Many people use the words 'sales' or 'selling' and 'marketing' to mean the same thing - basically selling products or services to customers, in the broadest sense. In fact, marketing refers to much wider issues than sales and selling. Marketing involves the strategic planning of a business (or other organizational provider) through to every aspect of customer engagement, including market reserach, product development, branding, advertising and promotion, methods of selling, customer service, and extending to the acquisition or development of new businesses. Sales or selling is an activity within marketing, referring to the methods and processes of communicating and agreeing and completing the transaction (sale) with the customer.