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From Marketing Ontology
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Introducing Marketing Ontology (MO)
The Marketing Ontology (MO) project aims to provide at the very least a controlled vocabulary describing any kind of marketing activity in any type of organisation profit or non-profit. MO takes inspiration from the successful Gene Ontology (GO) project [1] which provides a controlled vocabulary to describe gene and gene product attributes in any organism.
Ontology Benefits
You only have to look at one small UK Web site claiming "we now offer our customers a choice from over 2,500 stocked product lines" [2]. There is little or no evidence to suggest a reuse of information assets including lists of product categories and descriptions – unless the companies form part of an overall ecosystem e.g. retailer-wholesaler-manufacturer. The approach to an ontology was formally attempted in the late 1950s by Wroe Alderson. He added to the body of marketing knowledge by creating a tremendously wide and varying ontology to support marketing. Unfortunately, his work was found by most students to be far more complicated than understanding the 4Ps of marketing which had at that time started to take a hold and it seems will remain with marketing folks forever.
The importance of succeeding online by seeding a vocabulary of meaningful terms into the Web search engines is now essential. "For marketers the key to success is developing what I call a "Marketing Ontology"... you are what your keywords say you are. If you're an online marketer integrate a keyword vocabulary (ontology) into all facets of your marketing communications. Consistency is key" [3]
The Semantics of Marketing Information
Semantics, the meaning of the information, is strongly interlinked with a marketing ontology as Google’s corporate Web page and co-founder Larry Page serves to remind us "The perfect search engine would understand exactly what you mean and give back exactly what you want."[4]
Wiki Approach to Ontologies
This Wiki establishes a Wikipedia approach to creating and refining a marketing ontology which can be achieved in a relatively short space of time as has been seen with the development of the gene Ontology. Currently, it uses a free Wiki hosting service and once it achieves a critical mass in terms of audience and content the aim is to either seek grants or make a small investment to ensure a greater presence of the ontology and additional experiments.
The originators of this Wiki emanate from both academia (hugh.pattinson@uts.edu.au) and business (suresh.sood@uts.edu.au) and see tremendous opportunity for a marketing ontology. The aim is to use this environment to present findings publicly and at marketing conferences to create a groundswell interest in a marketing ontology. Likewise, the users and contributors to this wiki are encouraged to get the word out whether it be through conference papers, word of mouth or quite simply in the workplace or classroom.
Inspirational Article on Ontologies
It would be very amiss if we did not draw your attention to a landmark article co-authored by Sir Tim Berners Lee who provides some great scenarios in a 2001 Scientific American article.
The inspiration we gain from this reading concurs with a marketing world in which there exists a diversity of channels to reach and dialogue with our customers. Imagine, an advertisement on a 4 wheel drive car airs as you are watching TV and through interrogating "presence" on your instant messaging and knowledge of your interest in cars derived from your blogging site an email offer for a test drive is made. At the very least to make this scenario a reality a controlled vocabulary that achieves communication between searcher and system with consistent subject matter is needed rather than having a prospect try to retrieve relevant search terms from the head.
Message to Marketing
Failure by marketing as a discipline to embrace ontologies will be dangerous to the future health of the discipline. We live in the best of times and possibly the worst of times if we do not move forwards to take an ontological stand.
