For technical and sociological reasons, marketing has dealt with aggregates like market segments, target markets, and demand. They traditionally have used broad and blunt instruments like mass marketing, national advertising, assembly line production, and inferencial marketing research. The personal marketing orientation is an attempt to market on a one-to-one basis.

According to this orientation, everyone wants to be treated like an individual, and the fundamental marketing concepts, if taken to the limit would require that product offerings be designed for individual buyers. Customers want products that serve their exact needs. Product innovation, instead of being a process of designing standardized products born from inherent compromises, is transformed into a quest for the perfect match between product and individual buyer.

Until recently, this orientation was not practical. Mass production has traditionally depended on the standardisation of goods sold. Today however, we are beginning to see progress in this direction. Computers allow personalized marketing. Flexible manufacturing processes allow mass customization. The Internet allows permission marketing and real-time pricing. This overall process is sometimes referred to as the democratization of goods.

see also: marketing, marketing orientation, sales orientation, production orientation, e-marketing