Marketing 101 - The 4 "p's" of Marketing

Marketing is technically the art of connecting a product or service to a consumer by the producer or creator of such a product or service.Many get confused as to what Marketing is or actually does. I've created an easy way to determine whether what you are engaged in is actually part of the marketing process:

The 4 "P's" of Marketing
PRODUCT - Marketing a product is when you specify details about the product or service and how this relates to the consumer's needs and wants.
PRICING - The Process of creating a price for products or services based on multiple factors such as: Competition, Initial Cost, Inflation, Promotion, Strategy...just to name a few.
PROMOTION - Promotion includes advertising, sales promotion, publicity and personal selling. It refers to a multitude of methods of promoting a product, brand, person or company.
PLACE - location or distribution refers to how the product gets to the customer

These four are often referred to as a marketing mix. When marketing, you will use these variables to create a marketing plan. For a marketing plan to be successful, the mix of the four "p's" must reflect the wants and desires of the consumers in the target market.

Trying to convince a market segment to buy something they don't want is extremely expensive and usually an unsuccessful attempt. Marketers depend on marketing research to determine what consumers want and what they are willing to pay for. If you are trying to marketing a product or service and have not yet done the research to determine the who's and why's...you need to go back and determine this first. Marketers hope that this process will give them a sustainable competitive advantage.

Are you following the basics of the 4 p's? Do you have questions about your own products and services aligning with the 4 p's? Feel free to ask me questions on our Expert Form on BusinessIIBusiness at: http://www.BusinessIIBusiness.com/forum I am also available for BusinessIIBusiness members at a deeply discounted rate of just $20.00 per hour!! Contact me at: jennifer at businessiibusiness.com if you are interested in marketing consulting.