Chemistry of Marketing: Application of Chemical Thermodynamics Laws to Closed and Isolated Marketing Systems

Abstract

Over the years, marketing has been influenced by the soft sciences (i.e., economics, psychology, and sociology) and hard sciences (i.e., mathematics and physics). In this study, we discuss the various intersections between chemistry and marketing, and we elaborate on the areas in which chemistry can help develop marketing from both theoretical and practical perspectives. In doing so, we do not intend to assert definitive conclusions or provide substantial scientific evidence but instead to introduce a new interdisciplinary research area that we call the chemistry of marketing and highlight its potential areas of application and some future research directions. To establish the initial scientific bridge between marketing and chemistry, we rely on: 1) metaphors which as figures of speech have long been used in the development of marketing science and 2) the general systems theory which is recognized as a prevailing form of generalization. Moreover, we provide a novel explanation of closed and isolated marketing systems, present initial evidence on their emerging importance in the business world, and offer some suggestions for their potential application to the first and second laws of chemical thermodynamics.