Kellogg on Marketing, 3rd Edition

CHAPTER 1Marketing in the Age of Disruption

Alexander Chernev and Philip Kotler

Marketing has evolved dramatically over the past few decades. No other discipline has changed so rapidly in such a short period of time. These changes encompass both the strategic and tactical aspects of marketing and influence how companies conceptualize the process of creating value in their target markets and the ways in which they design specific offerings for these markets. In this context, understanding the new market realities, identifying the key marketing trends, and understanding their driving forces can help companies better design and manage their offerings to ensure sustainable market growth.¹

The New Market Realities

The business environment is going through a period of profound changes. These range from the emergence of new technologies to the exponential growth of available data and the increasing reliance on data analytics and artificial intelligence to complex sociocultural dynamics, mounting environmental challenges, and unpredictable market disruptions.

Technological Disruption

The technological environment may influence the way companies operate in two ways: by producing sustaining technologies that lead to improvements in a company's operations within the boundaries of its current business model and by introducing disruptive technologies that facilitate the creation of entirely new business models.

The impact of sustaining technologies can influence a company's performance ...