Marketing is a well known and studied discipline. However, the knowledge and teaching has focused on the application to the commercial field, leaving aside the possibilities that the discipline has in areas other than commercial.
The present work aims to review the true role, meaning and implications of marketing at the service of organizations whose purpose is purely and exclusively social.
In the first part, the work addresses the problem of value systems in the third sector, defining how the participating agents must add and deliver values in their process of valuable social offer for the group of their beneficiaries.
In the second part of the work, we address the nature of marketing in social organizations or the third sector. A clear differentiation is established between a commercial and a social cause. The first seeks to obtain profits, its produced in the market, and its benefits are exclusive to those who are part of that market. The social cause seeks to provide benefits to a particular group in society, using means and resources from both the organizations themselves and the support groups, thus originating an offer of a social nature.
The work continues addressing the variables of marketing in third sector organizations, defining the marketing mix, specifically four variables are identified and defined: social offer, contribution, assignment and communication.
The fourth part of the work raises the most significant differences between the marketing of companies and the marketing of social organizations.
The work ends with the presentation of a series of conclusions and recommendations on marketing to be put into practice by third sector organizations and the contribution of the bibliography used in the preparation.