Social marketing is a marketing approach which focuses on influencing behavior with the primary goal of achieving the common good. It utilizes the elements of commercial marketing and applies them to social issues. However, to see social marketing as only the use of standard commercial marketing practices to achieve non-commercial goals is an oversimplified view. Social marketing has existed for some time but has only started becoming a common term in recent decades. It was originally done using newspapers and billboards and has adapted to the modern world in many of the same ways commercial marketing has. The most common use of social marketing in today's society is through social media.

Traditional commercial marketing aims are primarily financial, though they can have positive social effects as well. In the context of public health, social marketing would promote general health, raise awareness and induce changes in behavior.

Social marketing is described as having "two parents". The "social parent" uses social science and social policy approaches. The "marketing parent" uses commercial and public sector marketing approaches. Social marketing has started to encompass a broader range of focus in recent years and now goes beyond influencing individual behavior. It promotes socio-cultural and structural change relevant to social issues. Consequently, social marketing scholars are beginning to advocate for a broader definition of social marketing: "Social marketing is the application of marketing principles to enable individual and collective ideas and actions in the pursuit of effective, efficient, equitable, fair and sustained social transformation". The new emphasis gives equal weight to the effects (efficiency and effectiveness) and the process (equity, fairness and sustainability) of social marketing programs. Together with a new social marketing definition that focuses on social transformation, there is also an argument that "a systems approach is needed if social marketing is to address the increasingly complex and dynamic social issues facing contemporary societies"

The first documented evidence of the deliberate use of marketing to address a social issue comes from a 1963 reproductive health program led by K. T. Chandy at the Indian Institute of Management in Calcutta, India. K.T. Chandy and colleagues proposed, and subsequently implemented, a national family planning program with high quality, government brand condoms distributed and sold throughout the country at a low cost. The program included an integrated consumer marketing campaign run with active point of sale promotion. Retailers were trained to sell the product aggressively, and a new organization was created to implement the program.

In developing countries, the use of social marketing expanded to include social and behavior change applications some of which include: HIV prevention, control of childhood diarrhea (through the use of oral re-hydration therapies), malaria control and treatment, point-of-use water treatment, on-site sanitation methods, promoting vaccine confidence and the provision of basic health services more broadly.

Health promotion campaigns began applying social marketing in practice in the 1980s. In the United States, The National High Blood Pressure Education Program and the community heart disease prevention studies in Pawtucket, Rhode Island and at Stanford University demonstrated the effectiveness of the approach to address population-based risk factor behaviour change. Notable early developments also took place in Australia. These included the Victoria Cancer Council developing its anti-tobacco campaigns "Quit" (1988) and "SunSmart" (1988), and its campaign against skin cancer, which had the slogan "Slip! Slop! Slap!".

Since the 1980s, the field has rapidly expanded around the world to include active living communities, disaster preparedness and response, ecosystem and species conservation, environmental issues, development of volunteer or Indigenous workforces, financial literacy, global threats of antibiotic resistance, government corruption, improving the quality of health care, injury prevention, landowner education, marine conservation and ocean sustainability, patient-centered health care, reducing health disparities, sustainable consumption, transportation demand management, water treatment and sanitation systems and youth gambling problems, among other social needs (See).

The impact of such social marketing campaigns are not always well documented. One study found that health awareness days can potentially raise knowledge about the causes of public health problems and promote an environment that supports policy changes, but noted that the accuracy of information shared is critical. On the other hand, there is some evidence to show that species awareness days meant to increase biodiversity and conservation awareness can lead to an increase in awareness through internet search for information, and an increase in conservation fund-raising by charities and advocacy groups.