Thinking about your marketing strategy can be overwhelming. It doesn't have to be, though! By focusing on a marketing mix, you'll be able to reach a wider audience and cover your fundamental marketing needs. The marketing mix, formed by the four Ps coined by E. Jerome McCarthy in 1960, includes multiple areas of focus to make up a comprehensive marketing strategy. We're going to cover the Marketing Mix and the 4 Ps of marketing so read on for help with effective marketing!
1) Product
Your product is what you sell. This includes physical goods, services, consulting hours, programs, etc. It should satisfy your customers needs and wants. When thinking about marketing your product or services, you need to identify what differentiates them from your competitors'. You will also want to consider if you have products or services that can be marketed alongside one another in a beneficial way. To best highlight what you offer, think about what makes your services or your products unique. How will they solve a specific problem?
2) Price
The price of your products and services reflect two things: Both their value and what the customer is willing to pay. When considering the cost of your goods, it is important to think about both cost-based pricing and value-based pricing. Cost-based pricing relates to research and development of the product or service, the manufacturing, and the marketing and distribution. Value-based pricing is based on your consumers' belief of the value of your goods, and what they're willing to pay.
3) Place
This is not about your location but your customers! The place to consider is where you want to market your products and services. You'll need to think about where your ideal audience lives, maybe physically but also virtually--where they look for information about the goods or services you might offer. Do they read blogs? The newspaper? Are they on TikTok, YouTube or Instagram? Understanding where your customers spend their time and where they find new information will help you determine the best place to sell your products. If your target audience spend most of their time online then you wouldn't want to pay for a print ad in a newspaper because that ad wouldn't be seen.
4) Promotion
Finally, how do your customers find out about you? What strategies are you implementing and are they currently working? Your marketing strategy will include multiple activities like paid advertisements, sale promotions, social media engagement, and it is important to track how each "arm" of the branch works as well as if these activities work well together. It's important to know how your audience learns about your industry, and the types of products and services you offer, but it is also important to understand how your audience shop. Do they prefer online shopping? Is your product a bigger hit during a specific season? Do your consumers like to refer you to their friends and family? All of these elements will factor in to your marketing strategy, too.
When using the four Ps to construct your marketing campaign, you will also need to consider your budget. You can combine paid advertising with low-cost activities, as long as you understand how your consumers behave and what they're looking for. Marketing teams will carefully construct a message that incorporates details from all four Ps as they try best reach their target audience—and you should be doing this too. Whether you have a marketing team or you ARE the marketing team, using the marketing mix and the four Ps will help you figure out how to best communicate your message, where you can communicate it, and how often you need to be reaching your customers.
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