Advances in strategic marketing and the advancement of the marketing discipline: the promise of theory

ABSTRACT

Hunt (2018, Advancing marketing strategy in the marketing discipline and beyond: From promise, to neglect, to prominence, to fragment, (to promise?). Journal of Marketing Management, 34, 16–51. doi:10.1080/0267257X.2017.1326973) provides a synthesis and critical review of over 100 years of marketing literature organised into four eras. In his prognosis of the outlook for Era V, Hunt notes that there are reasons to be optimistic about the prospects for both the marketing discipline, broadly, and the field of strategic marketing, specifically. However, he also draws attention to the concerns voiced by a number of marketing scholars regarding the current state of the field and the future outlook for the field. Hunt argues that the prospects for the marketing discipline and the field of strategic marketing are closely intertwined, and that the health of the latter contributes significantly to that of the former. Against this backdrop, this commentary focuses on the promise of theory for advances in strategic marketing and the advancement of the marketing discipline.