The Marketing Mix – All You Need To Know

As an entrepreneur, if you succeed in identifying the right product, placing it in the right place, choosing the right price and revealing your product at the right time in the market, you’re definitely a good marketer. It’s not a very easy fete because you need to do a lot of research and put more effort into making this work. Remember, if you don’t achieve one of the four elements, your product is bound to fail and cause your company lots of losses.

Using the marketing mix is the best way to make sure the right product is at the right place. Basically, a marketing mix will help you understand what your product can offer and how to plan carefully around that. It can be executed perfectly through 4 elements which are the price, the place, the promotion and also the product itself.

The 4P’s of Marketing

1. The Product
   It can either be an intangible service or a tangible good. Basically, a product should meet the customers’ specific demands or needs. Products usually follow a natural lifecycle and that’s why marketers should strive to understand and plan for each stage accordingly. Identify what the product is expected to solve and understand the benefits as well as the features of the product itself. Once you have understood the product itself, you can follow through to identify the target customers as well.
2. The Price
   This refers to what the marketers expect the end consumers to pay for the product. The pricing of a product can either positively or negatively impact its selling. The price of a product depends on the perceived value of the product from the customer rather than the actual value of the product itself. Therefore, if a product has a higher or lower price than the perceived value, it might not sell as expected.On that note, it’s important to understand what a customer perceives before you decide to price a product. If the customer perception is positive, it’s likely that the product will even go for a higher price than its actual value. On the other hand, if the product has very little or no value for the customer, it might be beneficial to underprice the product just to make some sales. Note that distribution places, markups, value chain costs and pricing on competing products might also affect the pricing of your product.
3. Promotion
   Refers to the marketing strategies and communication techniques used to advertise the product to the targeted customers. Promotion includes activities like special offers, advertising, public relations and also sales promotions. Any promotional channel used should always be suitable for the product, the consumer and also the price. Remember, marketing is different from promotion because the latter simply signifies the communication aspect of the former.
4. Placement
   Referring to how the product will be made available to the consumer. Placement mostly involves distribution among other aspects. A suitable placement strategy should assess the best and most suitable distribution channel for the product. Note that, depending on the level of accessibility of a product by the consumer, the rest of the marketing mix elements might work or not.

What’s The Purpose And Key Features Of The Marketing Mix?

Over the years, the 4 elements of a marketing mix by developed and formalized by marketing experts around the world to create and execute successful marketing strategies. This tool attempts to satisfy the seller and the customer concurrently. If understood and launched successfully, the marketing mix can prove to be successful in the success of any product. Some of the key features of marketing mix include the following.

• First, it’s made up of interdependent variables that are unique. The 4 elements of marketing mix need to be planned together to guarantee success for any marketing strategy.
• Using these elements, a company can achieve any marketing targets and objectives such as profits, sales, customer satisfaction and also retention.
• Marketing mix is very fluid and flexible. It’s easy to focus on any of the variables by decreasing or increasing it depending on the current marketing conditions or customer demands.
• In order for the elements of a marketing mix to stay relevant and updated, monitoring any trends and changes in the market is vital. Keep an eye on any changes in your company as well for the best results.
• At the head of a marketing mix strategy, there should be a qualified marketing manager. This individual should be able to manipulate all the variables and forces to achieve a desired result.
• Always remember that the customer is the most important part of any marketing mix. The overall value of the product is determined by the perceptions of the customers. Therefore, the goal is to satisfy and retain as many customers as possible.

There is a lot that goes into a developing a good marketing mix. With these few tips, your company should be successful in all the marketing endeavors.