The P’s of Marketing

The 4 P's of Marketing

Of course you know the P’s of marketing (ordered for the 4P’s, 5P’s and 7P’s):

  1. Product
  2. Price
  3. Place
  4. Promotion
  5. People
  6. Packaging
  7. Positioning

These are the elements we are taught to consider in our classes and theories when developing marketing strategies, campaigns and initiatives. They are important, but even now they are limited unless we fully understand the scope of each of the P’s and how they interact.

These P’s of marketing drive us since without them we are merely following the “Field of Dreams” marketing approach. And that’s fine, if your customers are ghosts of former baseball stars, but chances are, they don’t have real money to buy your products. So you really need to consider these P’s when developing an approach.

Afterall, the best ideas mean nothing unless your customer knows, needs and wants your offering.

When it comes to developing your strategy, however, the “Other” Five P’s of Marketing, or anything in life for that matter, is more applicable:

Proper Planning Prevents Poor Performance

Said more succinctly:

Measure Twice, Cut Once

Sure, you can follow your gut, you can “Just Do It”, or throw ideas against a wall to see what sticks. Finding the right balance between over-planning and no planning is critical to success.

Have a Strategy

Ideally you have a full marketing plan and strategy in place, but even tactical strategies are important. For every initiative you need to refer back to the overall marketing strategy, but fine tune each initiative for the desired outcomes.

The Business Goals and Objectives that drove your initial Marketing Plan are high level, despite how in depth the research went. Use that as a guide for your targeted initiatives, and develop a short-hand strategy that defines the goals and objectives for each campaign and tactic.

Each tactical strategy, each plan, should include at minimum:

  • Background/Rationale
  • Goals/Objectives
  • Targeted Audience
  • Required elements
  • Direction for Creative and Copy
  • Measurements (defining success, KPIs)
  • Reporting
  • Additional Recommendations

These core elements define the initiative, fine tune the expectations, and tailor the direction to meet the desired outcomes.

It makes the process much cleaner and keeps you from having to pick up and explain all the broken pieces left on the floor.

Have a target to shoot at. It reduces the chance of someone getting an arrow in the back.