Social critics have maintained that marketing leads people to buy products they do not want and do not need. However, the failure rate of new products that are heavily marketed is reportedly as high as 80 percent. How can these two seemingly opposite views of marketing be reconciled?

A. the social critics are simply wrong. People are not influenced by marketing

B. consumers are highly influenced by marketing, but some products simply fail anyway

C. marketing does have an influence on consumers, but marketers simply do not know enough about people to manipulate them any way they please

D. purchase is a function of marketing, but business failure is unrelated to marketing