Marketing mix: A great principle of business development

Marketing mix is a combination of elements in an organizations offering to the market. It involves the methods used by an organization to capture a certain market.
At first, there used to be four common elements known as the Four Ps, representing Product, Price, People and Promotion. Those elements influence a products performance on the market and that’s why organization must plan the development, introduction, continuation and if possible the departure of the product depending on the elements of the marketing mix

However, marketers have expanded the original Four Ps to include further factors; the new factors include Positioning and People. This changes the marketing mix elements from Four Ps to Six Ps

If an organization neglects the marketing mix, then there offering (products and services) are bound to fail. Below is the discussion of the elements and how they can influence the performance of a company’s products and services

Promotion
This is an element of the marketing mix that serves to inform, persuade and remind the market of a product and influence the receipts (customers or prospects) buying, belief or behavior towards the product being promoted. It enables market capture due to the continuous reminders. Promotion can take the following forms

Advertising
Public relations
Packaging
Sales promotion
Direct marketing
Exhibitions and
Point of sales materials
Price
Price is value exchanged for consumption of a product or service. Price is a two way channel in that the higher the price, the lower the demand for that market offer and vise versa but some pricing strategies limit the demand and purchase of a product or service.

Place
Some services or products may require people to move from a place to place in order to access them, for example Beaches and amusement parks. The marking manager should make sure that the benefit after travel outweighs the cost or else the business risks failure. For products, effective distribution methods should be assure to avail the goods to a place where people can easily access them,

People
An organization must involve people in there marketing mix, this greatly include the staff of the firms involved. If the company sells a particular design of clothes, the staff should be asked to wear such clothes for others to see. Organizations therefore need training programs for their staff to understand the importance of being responsive to consumer needs.

Product
In many places the product remains the most important element in the mix. It lies at the core of successful marketing. The features of the product must much as closely as possible the benefits the consumers are seeking. A product future can be in form of “add on” or after sale services for example extended guarantees and repair and maintenance.

Positioning
Positioning is the process of locating your product or service as being distinctive from others in order to address viable market segments. The feature which enable to differentiate a product from those of tits competitors are the elements in the mix which are modified as a result of the positioning decision. New and unique products will appeal greatly to the market than those which have no significant difference from those on the market.