7 P's of Marketing

[Jitendra Bundela]

Marketing Mix

Everybody knows the 4P’s of Marketing, but Services are are entirely in a league of their own. They follow the first 4P’s, but they have 3 additional P’s. I will briefly try to decipher all the 7P’s but I may not be able to do justice to them.  

The 7 P's of Marketing

 

Product  

Product is the total package you offer to your customers. It is the physical features of the product, or the intangible aspects of the service, it covers things you do to make the product more attractive to buy. You can ask questions like, “Is your current product or service, or mix of products and services, appropriate and suitable for the markets” Companies begin with, developing the habit of looking at their product as though they were an outside marketing consultant brought in to help them decide whether or not it’s in the right business at this time. Some other questions that you can ask are  

• What does the customer want from the product/service?
• What needs does it satisfy?
• What features does it have to meet these needs?
• How and where will the customer use it?
• What does it look like? How will customers experience it?
• What is it to be called?
• How is it branded?
• How is it differentiated versus your competitors?
• What is the most it can cost to provide, and still be sold sufficiently profitably?

 

Price 

The second P in the formula is price. Develop the habit of continually examining and reexamining the prices of the products and services you sell to make sure they’re still appropriate to the realities of the current market. There are various strategies of pricing, but I shall not go in to the detail of these. If you see the consumer market, price is a deciding factor at times. Sometimes you need to lower your prices. Sometimes, just raise them. Use a high price where there is uniqueness about the product or service. This approach is used where a substantial competitive advantage exists. Other times the price charged for products and services is set artificially low in order to gain market share. Once this is achieved, the price is increased. These are just some of the strategies used. In business, whenever you experience resistance or frustration in any part of your sales or marketing activities, be open to revisiting that area. You may find out a great deal that you need to work on. 

 

Place 

The third P in the marketing mix is the place where your product or service is actually sold. Sometimes a change in place can lead to a rapid increase in sales. You can sell your product in many different places. Some companies use direct selling, sending their sales-people out to personally meet and talk with the prospect. Some sell by telemarketing. Some sell through catalogs or mail order. Some sell at trade shows or in retail establishments. Some sell in joint ventures with other similar products or services. Some companies use manufacturers’ representatives or distributors. Many companies use a combination of one or more of these methods.

Basic Channel Decisions Include:

• Do we use direct or indirect channels?
• Single or multiple channels.
• Cumulative length of the multiple channels.
• Types of intermediary
• Number of intermediaries at each level

 

Promotion

The fourth P in marketing and sales is to think in terms of promotion all the time. Promotion includes all the ways you tell your customers about your products or services and how you then market and sell to them. Large and small companies in every industry continually experiment with different ways of advertising, promoting, and selling their products and services. Whatever method of marketing and sales you’re using today, sooner or later, it will stop working. Sometimes it will stop working for reasons you know, and sometimes it will be for reasons you don’t. In either case, your methods of marketing and sales will eventually stop working, and you’ll have to develop new sales, marketing and advertising approaches, offerings, and strategies.

The elements of the promotions mix are:

• Personal Selling.
• Sales Promotion.
• Public Relations.
• Direct Mail.
• Trade Fairs and Exhibitions.
• Advertising.
• Sponsorship

 

Process

It is the method and process of providing a service and is hence essential to have a thorough knowledge on whether the services are helpful to the customers. It refers to systems used to assist the organisation in delivering the service. It speaks about things like, if the customers are provided the service in time, if the customers are informed in hand about the service, if the customer feels that the process is simple. Marketing has a number of processes that integrate together to create an overall marketing process. For the purposes of the marketing mix, process is an element of service that sees the customer experiencing an organisation’s offering. It’s best viewed as something that your customer participates in at different points in time.

 

People

People are the most important element of any service or experience. An essential ingredient to any service provision is the use of appropriate staff and people. Develop the habit of thinking in terms of the people inside and outside of your business who are responsible for every element of your sales and marketing strategy and activities. Services tend to be produced and consumed at the same moment, and aspects of the customer experience are altered to meet the ‘individual needs’ of the person consuming it. People buy from people that they like, so the attitude, skills and appearance of all staff need to be first class. Consumers make judgments and deliver perceptions of the service based on the employees they interact with. Staff should have the appropriate interpersonal skills, aptitude, and service knowledge to provide the service that consumers are paying for. To be successful in business, you must develop the habit of thinking in terms of exactly who is going to carry out each task and responsibility. In many cases, it’s not possible to move forward until you can attract and put the right person into the right position.  

 

Physical Evidence

Physical evidence is the material part of a service. Physical evidence is the element of the service mix which allows the consumer again to make judgments on the organisation. Physical evidence refers to the environment in which the service is assembled and in which the seller and customer interact, combined with tangible commodities that facilitate performance or communication of the service. Because of the simultaneous production and consumption of most services, the physical facility can play an important role in the service experience. As services are intangible, customers are searching for any tangible cues to help them understand the nature of the service experience. The more intangible-dominant the service, the greater the need to make the service tangible. The physical environment is part of the product itself. Physical evidence is an essential ingredient of the service mix, consumers will make perceptions based on their sight of the service provision which will have an impact on the organisations perceptual plan of the service.

Some of the examples are:

• Packaging.
• Internet/web pages.
• Brochures.
• Furnishings.
• Uniforms.
• Business cards.

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Regards-
Jitendra Singh Bundela,
PGDPM (First batch)
Institute of Health Management Research, Jaipur(Raj.)