Social marketing vs Social Responsibility

[pic 1][pic 2][pic 3][pic 4][pic 5]

Introduction

Companies evolve as do the communities in which they develop and according to them and their needs changes are adopted in different areas, products, services and strategies of companies. Social Responsibility (SR) and Social Marketing (SM), have become new business’ approaches as well as their guidelines to relate with stakeholders have been seen as interesting connecting spaces for development for everyone. Both theories related to SR and stakeholders are just in the early stages of construction. Both have common and dissimilar elements that make them bond one to another.

Social Responsibility

Social responsibility should be oriented along two axes:

1. Compliance with laws and regulations of economic activity.
2. The rigorous respect for the rules of free competition, as well as the technical and economical competences to use their resources efficiently in order to offer its shareholders the maximum results.

Social Responsibility implies that consumers, as major players within the groups of interest, not only prefer certain companies based on their products and services, but they are very interested in knowing they provide welfare to all its stakeholders.

There are no socially responsible companies in its fullness, but good social responsibility practices, or companies with responsible management models, practicing continuous improvement regarding their social, laboral and environmental concerns. Thus, we find companies with good balance plans or models of environmental sustainability, others with non-discriminatory selection policies, some with good corporate governance or exemplary in community involvement, but hardly a company can cover all areas that make up the social responsibility and manage all with real coherence and effectiveness.

One of the problems that SR faces is that it is normally thought to be a valid strategy only for large companies, but it is believed there are interesting examples of small and medium businesses that have relied on SR environment to develop their organizations. Some of these examples will be found at the end of this document.

Social Marketing

In several forums, debates or consultancies that have been stated on Social Responsibility, Social Marketing or Marketing with a Cause, there is a lack of knowledge about an only meaning of Social Marketing.

SM is a term first mentioned forty years ago and it began as a discipline in 1970 when Philip Kotler and Gerald Zaltman proposed that the same principles used by the traditional marketing definition must be applied to sell not only products but also to "sell" ideas, behaviors, attitudes, etc.

Social Marketing is built around the knowledge gained in business practices: the establishment of measurable objectives, research on human needs, the belonging of products to specialized groups of consumers, positioning technology products focused on needs and human desires and effective communication of its benefits, ongoing monitoring of changes in the environment and the ability to adapt to change.

Every time the promotion of social causes is more common in our society and this has led to the development of social marketing as a specific area of marketing, specializing in the study of exchange with the promotion of ideas or social causes. This growing importance of social marketing can be seen daily in the many social

campaigns that are promoted in developed societies, such as AIDS, ecology, health, solidarity and road safety, where the involvement and participation of citizens is increasing. In fact, social marketing is an activity that is taking a rapid growth.

...