Achieving the Right Marketing Mix
Marketing, as we know now, is misunderstood to be only advertising, publicity or selling. In fact, it is much more and it begins before any product or service is designed. From then on, marketing is involved in every stage of the product development.
4-Piece Jigsaw Puzzle of Product Marketing
For successful marketing of any product, these four factors must align perfectly: Product, Price, Place and Promotion. These are called 4Ps of marketing or Marketing Mix.
Product
It means the product or service the company provides, along with the other combinations. It includes:
- The product’s physical look, packaging
- Variety of models, sizes, colors, options
- Features, warranty, cost of repair and spare parts
- Brand name
The product can be tangible (Food articles, soaps, shampoo, car, computer, mobile handset, pens etc. – all physical things)
Or it can be intangibles or services (insurance, banking, travel, mobile connection, film, software etc.)
Price
It is the amount of money customers must pay to obtain the product.
It includes the credit terms, discounts, schemes, if any.
Price represents the value of the product, both from the reference points of the company and that of the customer.
The price is set as a balance between the company’s cost, profit expectations, competitor’s prices and the customer’s perceived value of the product.
Place
Place refers to where the product is available to the target customers.
It depends upon the type of the product and the company’s strategy about geographies in which it wants to make its products available.
Nowadays, with the popularity of technology and e-commerce, products are being made available to customers in different ways and at locations which were not available earlier.
Various types of physical stores and outlets, on-line stores, TV based home-shopping, direct sales agents etc. are some of the options to make the products available.
Promotion
Promotion refers to the activities that communicate the benefits of the product and persuade the target customers to buy it.
Promotion activities are determined on the basis of the product type, its lifecycle stage, budget, customer segment, purpose of promotion etc.
Advertising through various media, events, exhibitions, personal selling, discounts, schemes etc. are some of the options for promotion.
The company may employ more than one promotion methods to communicate the benefits to the customers. All these must be used in an integrated manner to ensure the right impact to the message.
In order to succeed in marketing, all these four Ps (Product, Price, Place, Promotion) must align perfectly. They must fit together, just like the pieces in a four-piece jigsaw puzzle fit.
If any one of these pieces is not aligned or is out of shape, the jigsaw puzzle will remain incomplete, an unsolved problem. Similarly, if we try to borrow one or two pieces from another same sized four-piece jigsaw puzzle and try to fix them into our jigsaw puzzle, then also, the pieces will not match. The puzzle will not be solved. The four pieces in the jigsaw puzzle can match only if all the four pieces are from the same puzzle set.
In marketing also, the four Ps – Product, Price, Place, Promotion – for a particular product must align with each other.
They must correspond to each other perfectly. Any single P from one product can’t be blindly applied to another product.
