Beyond Customer Value: A Systems Redefinition of Marketing

This paper argues that conventional marketing definitions centered on customer-value creation are analytically incomplete. It advances a systems redefinition: marketing as strategic action aimed at improving a participant’s outcomes based on analysis of the entire market, its participants, factors, and mechanisms. Grounded in the foundations of voluntary exchange (trust and mutual benefit), the systems view restores marketing’s role as the missing link between business and economics, reduces isolationist diagnostic failures, and supports strengths-focused strategy.