Every company must have a strategy and practice marketing, regardless of how it refers to it or whether it is located in a dedicated department or division. This includes strategic marketing to define target market segments and product offerings, as well as operational marketing to support commercial activities.

In a large B2B/B2G group, the strategy may be determined for the entire group or a single activity. In a single-activity company, it is simply the company’s strategy. In technology, defining the scope of the strategy (what is strategic and what is not, who should make the ‘strategic decisions’) is generally not a issue, but it does not mean that formulating strategy is simple, quite the contrary.

However, this is not the case when it comes to defining marketing and its scope. Every B2B/B2G company must engage in marketing, regardless of how it is labelled or defined compared to other companies. In technology companies, marketing is often not well-known, understood or well-liked because it is associated with mainstream marketing that is not suited to B2B/B2G and is often considered as misleading (“it’s only marketing” is often heard in a pejorative way). It is also frequently devalued in comparison to technology because it is perceived as being less rigorous and predictable. Should marketing only involve product communication or should it include all market/product-related activities such as product definition and technical development? Should business development be considered part of marketing if properly defined? What should be the scope of a “marketing department”? The definition of what constitutes “marketing” and its scope are just as challenging as making marketing decisions themselves in technology companies. 

This section delves into the  different aspects of “marketing” in the B2B/B2G company, which we prefer to call “technology marketing” or “techno-marketing”.