Practically every company on the planet sets out with the primary objective of earning money. This is usually done by producing some form of product, or offering a service, and then charging customers money for it.
First of all, it is a very rare case where a business can offer a product or service that is truly unique and cannot be provided by anyone else. This means that your company will be competing with other businesses that sell a similar product and you will both be trying to earn money from the same shoppers, who only want to spend their money once.
Marketing is the primary tool used by modern organisations to draw potential customers to do business with them and not with their rivals. It is a very broad topic that is influenced by a great deal of internal and external factors, but when done well it can be the single business practice that could make or break a company.
So where should you start when creating a marketing strategy for your own business? Well, each situation is different, and every business will have its own set of strengths and weaknesses that must be taken into consideration, but there is a marketing rule that can be applied to almost any company to be used as a marketing framework. It is known as the “Marketing Mix”.
The Marketing Mix
The marketing mix was a term that was first coined during the 1950′s and is a phrase that is used to express the fundamental building blocks of any marketing strategy. It demonstrates the fact that marketing is not a simple, blunt-edged business technique, but rather a subtle balance of different elements of business operations. It got its name because it is similar to the ingredients list for a recipe.
The term was later built upon to include the idea of “four P’s” that described the critical elements of the marketing mix. The formalisation of these P’s made it very clear for company managers and marketers to quickly relate the elements of marketing to the strengths of their own companies, and by doing so could very rapidly form a tailored and efficient marketing plan.
The “product” element of the four P’s could refer to a service, just like combi microwave ovens, or any non-physical service being offered for sale by a business, see our website here.
Product
Whilst every aspect of the marketing mix is a necessity, the “product” element mentioned as one of the four P’s is possibly the most critical of all. It identifies the physical product or intangible service that your company will be offering, and at the end of the day it is the reason that customers are going to spend money with you.
Many people do not think that marketing has any role to play when it comes to the physical product that your company is selling. In fact, the common train of thought very often bears the precise opposite sentiment. Surely it should be the opposite way around – your production department creates a product for sale and then it is the task of the marketing department to discover ways to sell it, right?
Consider the computer software market as an example. There are many established brands of both operating system and software application products on the market already, and because the market is fairly well saturated it would be incredibly tough (and expensive) to “take on the big boys”. So how could the principles of the marketing mix help in this circumstance?
Rather than creating an operating system and then attempting to craft a marketing strategy to take on the likes of Microsoft or Apple, it would be more effective to look at what sorts of product are desired in the current marketplace, and how viable it would be to manufacture and sell them.
Once your goods have been fashioned and created it is still a vital skill to be able to objectively review your own products to identify the reasons why a customer would buy your product rather than a competitors’. The skill is called product differentiation and is one of the fundamental skills of the product part of the marketing mix pie.
A different form of this part of the marketing mix is known as product variation and is generally used to either extend the lifecycle of a product currently in the market, or to make your brand new product attractive to as many consumers as possible. Once again, this technique can be applied at all stages of product development.
The car industry uses this approach very effectively by offering various engines, trim packages and interior options with the cars that they sell. They use the marketing mix to good effect to sell their own products in an extremely competitive marketplace.
We do not have a specific promotion team in our new how to make bread enterprise though many of our own administrators have been able to take up marketing as part of their job role.
Price
Another key factor in the marketing mix relates to the price of your products or services. This isn’t a simple case of performing market research to determine the highest price that your customers would pay (although that can be a useful tool to use), but rather using the price of your products as a strategic tool designed to achieve any specific objectives your business has.
Although it may seem obvious, it is still worth noting that price has always been, and likely always will be, one of the key factors that customers take into account when they are making a purchase. It is also worth noting that customers don’t always consider the cheapest price to be the best price.
There are many questions that you need to ask yourself while devising a good pricing plan, key among which are the price sensitivity of your clients, what your rivals are doing and how can pricing maximise your own profits. From a strategy point of view however, pricing can be covered by two main principals; price skimming and penetration pricing.
Price skimming
The principal idea behind price skimming is to make as much money as possible from the segment of the market which is price-insensitive and will be prepared to spend a large amount of money to get a product or service early on.
This pricing strategy is very often used in the consumer electronics industry where customers will often eagerly await the release of a new mobile phone or computer games console. Makers could set almost any price they wanted to and there would still be a loyal base of customers that would pay it. By using this method as part of a pre-ordering strategy, a firm can help to smooth its own money flow.
Penetration pricing
Penetration pricing is at the opposite end of the pricing spectrum, and is geared towards gaining a large market share at a short-term cost so that monetary benefits can be earned long into the future. It can be a risky strategy, but when used correctly it can setup revenue streams for many years to come.
Yet another thing to bear in mind is that “price” is the one part of the marketing mix that will generate revenue for a business. The other members of the four P’s will all cost money to produce or undertake. So it is even more vital to get your pricing technique right.
Grabbing some of the on-line search market is extremely beneficial, so choose a term, just like 40th birthday presents men then evaluate if the phrase has an ample search market for your needs.
Place
Place is the component of the marketing mix that is often not addressed by companies, but it’s still an important part of selling your product successfully. In short, it describes the method in which you deliver your product to your consumer, and subsequently how you collect money from them. It can be a fantastic marketing technique when used correctly.
The most common implications of place-based marketing are the physical locations in which your products are sold. For the vast majority of consumer products, this involves the distribution infrastructure between your production centres and shops or other outlets around the country. Since distribution of a physical product costs money it is important to identify your own priorities and adjust your distribution network accordingly.
With the increasing use of the Internet by your potential customers, marketing strategies have had to consider how they use the Internet to help deliver their products. By using the Internet as a place of contact (or even as a complete distribution route in download-based markets such as MP3s) companies are now able to reach out to a huge pool of potential customers. Effective positioning of your product or service can therefore yield impressive financial results.
Promotion
When you say the word “marketing”, many people instantly think of the promotional aspect of the marketing mix, although as we have seen, this is only one branch of a more comprehensive system. Promotion can be used on a very individual basis or as a mass communication instrument, and whilst it can be an expensive undertaking it is often an important one.
Advertising is one of the most typical forms of promotion. Classically it would be done by posting on billboards, creating short clips for TV and radio or by physically handing out flyers or leaflets to potential buyers. With the coming of the information age we have seen a great increase in promotion via e-mail and the Internet, or just as targeted advertising materials posted through your door. The potential for individualised advertising has never been so great.
Another important part of promotion involves branding, which may not necessarily yield more sales directly, but goes back to one of the initial purposes of marketing; getting customers to choose your product over those of your competitors.
Putting it into Practice
As previously mentioned each company is unique and will have different marketing needs. By using a balance of the four P’s discussed above you can take an effective view of your own marketing strategy.