Marketing science is a field that approaches

marketing Marketing is the process of exploring, creating, and delivering value to meet the needs of a target market in terms of goods and services; potentially including selection of a target audience; selection of certain attributes or themes to emph ...

– the understanding of customer needs, and the development of approaches by which they might be fulfilled – predominantly through

scientific method The scientific method is an empirical method for acquiring knowledge that has characterized the development of science since at least the 17th century (with notable practitioners in previous centuries; see the article history of scientific ...

s, rather than through tools and techniques common with research in

the arts The arts are a very wide range of human practices of creative expression, storytelling and cultural participation. They encompass multiple diverse and plural modes of thinking, doing and being, in an extremely broad range of media. Both ...

or in

humanities Humanities are academic disciplines that study aspects of human society and culture. In the Renaissance, the term contrasted with divinity and referred to what is now called classics, the main area of secular study in universities at the t ...

. The field of marketing science, in the pursuit of "truths" in marketing, is related to, but more general than

marketing research Marketing research is the systematic gathering, recording, and analysis of qualitative and quantitative data about issues relating to marketing products and services. The goal is to identify and assess how changing elements of the marketing mix i ...

, which is oriented towards a specific product, service or campaign. Before marketing science was formally labeled, its activity appeared as

management science Management science (or managerial science) is a wide and interdisciplinary study of solving complex problems and making strategic decisions as it pertains to institutions, corporations, governments and other types of organizational entities. It is ...

within the marketing framework. The interaction between academics and practitioners in marketing science dates back to 1961, with the founding of the

Marketing Science Institute Founded in 1961, the Marketing Science Institute (MSI) is a corporate-membership-based organization. MSI claims to be unique as the only research-based organization with a network of marketing academics from business schools all over the world as w ...

. Interest in marketing science as a field grew in the late 1980s and early 1990s as electronic

point-of-sale The point of sale (POS) or point of purchase (POP) is the time and place at which a retail transaction is completed. At the point of sale, the merchant calculates the amount owed by the customer, indicates that amount, may prepare an invoic ...

data grew and

barcode reader A barcode reader is an optical scanner that can read printed barcodes, decode the data contained in the barcode to a computer. Like a flatbed scanner, it consists of a light source, a lens and a light sensor for translating optical impulses into ...

s led to a "marketing information revolution". Before conferences were organized with a "marketing science" label, four meetings were convened as "Market Measurement and Analysis" conferences from 1979 to 1982, sponsored by

The Institute of Management Sciences The Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) is an international society for practitioners in the fields of operations research (O.R.), management science, and analytics. It was established in 1995 with the merger of ...

and the

Operations Research Society of America The Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) is an international society for practitioners in the fields of operations research (O.R.), management science, and analytics. It was established in 1995 with the merger o ...

.Dick R. Wittink 2001. "Market Measurement and Analysis: The First ‘Marketing Science’ Conference." Marketing Science 20 (4): 349–356. {{doi, 10.1287/mksc.20.4.349.9758. The first officially labeled Marketing Science Conference was hosted by the School of Management at UCLA in 1983.

Marketing science and Big Data

The marketing profession has long relied on data. But as the data flood gets bigger, progressive marketers are turning to big data analysis methods as well as systematic observation, testing and measurement to study broad

behavioral pattern In software engineering, behavioral design patterns are design patterns that identify common communication patterns among objects. By doing so, these patterns increase flexibility in carrying out communication. Design patterns Examples of this t ...

drill down A drill is a tool used for making round holes or driving fasteners. It is fitted with a bit, either a drill or driver chuck. Hand-operated types are dramatically decreasing in popularity and cordless battery-powered ones proliferating due to ...

from the aggregate to the individual and produce new insights that improve business outcomes.

References

Management theory Applied statistics Marketing analytics