Why Are the 4 Ps of Marketing So Important to Your Plan? Example of a Marketing Mix.
The 4 Ps of marketing mix are a key element of your marketing plan. To better understand how to develop the most important elements of your mix, use this example of a marketing mix. Define your target market and then move into creating a marketing mix program that balances and develops the right strategies for your 4 Ps - product or service, its price, its promotion, and its distribution (or place).
Marketing planning is important to your business. Without a plan you will be challenged to stay focused on your goals. With a well developed marketing plan, you will have a direction to follow and measures in place to help you achieve your goals. Each business needs to build objectives, strategies, and plans that are specific to their own business and their markets. A definition of marketing strategy for your business will help you focus on what's most important to your business; your marketing planning will help you to deliver it.
This example of a marketing mix looks at a plan for a Computer Technology software company. The firm's profile: $2 million in annual sales, 14 employees (many of them long-term employees with a wide range of skills), and providing business-to-business services. Business priorities are to retain existing customers and to gain new business. The three year plan business objective is to grow sales 10 percent a year.
The company needs to clearly define the services offered. For example, the company offers consulting services on new software reviews; it conducts computer security audits; provides system assessments and provide recommendations; it offers 24 hour on-call technical support for software, and hardware, issues; provides service maintenance and bug fixes; handles back-up protocols and provides back-up tape storage offsite; and more.
Once the services are defined, you need to develop a benefits list that focuses on the value of each of the specific services; existing and potential customers need a clear understanding of the value proposition. For example, the benefits list could demonstrate the company's market leadership in business continuity efforts after a disaster (such as floods, power outages, commercial crimes, and more). It could focus on the strength of long-term employees with both specialist and generalist skills in multi-platforms. It could also focus on the advantages of outsourcing computer support compared to carrying in-house staff.
What is the business value proposition? Focus on uniqueness and differentiation: how are products different from the competition? Identify at least four differentiation points. First, define target market, so that product positioning is properly identified. Then state the differentiation points as solutions to customer problems and provide a cost/benefit value formula for these unique advantages. For example, employees are long term, with both generalist and specialist capabilities and skills. Employees are also certified in both new and legacy software support. Competitors do not have as broad a range of skills.
In this industry, an effective pricing strategy is to bundle price services. This involves bundling a number of services together for an all-in-one price. For example, a services bundle might include services such as daily back-ups offsite; regular maintenance and upgrades of existing software versions; remote monitoring of email software; and more. The pricing package needs to include pricing comparisons for customers to review and compare (to in-house staff costs or to hire competitive companies to do the same work).
Marketing mix promotion is focused on selling: through networking, public relations, face-to-face personal selling, telemarketing, advertising, direct email marketing programs, other forms of personal selling, relationship and referral marketing, website, and more. For example, companies cut staff positions during tough times. You can find out which companies have recently laid off staff by tracking media reports and announcements. Then prepare a marketing campaign that is directed to those companies and the outsourcing solution you provide. Target your campaign through a direct marketing program; using a personalized, one-to-one approach. Use a direct marketing firm to put the best campaign together. Sub-contract or hire sales and promotion support if you do not have professional sales and marketing staff.
The last element of marketing mix is place or distribution. Place is focused on delivery of the product or service to the market; whether the product or service is sold in a local store, online, through distributors, directly through business-to-business efforts and other methods. For example, if you're in the retail sector, this marketing mix element is about the store location (online or physical). For this computer technology business, reaching their clients is through both in-person service calls and remotely accessed service. Place also plays a role in how you are found by customers; it is as much related to promotional strategy as it is to physical location. For a service company, place or distribution is most often delivered directly from the company to its customers.
Create a marketing plan that focuses on the 4 Ps of marketing; and use it to focus on product, price, promotion and place. An example of a marketing mix (like this one) can be used as a template for building your own mix program, strategies, objectives and plan. Then, act on the plan.
About the Author:
Do you want to learn more about marketing, such as how to develop your marketing mix promotion plan? Find resources and strategies for managing cash flow, calculating profit, planning business operations, and more at www.More-for-Small-Business.com (http://tinyurl.com/m2febn).
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