Against this backdrop, please describe, predict, and justify what the marketing education/discipline would or should look like in the next five to ten years.

The marketing discipline will be fundamentally changed going forward and well into the future. Here the discipline will rely heavily on analytics and overall predictive ability. For one, artificial intelligence is beginning to enter the discipline as a means of predicting consumer behavior and purchasing decisions. Likewise, technology continues to evolve to allow marketers to properly pinpoint and isolate variables that are directly correlated to sales. Here, the use of social media websites, streaming viewership rates, time spent online, how people interact online and other variables now require a specific expertise as it relates to marketing. Marketing has now become an analytical science with many of its variables, easily measured and observed. The focus of this essay will be placed on marketing research and analytics and how it will evolve over the years to encompasses much more than pricing data that is reactive. Instead, the future of marketing research will be much more proactive in nature, with an ability to better predict how and when a consumer will make a purchase.

Historically, market research has been backward looking. Here researchers often review data related to sales, promotion effectiveness, and purchaser demographic use these variables to predict future marketing performance. However, this is often difficult in that many of these variables change and have different impacts on one another, thereby making predictions difficult. Research conducted by Larcker and Fornell found that many of these models do a poor job of predicting consumer behavior in highly dynamic markets. Here, fast growing markets such as Dallas, Texas or Atlanta, Georgia, often are not markets that provide ample predictive power. However, the...…surveys and focus groups, which were often staples within the market research profession can now be replaced with much more dynamic and insightful data. Researchers instead of relying on what consumers say can now more readily assess their overall behavior which can be very different. In addition, market researchers in the future will have real time feedback that can provide insights on much quicker basis. This ultimately helps improve market responsiveness to changes in consumer behaviors and preferences. In addition, the market research of the future will supplement human insights and behaviors with artificial intelligence. Research conducted by Agrawal, provided insights into how marketing research is being used to help companies not only market to consumers but also to market to potential employees. Here, the research indicates that performance is significantly improved at attracting and retaining both consumers and potential employees. This will be improved in the future going…