Putting the right product in the right place, at the right price, at the right time.

What is the Marketing Mix ?

         Marketing Mix is simple! You just need to create a product that a particular group of people wants, put it on sale some place that those same people visit regularly, and price it at a level which matches the value they feel they get out of it; and do all that at a time they want to buy. Then you’ve got it made!

        There’s a lot of truth in this idea. However, a lot of hard work needs to go into finding out what customers want, and identifying where they do their shopping. Then you need to figure out how to produce the item at a price that represents value to them and get it all to come together at the critical time.

         But if you get just one element wrong, it can spell disaster. You could be left promoting a car with amazing fuel economy in a country where fuel is very cheap, or publishing a textbook after the start of the new school year, or selling an item at a price that’s too high – or too low – to attract the people you’re targeting.

The Marketing Mix is a good place to start when you are thinking through your plans for a product or service, and it helps you avoid these kinds of mistakes.

Marketing Mix :

The Marketing Mix and the 4Ps of marketing are often used as synonyms for each other. In fact, they are not necessarily the same thing.

“Marketing Mix” is a general phrase used to describe the different kinds of choices organizations have to make in the whole process of bringing a product or service to market. The 4Ps is one way – probably the best-known way – of defining the Marketing Mix, and was first expressed in 1960 by E J McCarthy.

You May also like to Read:

• What is Marketing
• What is Marketing Strategy Process
• Classification of Markets

The Marketing Mix are:

• Product (or Service)

A good way to understand the 4Ps is by the questions that you need to ask to define your Marketing Mix. Here are some questions that will help you understand and define each of the four elements:

Product:

1. What are the benefits and features of your product or service?
2. What is your competitive advantage?
3. How will you position and differentiate your product?
4. What complementary products are available?
5. What customer services can you offer?
6. What are the costs associated with your product or service?
7. What will your price strategy be?
8. Will you give discounts?
9. Who are your suppliers and intermediaries?
10. How will you make your product or service easily accessible to customers?
11. What partnerships can you form to help with distribution of the product?
12. Where and how will you advertise?
13. What public relations activities will you pursue?
14. What types of promotions will you run?

The product is the basis of the marketing mix. It is the product which is ultimately delivered to the consumer. The word ‘produce’ cover good, service or an idea. The good may be a consumer good (pen, apple, cloth etc) or producer good (plant, machinery, office equipment etc)the product strategy involves the decision of what type of good, in what quality and for whom the goods or service are to be offered for sale. Product strategy also involves making a decision about the quality of the product, design, trademark, package etc.

Product planning also includes making a decision about the product of new goods, making research and development programmer. If the business is to stay, prosper and earn a profit. Then right product has to be developed after careful consideration of the needs of the consumers to whom it is to be sold.

Price:

1. What are the costs associated with your product or service?
2. What will your price strategy be?
3. Will you give discounts?

Price is a strong element in the marketing mix. It has a direct impact on the customer, the business, and the economy. To the consumer, the price is a major indicator of the quality of good and an important factor in making a decision about its purchase. For the business, the price at which the product or service is sold represents the sole mean of recovering costs and making a profit. The price level, in general, has far-reaching effects on the national economy. It influences wages, interest rates, employment and the policy of the government.

                Prices strategy, therefore, is the most important and difficult area of marketing. In deciding the price the business management must consider the kind of completion in the market for the good. The elasticity of demand for the product, its cost of production etc. generally, the price should be such which yield the fair profit to an enterprise and is justifiable to the consumer also.

Distribution:

1. Who are your suppliers and intermediaries?
2. How will you make your product or service easily accessible to customers?
3. What partnerships can you form to help with distribution of the product?

This element of marketing is concerned with all those activities which are needed to move the product or service from the seller to the buyer. The place strategy ensures that the products are available to the consumer at the right time when they are needed, (time utility) at the place where they are demanded (place utility) in the form or shape in which they are required (from utility) and the ownership of the good is transferred with less financial risk (possession utility) a product reaches customer through a channel of distribution. Sometimes a channel is quite short. It may run directly from a producer to a final customer. The offer, it is more complex involving many kinds of middlemen, manufacturers, wholesalers, retailers. The success of business greatly depends on the selection of channel most appropriate to the business.

Promotion:

1. Where and how will you advertise?
2. What public relations activities will you pursue?
3. What types of promotions will you run?

In a competitive world of today, the goods produced by business are not sold by themselves. They are to be introduced to the consumers. The purpose of promotion is to compete, create, stimulate demand and persuade target consumers to buy them.

                The promotional strategy covers three basic activities.

1. Advertising
2. Personal selling
3. Sales promotion

Advertising is a mass paid information. The aim of advertising is knowledge and awareness of the good and induce feelings for the purchase of the good. Personal selling is the sale of good direct to the consumer’s Sales promotion is a marketing activity which persuades the prospective buyers to purchase the product or service. It is a short-term marketing activity which stimulates quick buyer’s action.

For example, free samples, temporary price reductions, coupons, lotteries etc are only a few of the many sale promotional techniques.

The four elements of marketing mix called four P’s product, price, place, and promotion are needed in a marketing mix. They should all be tied together. The importance of each element varies with the specific condition of a business. Different products or services requires different mixes

Get the mix right and the success in business is yours

        Among the other models that have been developed over the years is Boom and Bitner’s 7Ps, sometimes called the extended Marketing Mix, which includes the first 4Ps, plus people, processes, and physical layout decisions.

Another approach is Lauterborn’s 4Cs, which presents the elements of the Marketing Mix from the buyer’s, rather than the seller’s, perspective. It is made up of Customer needs and wants (the equivalent of product), Cost (price), Convenience (place) and Communication (promotion). In this article, we focus on the 4Ps model as it is the most well-recognized, and contains the core elements of a good Marketing Mix.

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