Everything is Marketing, NOT!

A common phrase is “Everything is Marketing”. Marketers have to analyze and create products and/or service in every possible phase of the company structure: R&D, Planning, Packaging, Selling, Purchases, Research, Managing, etc.

Although Marketers design the outcome for departments, the base is still set according to that departments’ knowledge and experience. The best examples I can give is during my time as purchaser.

Price Example
One competitor was able to sell a certain merchandise with lower prices than ours. Our department was asked to go find cheaper suppliers. After lot of research we found some possible producers, but the quality was not according to the needed standard. The Marketing Department went over our head and told the directing managers we were incompetent.
After a brief meeting we were able to change that threatful view. Not finding the right suppliers wasn’t the problem, but the sold quantity was too low to be able to negotiate prices for mass quantities.
By making the decision of stock building 4x the regular purchase quantity we were able to negotiate good prices. Therefor we were able to face that competitor and sales quantities rose to new heights.

Value Example
Our company was contacted by an inventor of a new product. The Marketing Department was a big believer and wanted to be the exclusive contractor for the Belgian area. Before any negotiation about prices or conditions, the Marketing Department was already trying to close the deal.
Luckily the Purchase Department slowed signing the project and started to analyze the contract. We found that the price margins were too low according to the effort that was needed. Our representatives would have to spend too much time on prospecting and persuading customers.
After reporting these complications, the deal was cancelled.

Similarity
These examples are a classic view on marketers creating a certain structure, but not knowing how to achieve it. I truly believe every worker in a specified department can tell similar stories, such as this article about Sales versus Marketing does: https://www.heinzmarketing.com/2017/04/7-problems-between-sales-marketing-and-how-to-fix-them/ ,
or this article between Marketing and Production does:
https://smallbusiness.chron.com/conflict-between-marketing-production-departments-67774.html .
You might say: Marketers write guidelines but specialists guide the lines.