6. Marketing

Reg Bibby,[] Sociologist and researcher into the Church in Canada has make a good deal out of the need for the Church to become involved in some basic marketing initiatives. By this, he means that they need to become much more responsive to the needs of their congregants in today's world.

There is a downside to this approach, however, in that it can tend to cater to the felt wishes of the current establishment, or majority, and fail to minister the word to the current situation. As someone put it, "if we had marketing philosophy in the 1960's we would never have had the Beetles".

In Community Development, there is also a need to do marketing studies of one form or another. New enterprises almost always require a business plan, the central component of which is a marketing study. Towns themselves need to market themselves to new enterprises which might relocate to their area. Workers frequently need to be attracted to towns or regions in order to staff existing facilities. As in the case of Minister, it is often necessary for community development people to address problems which interfere with the level of health in communities in order t be able to market the town or organization or message effectively. Marketing in this way is somewhat iterative. It requires a dialogue between parties along with a flexibility on the part of organizations and communities so that change is introduced appropriately and presented accurately