Some time ago, I came across a job description for a marketing manager for a leading hotel group in Islamabad. Among the job responsibilities listed was “Take care of journalists staying at the hotel.” Now I can understand a marketing person at junior level tasked with taking care of VIP guests and journalists. However, I would not have expected a marketing manager to be given this task. Yes, I do believe that everything a company does or doesn’t do is marketing, but I do not subscribe to the belief that marketing should do everything.

Locally and globally, marketing has evolved, but it has also been diluted. With the onslaught of digital and social media, the addition of new roles and positions was inevitable. Now with AI, more changes seem imminent. Depending on the organisation, the industry and the type of ownership, what we define as marketing can vary. Many years ago, I remember seeing classified print ads seeking a marketing officer, with a common stipulation of “Must have own conveyance.” Obviously, these companies were looking for salespeople.

You could easily attribute this example to the sethiya mind and the lack of proper exposure and understanding of marketing’s importance and purpose. But I would disagree. I have seen seasoned people in the profession globally share the sort of self-pity posts that say, “If you think marketing is easy, try coming up with something creative every day.” Or a viral post about how branding and marketing are different. These suggest that there are some myths in play. What marketing is and what it is not is a never-ending debate.

The first myth is that marketing is about advertising. I will not blame Don Draper entirely, but for decades advertising has been regarded as a profession that embodies glitz and glamour and a life in the fast lane.

As a result, many people, when they envision a career in marketing, picture this aspirational heaven: rubbing shoulders with models and actors, flying to exotic locales and having cocktails a la Cannes.

The reality of what marketing entails is quite different. It’s a mix of finance, psychology, communication and managing resources. Every business graduate knows that advertising is just one of the Ps (product, price, packaging and promotion).

The second myth is that marketing is all about talkability. I have seen this attitude or belief more than a few times. Marketers seem to believe in the adage that any news is good news and if people are talking about your campaign, this means you are a success even if they are not speaking about it in a positive way. In the age of virality and social hysteria, this premise can seem to be proved right. Every brand wants to traverse into the realm of pop culture and become trendy. If your creative execution is meme-worthy, this means more and more people can be exposed to your message. However, even if, through memes and other content, a brand can gain virality, there is the risk of the message being diluted or altered as you surrender control.

Regarding the branding versus marketing myth, this one spread on LinkedIn because of a comparison someone made that showed that branding and marketing are two different things. One point made was that branding is long-term and marketing is short-term. I agree that without building a brand, you keep selling a product and have to work extra hard to break the clutter to stay in the consideration set. However, I do not believe that marketing can ever only be short-term.

The only marketing that is short-term is short-sighted marketing.

The third myth is that marketing is about coming up with something creative every day. I personally think we need to stop trying to think outside the box. When we think outside the box, we end up inside a bigger box. There is actually research and experts that advocate thinking inside the box. The advantage here is that the ideas are not as outlandish and also easier to translate into realistic projects and are more effective. Apart from limiting your scope of thinking, daily creativity is either impossible or exhausting (and, as Depeche Mode sang in Enjoy the Silence, unnecessary).

The obsession with creativity, innovation and disruption has become nauseating. Felicity Ward, in her comedy routine, said she needs to leave Instagram, but she is too busy seeing her friends put up motivational quotes they don’t live by. Marketing may not be glitz and glamour, but it is certainly not Siberia and those in the industry are definitely not living in a gulag. These days, people seem to be awash with self-sympathy and pity. Working in marketing is not a struggle and as they used to say, if you can’t take the heat, get out of the kitchen – try that valet job instead.

So, what is marketing? Well, Ronan Keating sang that love is a rollercoaster and I’m pretty sure that marketing is one too. There will be days when you will feel like Jack on the bow of the Titanic, feeling like the king of the world and there will be days when you will be questioning your existence.

Can you accept both extremes and return to your love for marketing, is the question? To be honest, that cycle of peak and trough and self-doubt, jubilation and heartbreak comes with everything in life and every profession.

Marketing is not special, nor does being in marketing make you special. There are, however, certain skills or traits that are essential for working in marketing, such as curiosity and communication.

Marketing is about creating impact by modifying or changing people, places and processes through experimentation and iteration. Marketing, to borrow from the Japanese Kaizen methodology, is about tweaking and changing in order to create long-term and continuous growth and, if possible, innovation. In Pakistan in general, the experimentation part seems missing, as well as the consistency needed to have an impact. Our marketers seem to be more like kamikaze pilots, intent on the mission at hand, not caring about the future and the consequences of their action or inaction. It can seem glorious to zero in on targets and achieve a ‘victory,’ but winning battles and losing the marketing war is a flawed and failure-doomed strategy.

Tyrone Tellis is Senior Manager, Corporate Sales and PR, Bogo. tyrone.tellis@gmail.com