Marketing is really interesting.....

We learned in Chapter 1 that marketing is not only the responsibility of the marketing department, but that of the whole organization. And that's very true; as the chapter brought out, a customer can make a marketing decision when he or she is deciding what to buy or what appeals to his or her needs and wants, and can decide whether or not to deal with an organization based on experiences with just ONE member of the staff. For instance, if a customer has a good experience with an employee in a store or other organization, he or she will recommend the business to his or her friends, and there will be not only repeat business from the satisfied customers, but new business from friends and family members.

However, all it takes is one negative experience to do just the opposite, no matter how satisfied the customer has been in the past. A rude employee can do much to hurt the image of a company, no matter how sterling its reputation has been in the eyes of the customer in the past. So all must learn to play a part in effective marketing, from our dealings with customers down to our goods and services. We should try to focus more on the marketing concept--which states that customer satisfaction, not sales, should be our focus as well as meeting organizational goals.

Just thumbing through my Marriage and Families book, I saw some pretty interesting topics for discussion. The first chapter we have to study deals with the changing definition of family from the traditional family (a husband who's the breadwinner; a wife who's the homemaker; and any children that may be in the home). There are other chapters, however, that I believe will challenge what I hold true, and that I may get somewhat perturbed by what the readings are suggesting (one chapter, in particular, has to do with rearing children). But I will remain respectful and courteous of all my classmates and try to explain my beliefs and values in the best way I can. After all, we are all different, and our upbringings don't make us any better or worse than anybody else.