area are related to its:
.
inheritance;
.
prescience;
.
expedience; and
.
assemblance.
Inheritance
Of all the disciplines that have made a contribution to the corporate-level constructs
detailed earlier, marketing has been the most conspicuous. Consider communication,
image, reputation, and branding. These are key concepts within the marketing domain,
although marketing scholars and practitioners frequently incorporate others, such as
identity. To date, the above concepts have tended to be narrowly conceived by
marketers in terms of products or services rather than corporations (or organisations
generally.)
Prescience
The notion that the marketing should concern itself with corporate-level concerns is far
from new. In the 1960s, Kotler and Levy (1969) had the prescience to articulate that the
marketing concept should be broadened so as to encompass any entity and that it
should be able to be applied to all areas of business and not just product-dominated
organisations.
More recently, Webster (1992) advanced the view that it was de rigueur for
marketing to affect a paradigm shift away from products and ?rms to people and
organisations. As such, there was a requirement for greater scrutiny to be accorded to
phenomena which traditionally have been the preserve of psychologists,
Corporate
marketing
737
organisational behaviourists, political economists, and sociologists. In terms of
corporate-marketing the insights gleaned from identity theory as employed by
organisational theorists and behaviourists can be in?uential in the conceptualisations
of marketing (see Bhattacharya and Sen, 2003).
Marketing’s entre´e into the corporate domain has, already, become a reality. This
has been re?ected in the rise of “new” areas of marketing interest such as relationship
marketing (Gummesson, 1994), the marketing of services (Lovelock, 1983; Booms and
Bitner, 1992), internal marketing (Berry, 1981), marketing for non-pro?ts (Kotler and
Andreason, 1996), green marketing (Meffert and Kirchgeorg, 1993), and in relation to
corporate brand management (Balmer and Gray, 2003; Knox and Bickerton, 2003),
corporate communications (Van Riel, 1995) and corporate image and reputation
(Kennedy, 1977; Dowling, 2001). Kotler’s (1986) notion of megamarketing with its
recognition of groups “beyond customers”, the importance accorded to political power
and public opinion, and the importance attached to marketing networks in their
various guises (Achrol, 1991) all resonate with our comprehension of corporate
marketing.
Expedience
Marketing has been particularly effective in demonstrating its utility to managers.
Baker (1999) observed that marketing is a synthetic discipline in that it distils insights
gained from other ?elds (both business and non-business) into a body of knowledge
with an immediate and practical relevance. In other words, marketing is adept in
operationalising theories. It should be noted that the corporate-level constructs
mentioned in this article all have a strong applied nature and are in common parlance
in business and consultancy contexts. This has not been without its critics however;
the over-reliance on the marketing mix is case in point (O’Malley and Patterson, 1998).
Assemblance
Marketing is, and always has been, a repository of insights and theories marshalled
from other disciplines. Traditional marketing draws heavily from a number of
management and non-management disciplines such as psychology, economics, and
strategy. The assemblance of diverse perspectives to form a uni?ed whole has been a
basic tenet of marketing. Indeed, Borden (1964), who ?rst devised the marketing mix,
was profoundly in?uenced by the work of Culliton (1948) who had envisioned the
marketer to be ?rst and foremost a mixer of ingredients, in other words an
orchestrator. To some degree the corporate marketing mix outlined here follows in this
vein but we are sensitive to the fact that any list of attributes underpinning a
marketing mix or philosophy are likely to be limited (Gro¨nroos, 1993; Gummesson,
1994).
Conclusion
In bringing our short commentary to a close we are mindful that for the last 50 years, or
more, marketing scholars, as well as practitioners, have realised the crucial importance
of corporate-level concepts, beginning with the concept of the corporate image and the
pioneering work of the English economist Kenneth Boulding. We celebrate the 50th
anniversary of the publication of his book, The Image this year (Boulding, 1956).
Whereas the marketing concept as applied to products and services has achieved wide
EJM
40,7/8
738
acceptance, the same cannot be said, alas, in relation to the application of the marketing
concept to organisations in their totality. While scholarship relating to individual
corporate-level marketing constructs is developing apace we note that integrative
perspectives still remain the exception rather the rule. However, we hold that it is
dif?cult to examine one concept without recourse to another: corporate communication
is one prime example of this. In terms of management, although we hold that corporate
marketing is extrinsically a boardroom and CEO concern, responsibility for corporate
marketing should be institution wide and should not be assigned to a particular
department or directorate. In short, all staff are corporate marketers.
What of the future? We acknowledge that for some the very notion of corporate-
level marketing is likely to be contentious especially the notion that marketing should
have a more strategic and institutional-wide role. However, we are of the ?rm view that
the ascendancy of corporate marketing concerns and concepts (corporate brands being
illustrative) is inexorable. We opened this article by observing that we gain perspective
by looking forward and backward. In bringing this commentary to a close we are
reminded that Theodore Levitt (1960) fashioned the phrase “marketing myopia”. In this
century, such myopia could reside at the institutional level. As Janus would no doubt
have mused “what goes round comes around”.
References
Achrol, R.S. (1991), “Evolution of the marketing organization: new forms for turbulent
environments”, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 55 No. 4, pp. 77-93.
Baker, M.J. (1999), “Marketing-philosophy or function?”, in Baker, M.J. (Ed.), The IEBM
Encyclopaedia of Marketing, International Thomson Business Press, London, pp. 3-17.
Balmer, J.M.T. (1998), “Corporate identity and the advent of corporate marketing”, Journal of
Marketing Management, Vol. 14 No. 8, pp. 963-96.
Balmer, J.M.T. (2001), “Corporate identity, corporate branding and corporate marketing: seeing
through the fog”, European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 35 No. 3 and 4, pp. 248-91.
Balmer, J.M.T. (2005), “Corporate brand cultures and communities”, in Schroeder, J.E. and
Salzer-Morling, M. (Eds), Brand Culture, Routledge, London, pp. 34-49.
Balmer, J.M.T. (2006), “Comprehending corporate marketing and the corporate marketing mix”,
working paper, Bradford School of Management, Bradford.
Balmer, J.M.T. and Gray, E. (2003), “Corporate brands: what are they? What of them?”, European
Journal of Marketing, Vol. 37 Nos 7-8, pp. 972-97.
Balmer, J.M.T. and Greyser, S.A. (2003), Revealing the Corporation. Perspectives on Identity,
Image, Reputation, Corporate Branding and Corporate-level Marketing, Routledge,
London.
Bernstein, D. (1984), Company Image and Reality: a Critique of Corporate Communications,
Rinehart and Winston, Eastbourne.
Berry, L.L. (1981), “The employee as customer”, Journal of Retail Banking, Vol. 3 No. 1, pp. 33-40.
Bhattacharya, C.B. and Sen, S. (2003), “Consumer-company identi?cation: a framework for
understanding consumer’s relationships with companies”, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 67,
April, pp. 76-88.
Booms, B.H. and Bitner, M.J. (1992), “Marketing strategies and organisations structures for
service ?rms”, in Donnelly, J. and George, W.R. (Eds), Marketing of Services, American
Marketing Association, Chicago, IL.
Corporate
marketing
739
Borden, N. (1964), “The concept of the marketing mix”, Journal of Advertising Research, June, pp. 2-7.
Boulding, K. (1956), The Image, University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, MI.
Cornelissen, J.P., Lock, A.R. and Gardner, H. (2001), “The organisation of external communication
disciplines: an integrative framework of dimensions and determinants”, International
Journal of Advertising, Vol. 20 No. 1, pp. 67-88.
Crosier, K. (1975), “What is marketing?”, Quarterly Review of Marketing, Vol. 1 No. 2.
Culliton, J.W. (1948), The Management of Marketing Costs, Harvard University Press, Boston, MA.
Dowling, G. (2001), Creating Corporate Reputations, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Drucker, P. (1954), The Practice of Management, Butterworth-Heinemann, Oxford.
(The) Economist (2006), 14 January, p. 80.
Greyser, S.A. (1997), “Janus and Marketing”, Re?ections on the Future of Marketing, Marketing
Science Institute, Boston, MA.
Greyser, S.A., Balmer, J.M.T. and Urde, M.(2006), “The monarchy as a corporate brand. Some
corporate communications dimensions”, European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 40 No. 7/8,
pp. 902-08.
Gro¨nroos, C. (1993), “Quo vadis, marketing?”, Journal of Marketing Management, Vol. 3 No. 5,
pp. 347-60.
Gummesson, E. (1991), “Marketing-orientation revisited: the crucial role of the part-time
marketer”, European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 25 No. 2, pp. 60-75.
Gummesson, E. (1994), Relationship Marketing-From 4Ps to 30Rs, Stockholm School of Business,
Stockholm.
Kennedy, S.H. (1977), “Nurturing corporate images: total communications or ego trip?”, European
Journal of Marketing, Vol. 11 No. 3, pp. 24-33.
Knox, S. and Bickerton, D. (2003), “The six conventions of corporate branding”, European
Journal of Marketing, Vol. 37 Nos 7/8, pp. 998-1016.
Kotler, P. and Andreason, A. (1996), Strategic Marketing for Nonpro?t Organizations,
Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ.
Kotler, P. (1986), “Megamarketing”, Harvard Business Review, March-April, pp. 117-24.
Kotler, P. and Levy, S.J. (1969), “Broadening the concept of marketing”, Journal of Marketing,
January, pp. 10-15.
Levitt, T. (1960), “Marketing myopia”, Harvard Business Review, July-August, pp. 45-6.
Lovelock, C.H. (1983), “Classifying services to gain strategic marketing insights”, Journal of
Marketing, Vol. 47, Summer, pp. 9-20.
McCarthy, E.J. (1960), Basic Marketing: A Managerial Approach, Irwin, Homewood, IL.
McGee, L.W. and Spiro, R.K. (1990), “The marketing concept in perspective”, Business Horizons,
Vol. 31 No. 3, pp. 40-5.
Meffert, H. and Kirchgeorg, M. (1993), Marktorientiertes Umweltmanagement, Poeschel-Verlag,
Stuttgart.
Nowak, G.J. and Phelps, J. (1994), “Conceptualizing the integrated marketing communications
phenomenon: an examination of its impact on advertising practices and its implications for
marketing research”, Journal of Current Issues and Research in Marketing, Vol. 16 No. 1,
pp. 49-66.
O’Malley, L. and Patterson, M. (1998), “Vanishing point: the mix management paradigm
re-visited”, Journal of Marketing Management, Vol. 14 No. 8, pp. 829-51.
EJM
40,7/8
740
Schultz, D.E., Tannenbaum, S. and Lauterborn, R. (1992), Integrated Marketing Communications,
NTC Business Books, Lincolnwood, IL.
Van Riel, C.B.M. (1995), Principles of Corporate Communications, Prentice-Hall, London.
Van Riel, C.B.M. (2003), “The management of corporate communications”, in Balmer, J.M.T. and
Greyser, S.A. (Eds), Revealing the Corporation, Routledge, London, pp. 161-70.
Webster, F.E. (1992), “The changing role of marketing in the corporation”, Journal of Marketing,
Vol. 56, October, pp. 1-17.
Further reading
Balmer, J.M.T. (1995), “Corporate branding and connoisseurship”, Journal of General
Management, Vol. 21 No. 1, pp. 22-46.
Balmer, J.M.T. (Ed.) (2001), European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 35 No. 3 and 4,special issue on
corporate identity and corporate marketing, pp. 248-484.
Balmer, J.M.T. (Ed.) (2003), European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 37 No. 7 and 8, special issue on
corporate and service brands, pp. 972-1141.
Balmer, J.M.T. and Van Riel, C.B.M. (Eds) (1997), European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 31 No. 5
and 6, special issue on corporate identity, pp. 396-422.
About the authors
John M.T. Balmer is Professor of Corporate Brand/Identity Management at Bradford University
School of Management (BSM), England. His research focuses on a range of corporate-level
marketing issues and has a particular interest in the management of corporate brands and
identities. His work has been published in leading journals such as California Management
Review, Long Range Planning, European Journal of Marketing, and International Studies of
Management and Organizations. With Stephen Greyser he co-authored Revealing the
Corporation (Routledge, 2003). He has served as a special advisor on corporate identity issues
for the BBC, Mercedes Benz, the WPP Group and other organisations. Along with Professors
Greyser (Harvard) and Urde (Lund University) he is involved in a major study on monarchies as
corporate brands and unprecedented access has been given to Their Majesties the King and
Queen of Sweden, The Crown Princess, and to Senior Courtiers. At BSM he conceived and
developed the MBA elective on Corporate Marketing.
Stephen A. Greyser is the Richard P. Chapman Professor of Business Administration
(Marketing/Communications) Emeritus at Harvard Business School, where he specializes in
brand marketing, advertising/corporate communications, sports management, and non-pro?t
management. His long-time association with the Harvard Business Review included ?ve years as
an editor and research director, and subsequently Editorial Board Secretary and as Board
Chairman. For eight years he was also Executive Director of the Marketing Science Institute. He
is responsible for 16 books and monographs; is a frequent contributor to journals on marketing,
and has published some 300 case histories. He has served on numerous corporate and non-pro?t
boards, including Opinion Research Corporation. He is past national vice-chairman and a
director of the Public Broadcasting Service (the US non-commercial television system). At
Harvard Business School (HBS) he conceived and developed the HBS MBA elective on the “new”
Corporate Communications. In almost 40 years of teaching, he has never missed a class.
Corporate
marketing
741
To purchase reprints of this article please e-mail: [email protected]
Or visit our web site for further details: www.emeraldinsight.com/reprints
doc_166840619.pdf