The history of marketing is as old as human society, starting with word-of-mouth marketing and evolving to written, visual, and digital marketing. Marketing empowers your brand and product to reach the right target audience.
Building a strong brand requires more than just a logo or slogan. You must think about how to get your brand to the customers and how you differentiate your business from another.
With the right digital marketing strategies, your company achieves good visibility to promote your products and services. In this blog, you will learn about the 11Ps of marketing as ingredients to make your company and products stand out by identifying and promoting your unique selling points (USPs).
Marketing and digital marketing have evolved over the years; however, the Ps of marketing have stayed the same. Therefore, as you pull together a marketing plan, think through the following 11Ps.
When we say product, it also refers to any services you offer to the customers. Whatever your brand offers, the primary focus is providing a better-quality product or service than any other competitor.
To improve your product and build a robust marketing strategy, you must focus on
- What makes your product unique?
- How does it benefit your customers?
- How is your product better than your competitors?
The answers to these questions will give you answers on how to determine your product quality.
Determine Your Product Quality
Focus on the following factors to determine and improve your product’s quality.
- How fit is your product for use?
- Does your product meet customers’ needs?
- Does your product offer a unique/memorable customer experience?
- Is your product free from defects?
- Is your product compliant with industry standards?
- Does your product give you a decent ROI?
Now that you have a quality product, it is time to decide on the next P of marketing: the best price point.
You must promote your product with the best price at which your product will be available in the market. To do so, you must follow these steps.
Step #1: Research to understand the real worth of your product in the market.
Step #2: Get the ideal price range of your product by checking out the prices of similar products sold by your competitors.
Step #3: Run a survey to find out how much your customers can afford or are willing to pay for your product.
Step #4: Think about what discounts you can offer on your products or services.
A quick note: As a marketer, you must focus on the language you use to describe your product and pricing. The language must be something that your target audience can relate to.
Place or your target market is another critical P of marketing. Therefore, you must choose the right place to market your product. This will depend on who your ideal customers are and where to find them.
This involves geographical location and digital space, i.e., social media platforms, to market your products accordingly. In simpler terms, instead of expecting your customers to find you, you must be where your customers dwell.
This applies to all brands, whether you are an offline marketer or an online seller. Instead of marketing to the entire planet, you must target the customers in the areas where you actually provide your service.
Before choosing the right place/location to promote your products or services, ask yourself the following questions.
- Where do you typically find your potential customer base?
- What are the primary distribution channels utilized for our product?
- Does your brand primarily engage in a B2B or B2C strategy?
- What geographical locations are targeted by your competitors?
Once you have all the necessary answers, you will be able to identify the optimal location for promoting your business.
Once you grasp the intricacies of pricing, you must devise effective digital marketing strategies for promoting your product. Remember that promotion plays a pivotal role in shaping your brand’s destiny, necessitating careful consideration.
It would help if you opted for a professional marketing team. This provides a distinct advantage for an optimal product launch and promotional campaign. It lets you stay on top of the latest marketing trends, monitor competitor activities, and craft effective promotional strategies.
A skilled marketing team aids in formulating a compelling brand message, bolstering brand awareness, and elevating visibility among the target audience. In today’s digitally-driven landscape, online promotion holds equal importance alongside traditional advertising.
To maximize these benefits, establishing your brand presence on prominent social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, and LinkedIn is imperative—more platforms translate to a broader reach.
People, also known as your target customer, is the P of marketing that allows you to create a better customer experience. You can hire and engage a team of experienced professionals to elucidate the intricacies of your product and address any uncertainties.
Typically constituting technical support teams, these seasoned experts provide comprehensive assistance and information pertaining to your product. They also inform you about what your customers expect from your product.
To ensure the availability of your product to customers’ demands, you need a reliable and swift process. There is a growing inclination towards sustainable logistics for a seamless delivery process.
Modern-day customers expect efficiency and an eco-conscious approach in the logistics chain. Sustainable logistics involve implementing practices that minimize the environmental impact of transportation, storage, and distribution.
This also encompasses eco-friendly packaging, optimized transportation routes to reduce carbon emissions, and adopting energy-efficient technologies. This allows you to contribute to environmental conservation.
Furthermore, it aligns your business with the values and preferences of a growing, environmentally-conscious consumer base.
Focusing on process P of marketing allows you to meet customer expectations for fast and reliable delivery. Most importantly, it enhances your brand’s reputation by demonstrating a commitment to sustainable and responsible business practices.
This “P” refers to a crucial aspect, especially for today’s consumers who pay close attention to every product detail. Your customers consider factors like how it looks, feels, and smells, if applicable.
Therefore, it is important to focus on improving the appearance of your product, its packaging, and how you present it to customers. However, this aspect becomes less relevant if the product you offer is a service rather than a tangible item.
When you offer services, the emphasis shifts away from physical attributes and more towards the quality and delivery of the service itself.
Personal relationship or PR is a method that allows your business to communicate with media personnel. The purpose of PR is to develop good relationships with your customers. This way, you learn more about your customers’ needs and design your products accordingly.
Some other benefits of PR include the following:
- Recognition for new brands and startups
- Better platforms for new and established brands to grow
- Reach a larger audience
- Retention of brand identity.
Packaging refers to the boxing of products for appropriate transportation and storage. The packaging involves several methods, such as wrapping, strapping, bottling, marking, sealing, bracing, cushioning, blocking, or weatherproofing. However, the type of packaging depends on the type of the product.
Types of packaging
Primary packaging: The first level of packaging to protect your individual products from damage.
Secondary packaging: Perfect for transporting commodities in primary packages.
Tertiary packaging: Perfect for warehouses to products/bulk shipments in pallets.
The role of packaging extends beyond mere containment. Tt significantly contributes to your product’s brand and marketing. Distinctive packaging has the potential to heighten the product’s appeal, influencing the inclination to make a purchase.
Its primary objective is to make your brand or product stand out on shelves or websites and boost sales. Moreover, it conveys information about your product and generates interest. Around two-thirds of customers admit that packaging influences their purchasing decisions.
Packaging serves as a storyteller, providing insights into the business behind the product. It showcases your product’s environmental, social, and economic impacts. It becomes a communication tool, articulating the company’s values and highlighting the valuable benefits that the product offers to consumers.
Positioning is also known as brand positioning. It is a process to get your brand out in the market and establish its credibility for customers to remember.
Three common benefits of positioning include:
- It enables you to distinguish your brand.
- It provides validation for your pricing strategy.
- It enhances the creativity of your brand.
Therefore, you need to create a brand image that is unique, relevant, consistent, and credible.
Performance marketing is a strategy in online marketing campaigns where advertisers pay marketing agencies or advertising platforms to achieve results, such as clicks and conversions. To incorporate performance into the marketing mix, you must consider the following aspects:
Product Performance
Make sure that your products and services meet desired performance levels. Therefore, you must evaluate factors such as website load times and app responsiveness. You must also provide exceptional user experience across various devices and platforms.
Promotion Performance
Monitor the effectiveness of your promotional campaigns by analyzing their impact on website traffic, conversion rates, and other key performance indicators (KPIs). You can use this data to optimize promotional strategies and allocate resources more efficiently.
Placement Performance
Assess the performance of your distribution channels with a focus on online visibility. SEO and Core Web Vitals play a crucial role in search engine rankings. You must focus on the following factors:
- Optimization for mobile devices
- Enhance your content delivery network (CDN)
- Invest in technologies to accelerate website speed
- Boost SERP rankings and streamline the buying process.
The primary goal of marketing is to generate interest in a company’s products or services. This involves conducting market analysis, research, and understanding the needs of a business’s ideal customers. The aim is to attract the target audience through informative and beneficial messaging that resonates with the business’s specific group of customers.
There are nine different types of marketing, which are as follows:
- Content marketing
- Direct mail
- Email marketing
- Influencer marketing
- Online Reputation/Public Relations
- Search engine marketing
- Social media marketing
- Streaming TV Advertising
- Traditional Marketing (Television, Print and Radio)
Three basic rules of Marketing and why your clients matter most
- Know what your customers want. The biggest golden rule is to identify your clients’ needs carefully and wants. The next step is to match those needs with excellent customer experience.
- Communicate clearly
- Use your reputation to your advantage
Marketing is about planning and executing the development, pricing, distribution, and promotion of products and services to satisfy the needs of your customers. The main role of marketing is to deliver customer value to attract new customers and keep existing.
