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We have all heard that Marketing is all about 4 P’s: Product, Price, Place and Promotion. In fact, nowadays 3 more P’s have also been added which are: People, Physical evidence and Process improvement.This is all good to know from an academic perspective, but in practical reality, what all does Marketing Management cover? What are the responsibilities of Marketing Management and what role do they play in a Company? Let’s try to understand the answers to these queries, in a simplistic manner…
Marketing can be thought of as the critical “air-cover” provided to the ground troops. Who are the “ground troops”, you might ask?! Yes, these are the sales-force staff of a Company.
So, Marketing’ role is to make life easier for the soldiers of the Company to sell their products to their target customer base and win against the “enemy” (read, competition!).
Now, how does Marketing Management go about doing this, you might ask?
The starting point for doing an effective Marketing role is the STP or Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning framework.
Segmentation means categorizing the Customers according to a combination of features (e.g., demographics- age, salary, nationality, etc. or geography, or life-style).
Targeting comes next, in terms of deciding the Target Customers segment whom the Company wants to focus on. After all, is there any point going after Customers who you know will not be interested in availing your product or say, do not find your product as useful?
Once the Segmentation and Targeting is finalized, the next step is the Positioning of the Company and its products so the Target Customers are attracted to take these products or services.
When marketing meets mathematics – the 4ps goes regression
Of course, the Marketing Mix of 4 P’s is used to prepare the final value proposition that is offered to the Target Customers base.
Product is the finally designed end-product or service including its features, packaging, size, design, etc.
Price is the only element which generates revenue for the Company, hence, must be arrived at extremely carefully so as not to lose Customers by a high price and also not to get Customers at a low price, which would result in a potential revenue loss! You also have to consider the competitive prices and whether the price being charged is suitable for your target segment of Customers.
Place is the distribution channel (s) that are used to place the product in front of the Customers. Nowadays, alongside physical channels, online channels are also getting increasingly prominent.
Finally, Promotion is the marketing campaigns undertaken to increase awareness about the Company’s product or service offers and attract potential Target Customers.
Wish you the very best of luck in becoming practical Marketing Managers!
Credits:
Parag Tikekar
Faculty – Management
