The marketing mix is the first thing taught in most business classes, according to EFG Marketing Solutions. One cannot run a successful business without knowledge of it. However, many small business owners or entrepreneurs have not had the formal training to know what is meant by this term. The phrase was invented fifty years ago to describe what should be instinctual for those in business. The phrase is still used today, though the definition and its importance will never be replace or irrelevant.
The marketing mix is made up of four P’s: Product, Price, Place, and Promotion. Packaging is the arguable fifth P. The product is what you make or do for another that you charge them for. Price is what it costs the customer. Place is where you sell it. Promotion is how people find out about it.
One must start with the product. You’ve got to find something that no one else is selling and then figure out how to get started. Is there something you think would be useful that you can’t find anywhere? There is your product. Products are difficult because they’re always evolving and competition is stiff.
“Price is a tricky issue because you have a lot to think about. It would be easy to say, “”Charge more than what it costs to make it, “” and you must do this anyway to make a profit. But consumers expect certain types of things to be certain prices. Do you want to play with their idea of a price? Will it hurt your reputation or make you an enemy in the business world?”
Place is fairly simple. You want to sell your product in a place where it is likely to be bought. Who are you gearing the product to? Why? Do you have a web site? Can you expand your sales region? Do you want to?
No one is going to buy your product, however, if they don’t know it exists. This is where promotion comes in. You need to get people talking about your product, if it’s through viral marketing, or magazine ads, or product placement in movies.
According to EFG Marketing Solutions, the four P’s are starting to be replaced by the four Cs: consumer, cost, convenience, and communication. Cost and communication is essentially the same thing as price and promotion. Consumer is thought to be a better definition than product because the term consumer means you’re looking at the buyer and what you can supply for them, not merely what you can make in terms of yourself.
Convenience is a terribly important part of the marketing mix –one that was not addressed in the four P’s. It is even more important than place because placement of a product is only one part of the convenience of an item. Yes, the customer has to have easy access to a product in order for it to sell well. Products should be placed in areas where the types of residents will be likely to buy them. But one must also consider how convenient a product is to someone. In India, for example, the mindset is that smaller sized food packages are more convenient. They would rather pay more for a smaller bag of chips that they could eat in one sitting than pay less in the long run for a large bag that would last them several days.
EFG Marketing Solutions provides unmatched experience, maturity, professionalism, integrity, and commitment when it comes to their clients’ marketing needs. Since 2005, EFG Marketing Solutions, Inc. has provided professional and reliable results for their Fortune 500 customers’ bottom line.
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