Social marketing: Principles and practice

SMQ / VOL. X / NO. 1 / SPRING 2004 This book, authored by two of Australia’s leading social marketing researchers and practitioners, is a welcome addition to the social marketing literature for at least three reasons. First, it provides a showcase of social marketing projects conducted in Australia and other international venues that are not covered in other texts on the subject. Second, it may be the best presentation yet of an integration of theory, research, and practice in describing social marketing that reflects the authors’ experience at each of these three levels. Finally, it is the first book since Manoff ’s Social Marketing: New Imperative for Public Health (1985) to firmly place its discussion of social marketing within a public health philosophy and framework. In and of itself, the latter point – addressed in the first two chapters – makes this book required reading for anyone using social marketing in public health contexts. The authors position social marketing within a social change context and use the social determinants literature to expand its purview beyond just individual change models. They note that target groups for social marketing include groups not usually addressed by others – policymakers and legislators, service providers, opinion leaders, and businesses – and throughout the book provide examples of how these audiences have been incorporated into programs. The distinctions they draw between social marketing and other related approaches (e.g., not-for-profit marketing, cause-related marketing, corporate philanthropy, and others) are well thought out and if widely read would likely put an end to the fuzziness with which many often approach this task.