Can You Explain The Marketing Mix?

It is the combination of plans made by an organization related to products, price, promotion and distribution. In simple words marketing mix consists of everything that a firm can do to influence the demand for its products, the many possibilities can be collected into four groups of variables known as 4Ps, product, price, place and promotion.

Product:

Product means goods and services or combination of both that a company offers to the target market. This is the most important variable of marketing mix, because if there is no product there will be no business. It includes the decision about product variety, quality, design, feature, brand name, packaging, size, services, warranties, returns etc.

It is the amount of money that the customers are willing to pay for the product in order to satisfy his needs. Deciding the list price, discount offered, allowances, payment period and the length of credit period is very much important.

Place:

Once the product is manufactured and price is settled the next step is the availability of product to the target customer. Placement includes the company activities that make the product available to the target customer. Placement is done directly, through dealers and many other ways.

Promotion:

It includes all those activities that communicate the merits and demerits of the product to the target customers and convince him to buy it.

The marketing mix
The various elements of marketing mix are the four Ps
1- Product
Product planning is an important element of the marketing mix. It includes management, decision about the shape, design, labeling, guarantees and the utility of the product. The product should be developed after careful examination of the needs of the customer.
2- Price
Pricing is the very important element of the marketing mix. While deciding on the price of the products, management should see that these are competitive with the similar products offered by other sellers. Prices should be set at a point which yields profit to an enterprise and is justifiable to the customers also.

3- Promotions
In the competitive world of today, the goods produced are not sold by themselves. They are to be introduced to the consumers through various methods of communication such as personal selling, social contacts, advertising, publicity, reduced price offers, free demonstrations in the market, etc
4- Place
The place element of the marketing mix involves the decision regarding outlets for sale, channels or distribution, location and layout of the stores, etc. The success of the business greatly depends on the selection of appropriate channel of distribution of goods from the point of production to the place of consumption.

Brief description of a marketing mix