So, you're just starting your first Marketing course and trying to figure out what's in store for you this term. Welcome to our book! Let us take this opportunity to help you get out of vacation mode and get serious (well, not too serious -- we hope you'll have a little fun in this course as well!). Here's why we think this course is one of the most important you are going to take:

More than ever, people in business need to work hard to satisfy the needs of individual customers and of society as a whole. That's what marketing is about--creating long-term satisfaction with an organization's goods or services while profiting the firm and providing benefits to the community at the same time. The goal of this book is to show you how that's done and to prepare you to do it as well.

As you are reading this book, the world is entering the 21st century. We believe that you are beginning your careers at the most exciting time in history. We have started taking our first baby steps on the information superhighway. Science and technology are improving the quality of life at an unprecedented rate.. As political and technical barriers fall, we increasingly live and work in a global marketplace. At the same time, many people in the industrialized world are starting to turn from desires based on materialism and wealth to a focus on the environment, social responsibility, and the preservation of human dignity

We believe a marketing textbook that will accurately portray the excitement and challenge of the marketing profession has many jobs to do -- it has to be dynamic, it has to be realistic, it has to be even-handed about the good and bad consequences of marketing decisions. It also has to give students an inside view of life "in the trenches" of the marketing world. Instead of simply painting a rosy picture of how great marketing strategies turned out, it should provide readers with a sense of how these decisions were made in the first place -- and emphasize that the "correct" choice is not always so obvious beforehand as it is after the fact!

We'd like to take a minute to tell you about some of the unique features of this book -- and to show you how we've gone about crafting a brand new text to lead a new generation of marketing students into the 21st century.

Well, that's easy -- the professor assigned it and you want to get a good grade! Hopefully, though, you will want to learn about marketing for other reasons as well -- and we want to make this as enjoyable and useful an experience as possible. There's nothing worse than slogging through a boring textbook and memorizing long lists of terms you'll forget after Spring Break anyway.

Hey, we've been there! That's why we want to show you how much of what you'll learn in this course is related to the rest of your life as well. After all, the actions of marketers affect us everywhere we turn -- in the clothes we buy, the music we listen to, the food we order....and even the politicians we vote for, the college we choose, and the church or synagogue we attend.

This course is a chance for you to learn about how all sorts of goods and services are developed, how they "magically" appear in stores, and the techniques that are used to convince you to choose one option over many others competing for your attention - and hard-earned cash.

Throughout the book, we provide information to help you get started on a career in marketing (and we even include an Appendix on Careers in Marketing on our innovative website to give you a bit of a head start). But what if you're an accounting student, or majoring in some other aspect of business? Why is it important to understand marketing? Quite obviously, we believe everyone should study marketing because it is the single most important function of every organization (of course, we're somewhat biased!). But even if you disagree, you must realize that the changing nature of organizations is leading to greater integration across departments and functional areas of business. For an accountant to do her job, she must understand all the areas of the firm, just as a marketer should know something about accounting, finance, and management.

What if you're "just visiting" the business disciplines, and your real interest is in the arts, engineering, or education? We'll try to show you how a knowledge of marketing concepts is applicable to many other activities as well. But, in any case, whatever your major, you're also a consumer. This means marketing activities affect you throughout your life. As a person who buys or receives shelter, food, clothing, utilities, and perhaps Matchbox 20 CDs, you are a customer--the target of a multitude of marketing strategies. If nothing else, then, an understanding of how marketing works can make you a more intelligent consumer. Perhaps you will be better able to manage your resources, understand how marketing communications attempt to encourage your purchase of a variety of products and services, and appreciate the huge impact marketers have on fashion, music, sports, and other aspect of popular culture.

There are several aspects of this book that make it a bit unique and --we hope-- will make the process of learning about marketing more enjoyable and effective. These features have been developed with the help of many marketing professors (maybe even your own?) who were selected because they love to teach the Principles of Marketing course and wanted a book that would let them do this even better. From the very beginning, this book took shape based on their suggestions and comments. We also showed numerous drafts to our own students to be sure that they liked what we were up to. So, we'd like to think that we practice what we preach by starting the development process from Day One with a focus on the needs of our customers -- you!

One of the most important features of this text is an emphasis on decision making. Rather than simply listing a bunch of terms and asking you to memorize all that jargon, we've tried to put you in the driver's seat wherever possible. One way we've done that is to introduce you in each chapter to a marketing professional who had to make a decision--as the title of the book suggests, we're focusing on real people who had to make real choices. This strategy serves as an important reminder that decisions are not made by companies--they are made by flesh-and-blood people. The companies and people we worked with to bring you this exciting feature are

Steve Goldstein, Levi Strauss & Co.

Frank Cimermancic, Harley-Davidson

Joyce LaValle, Interface Americas

Peter Einstein, MTV Europe

Dee Dee Gordon, Lambesis

Rick Wertheimer, American Wool Council

Craig Weisbruch, National Gypsum

Sarah Burroughs, Burrell Communications Group

William Smith, Kodak

Dennis Carter, Intel

Charles Waddell , Carolina Panthers

Randy Poindexter, Bojangles'

Craig Lambert, Marriott Courtyard

Cecelia Gardner, First Union

Göran Carstedt, IKEA

Tom Eppes, Price/McNabb Focused Communications

Anna Oloffson, Gazoline Advertising

Bunny Richardson, BMW

We've benefitted from the cooperation of a wide variety of dedicated businesspeople from around the globe who have had to "talk the talk and walk the walk" by making difficult choices. These men and women represent organizations as diverse as a global giant that supplies denim products and other apparel to millions of consumers at play (Levi Strauss & Co.) to a company that profits by supplying hotel rooms to consumers when they sleep (Marriott). From "hogs" (Harley-Davidson motorcycles) to rugs (Interface), from a fast-food chain (Bojangles') to a Swedish advertising agency (Gazoline), we've enlisted people who are on marketing's front lines to share their experiences with you.

And, whether the person makes cameras (Kodak) or broadcasts Top 40 videos (MTV Europe), the choices they face on a daily basis will help to bring marketing issues to life for you. In each case, we describe the problem our decision maker was facing, and lay out some of the options being considered. Then we ask you to choose from among these options. But, just in case you're the type of person who likes to read a mystery novel starting with the last page to find out "whodunit," we end the chapter by telling you what choice the person made and what happened as a result. In some cases we've also captured the executive on videotape to give you an even more complete picture of how marketing decisions are really made.

A lot of the excitement in marketing today is being generated by young entrepreneurs who got a bright idea and ran with it. We highlight some of these folks in two ways. First, in every chapter we present a box called Spotlight on Real People that presents an example of a small company trying to make a go of it. In addition, we're pleased to introduce you to the guys at Computer Friendly Stuff, a small company based in Chicago that makes some really neat "stuff" you'll be hearing more about. We'll show you how some of the decisions they've made so far are related to the marketing concepts in this book. But, marketers never rest -- there's always new decisions to make. We'll also go behind the scenes and let you give advice to them as they encounter problems and issues in running their business at the very same time you're taking this course.

Another aspect of marketing we emphasize is the importance of building long-term relationships with customers and business partners rather than selling them something and disappearing into the night. This seems like simple common sense, but you'd be surprised how many "traditional" marketers are only slowly coming around to the realization that satisfying people the first time and every time makes good business sense.

But, these bonds can't be built in a vacuum. We believe that good business is responsible business -- marketing decisions that benefit only the firm and its customers aren't such good decisions after all. Contrary to what some people believe, it is possible to make money and still do good works. That's why we emphasize what we call The New Era of Marketing, and single out firms for praise that conduct business ethically and that return value to society and to the environment. We believe in this so strongly that we've devoted one of our first chapters to The New Era (Chapter 3), and every chapter also features a box called Real People, Bad Choices? that highlights the ethical issues faced daily by companies and individuals.

Another feature that we're proud of is our emphasis on global marketing. Talk to businesspeople and consumers around the world, and you'll find that all too often the stereotype of the "ugly American" is all too true. For a long time, American companies prospered by simply "doing their thing" and not worrying too much about adapting their outlook to the needs and preferences of people in other countries.

Now, the party's over: From advertising on The World Wide Web to negotiating a complicated merger with a foreign firm, marketing decisions often need to be global decisions. We've tried where possible to emphasize the importance of a trans-national perspective. Many of our corporate examples are non-American, as are a large number of the advertisements we have chosen to illustrate key points. And, of course, we also offer an entire chapter on Global Marketing for your traveling pleasure. So, it's time for the journey to begin: relax, sit back, and enjoy the flight!