Social marketing faces significant barriers to growth because there is no clear understanding of what the field is and what its role should be in relation to other approaches to social change. However, growth is possible through increases in social marketing's share of competition at the intervention, subject matter, product, and brand levels. The author proposes a specific social marketing branding campaign to advance the field, with roles for academics and the American Marketing Association.

The author argues that social marketing has been defined improperly in much of the literature. A revised definition is proposed and the domain of social marketing defined. He concludes with suggestions for implications for future growth of the discipline.

A theoretical model linking measures of objectively defined changes in consumer life status to changes in brand preferences and overall satisfaction with product and service purchases is proposed and empirically tested. Bivariate and multiple equation analyses of cross-sectional data in one metropolitan area indicate strong support for the model. The results imply that households undergoing status change are more likely to be (1) undergoing spontaneous changes in brand preferences and (2) open to intervention by change agents in the future.

A survey of consumer reactions to common purchases was conducted in 1975. Consumers perceive problems with many products and services, and voice complaints concerning about one-third of those problems. Third-party complaint processors play a very small role in buyer-seller disputes. Household status and type of problem influence perception of problems and choice of action or inaction. Satisfactory resolutions occur in somewhat more than half of voiced complaint cases. To increase voicing and fair handling of complaints, procedural changes at the buyer-seller level are suggested; to improve treatment of complaints that are not resolved at the buyer-seller level, improvements in community small claims courts are suggested.

Abstract. The history of social marketing has similarities to the growth and maturity of human beings from its birth in the 1960sSocial marketing in the 21st century has achieved wide awareness and adoption as an innovative approach to social change. Its status has evolved over four decades, which have seen confusion about the field's scope, significant shifts in focus and eventual evidence of maturity along several dimensions. However, a recent evaluation of the field's current status suggests some important barriers to future growth (Andreasen, 2002). Understanding of how we got to this situation offers perspective on those challenges and possible solutions.While metaphors are often tortured frameworks for understanding historical phenomena, it is useful to think of the growth of social marketing over the past 40-plus years as paralleling the formative years of a person. The field has had its infancy and adolescence and one could argue that it is just now entering early maturity. As with humans, each of these stages has reflected important conflicts and the early maturity phase can still be seen as time where identity needs to be affirmed and a future career trajectory established. 293Volume 3(3): 293-303