Nearly every business on the planet sets out with the main objective of earning money. This is generally done by producing some form of product, or offering a service, and then charging people money for it.

First of all, it is a very rare case where a company can offer a product or service that is genuinely unique and cannot be supplied by anybody else. This means that your enterprise will be contesting with other businesses that sell a similar product and you will both be trying to earn money from the same customers, who only want to spend their money once. So how can you increase the chances of them spending money with you?

Marketing is the primary tool used by modern businesses to draw prospective customers to do business with them and not with their rivals. It is a very extensive topic that is affected by a great deal of internal and external factors, but when done right it can be the one business practice that can make or break a corporation.

So where should you start when creating a marketing strategy for your own company? Well, every situation is different, and every business will have its own set of strengths and weak points that must be taken into consideration, but there is a marketing principle that can be applied to almost any company to be used as a marketing platform.

The Marketing Mix

The marketing mix was a phrase that was first coined during the 1950’s and is a phrase that is used to express the fundamental building blocks of any marketing strategy. It reflects the fact that marketing is not a simple, blunt-edged business tool, but rather a delicate balance of different elements of business functions. It got its name since it is similar to the ingredients checklist for a recipe.

The term was later developed to include the concept of “four P’s” that described the critical elements of the marketing mix. The formalisation of these P’s made it very easy for company managers and marketers to swiftly relate the elements of marketing to the strengths of their own organisations, and by doing so could very rapidly create a customised and effective marketing system.

Our company specialises at offeringconference production facilities and whilst we believed our marketing plan was adequate we have seen advancements since using marketing mix principles.

Product

Although every element of the marketing mix is a necessity, the “product” element mentioned as one of the four P’s is possibly the most critical of all. It identifies the physical product or intangible service that your business will be offering, and at the end of the day it is the reason that buyers are going to spend money with you.

Many people do not think that marketing has any place to play when it comes to the physical product that your company is selling. In fact, the typical train of thought very often bears the precise opposite sentiment. Surely it should be the other way around – your production department creates an item for sale and then it is the job of the marketing department to discover ways to sell it, right?

Take the computer software market as an example. There are many established brands of both operating system and software application solutions in the marketplace already, and since the market is relatively well saturated it would be incredibly tough (and expensive) to “take on the big boys”.

Rather than creating an operating system and then trying to craft a marketing strategy to take on the likes of Microsoft and Apple, it would be more effective to look at what types of product are sought after in the current marketplace, and how viable it would be to produce and sell them.

Once your goods have been fashioned and created it is still a critical skill to be able to objectively review your own products to identify the reasons that a customer should buy your product rather than a competitors’.

Another form of this part of the marketing mix is known as product variation and is typically used to either extend the lifecycle of a product currently in the market, or to make your brand new product attractive to as many consumers as possible.

The motor industry uses this approach very effectively by offering various engines, trim packages and interior options with the cars that they sell. They use the marketing mix to great effect to sell their own goods in an extremely competitive marketplace. Whilst these companies may have huge marketing budgets, the same principles can be applied to all companies.

As part of our own promotion strategy, our business carefully researched what exactly made our goods stand out from the masses.

Marketing plays a key function in a business plan and it shouldn’t be treated like an afterthought.

Price

Another key factor in the marketing mix concerns the price of your products or services. This is not a simple case of carrying out market research to determine the top price that your customers would spend (although that can be a useful tool to use), but rather using the price of your products as a strategic tool designed to achieve any particular objectives your company has.

Whilst it may seem obvious, it is still worth pointing out that price has always been, and probably always will be, one of the key factors that customers take into account when they are making a purchase. It is also worth noting that customers do not constantly consider the lowest price to be the best price.

There are many questions that you need to ask yourself when devising a good pricing strategy, key amongst which are the price sensitivity of your customers, what your competitors are doing and how can pricing maximise your own profits. From a strategy point of view however, pricing can be covered by two main principals; price skimming and penetration pricing. These are outlined below.

Price skimming

The principal idea behind price skimming is to make as much money as possible from the segment of the market which is price-insensitive and are going to be willing to spend a premium amount of money to get a product or service early on. Not only can this technique deliver great financial benefits, but it can also promote an exclusive and high quality image of your product.

This pricing technique is very often used in the consumer electronics industry where customers will often eagerly await the release of a new mobile phone or computer games console. Manufacturers could set almost any price they wanted to and there would still be a loyal core of customers that would pay it. By making use of this method as part of a pre-ordering strategy, a firm can help to smooth its own money flow.

Penetration pricing

Penetration pricing is at the other end of the pricing spectrum, and is tailored towards gaining a large market share at a short-term cost so that monetary benefits can be earned long into the future. It can be a risky strategy, but when used correctly it can setup revenue streams for many years to come.

Yet another thing to keep in mind is that “price” is the one part of the marketing mix that will generate earnings for a business. The other members of the four P’s will all cost money to create or undertake. So it is even more vital to get your pricing strategy right.

We were able to make use of our previous marketplace analysis about lamb cooking to start the online key phrase optimisation we were doing.

Place

Place is the portion of the marketing mix that is often not addressed by companies, but it’s still a significant part of selling your product effectively. In short, it describes the method in which you deliver your product to your consumer, and consequently how you receive money from them.

The most typical ramifications of place-based marketing are the physical venues in which your products are sold. For the majority of consumer products, this includes the distribution infrastructure between your manufacturing centres and shops or other outlets around the country. Since distribution of a physical product costs money it is important to identify your own priorities and adapt your distribution network appropriately. This is the primary application of this element of the marketing mix.

With the increasing use of the Internet by your prospective customers, marketing techniques have had to consider how they use the Internet to help deliver their products. By using the Internet as a place of contact (or even as a whole distribution route in download-based markets such as MP3s) companies are now able to reach out to a large pool of potential customers. Effective placing of your product or service can therefore yield impressive economic results.

Promotion

When you say the word “marketing”, many people instantly think of the promotional aspect of the marketing mix, although as we have seen, this is only one branch of a more comprehensive system. Promotion can be used on a very individual basis or as a mass communication tool, and whilst it may be an expensive undertaking it is often an important one.

Advertising is one of the most common forms of promotion. Classically it would be done by posting on billboards, producing short clips for TV and radio or by physically handing out flyers or leaflets to potential buyers. With the coming of the information age we have seen a great increase in promotion via e-mail and the Internet, or just as targeted advertising materials posted through your door.

Another important part of promotion involves branding, which will not necessarily yield more sales directly, but goes back to one of the initial functions of marketing; getting customers to pick your product over those of your rivals. When all other parts of the marketing mix are equal it could be branding that swings a customer’s decision.

Putting it into Practice

As previously mentioned each company is unique and will have different marketing needs. By using a mixture of the four P’s discussed above you can take a good view of your own marketing strategy.