Marketing people

In the course of a few years, I have been able to observe several Marketing Departments from the perspective of various Engineering and R&D departments. There seems to be three distinctive types of marketing:

Type I marketing

The marketing staff go out into the marketplace, do surveys and interview clients and potential clients to find out what they want in a product. They come back and have meetings with engineering in which they present their findings, and discuss the manufacturing possibilities, eventually agreeing on what product improvements can be made, or what new products can be manufactured.

Type II marketing

The marketing staff go out into the marketplace, do surveys and interview clients and potential clients to find out what they want in a product. They come back, have meetings with the advertising department and design ads which make it seem like the company's products meet or exceed the clients' needs.

Type III marketing

The marketing staff go out into the marketplace, have lunch with and interview marketing staff from other companies to find out who is leaving and who wants to change jobs. They come back to the office and write emails and internal "newsletters" that talk about the "great" new leads and "exciting" opportunities that exist for the products. A few weeks later, they quit and go to another company.