Psychology
If you could only learn about Marketing from the perspective of one topic, there is no debate that the best choice would be Psychology. Defined as the scientific study of mind and behavior0, Psychology offers deep insights into everything humans make, do, and interact with. Since everyone is literally controlled by their brain, understanding people and their needs requires an understanding of how those brains operate.
Marketing is a business practice that involves identifying, predicting and meeting customer needs
Marketing is Social
With the core purpose of Marketing being the understanding and satisfaction of people’s needs, Marketing is inherently social. This means that it takes place between living, breathing human beings. On one side, people with problems (needs, wants, and demands) are looking for solutions. On the other side, people that develop solutions for problems are looking for people to deliver them to.
Therefore, if we want to understand Marketing, it is best to understand how people interact with one another. And to understand how they interact with one another, we need to understand how people work in the first place. Our brains are the control unit that analyze the world around us and make decisions to navigate every single situation we encounter, and it’s those processes that we want to understand.
Emotions
One fundamental “process” that offers a key starting place to how brains and humans navigate the world is Emotions.
Humans are animals too, and all animals are evolutionarily adapted for two main purposes: survival and reproduction. While there is not yet a universally accepted theory on the function of emotions, one commonly accepted idea argues that emotions allow humans (and other animals) to react quickly to external events in a way that enhances their chances of… survival and reproduction! Whether this be fear of a large animal, happiness from a friend’s hug, or sadness from a relative dying, emotions guide your behavior and beliefs in a way that (ideally) should most benefit you in an evolutionary sense.
Emotions are not just some conceptual ideas of how our brain works though. They are the actual process of the brain producing chemicals or activating bodily functions to signal that something should be done. While these signals can be ignored or overpowered in certain circumstances, they create a path of least resistance that, statistically speaking, will be followed on average.
Therefore, it’s in a Marketer’s best interest to understand brains, psychology, and how people work, because it will allow you to understand how people make decisions and how you can influence them to make decisions that benefit you both.