The online marketing mix - 4Ps or 8?
For anyone writing a blog as a means of making money, it would be worth reading Daniel’s Daily Blog Tips blog. I especially like this article that applies the traditional 4P marketing mix concept to blogging (www.dailyblogtips.com).
Daniel makes some great comments about the 4Ps (Product, Promotion, Place, Price) and how these are outdated when applied to blogs. For example he suggests Promotion should be replaced by Persuasion, with bloggers encouraging their readers to share ideas and contribute to the discussion. This makes perfect sense as blogs become more valuable when they are interactive.
However, the 4Ps model was actually usurped firstly by the 7PS - which mostly applies to services marketing - and now the more recent 8Ps.
So what are the extra Ps and are they valuable for your business?
The first to think of is People, which in a red brick company means your employees. However in the more interactive world of blogging this also applies to your readers. You need good readers that interact and subscribe in order to grow a sustainable business. How do you get good readers = good content.
Physical Evidence. In an offline business this refers to your restaurant, or the invoice you send out, or the letterhead you use. But in an online environment it equally applies to the quality appearance of your blog and other materials - your online brand if you like. Develop this with a clear and consistent feel if you want to maintain a good readership. You will see a lot of over designed blogs but simplicity is the key here.
The third extra P is Process. This usually means the steps in which a customer goes through from first contact with your business, to receiving their good or service. For bloggers, this means the ease of which readers can sign up to an RSS feed, or newsletter, or even comment on your posts. Make this as simple as possible as it is all too easy for a reader to click away from your blog. Chances are unless your content is excellent, this will happen fairly quickly anyway.
The final and most recently added P is Planning. As with any business, you increase your chances of being successful by planning what you want to achieve ad how you will achieve it. Think short, medium and long terms (i.e.1,3 and 5 years) with a series of objectives, strategies and tactics i.e. where you want to get to, how you will get there and what will actually happen.
So there you have it. A great idea from Daniel, developed to add the further 4 Ps of the modern marketing mix concept.
Tag:General marketing mix People
comments
3 Responses to “The online marketing mix - 4Ps or 8?”
Leave a Reply
-
Recent Conversations
-
- deden: He is my inspiration. Whenever i say i can’t. I am trying to remember Him. He breaks...
- Product Sourcing: nice blog, i used that times 50 bestt blogs thing once, very good list of them...
- hair irons: Everyone has high hopes that Obama can turn everything around. I just hope they give...
- Jessica Helter: what a such good information.. thanks for this.. I totally agree in your post.....
- Roger Hamilton: Aggresive marketing is irritating..
- book marketing plan: Excellent post! Thanks for recommending Steve’s site - his eBook is a...
- Voos Baratos: I think that bloggers are not geeks, but geeks can be bloggers :-) The so-called...
- Andy Bargery: Hi Isuzu Commercial Truck. You should definitely be able to find good small town...
-
Loading ...
-
Subscribe to this Blog
Hi Bobby and thanks. When I refer to People I really mean the People involved in delivering the product or service, rather than the customer with user goals. But I like that idea very much as marketing is all about understanding your customer, what they want and then how to persuade them to do business with you.
Planning specifically refers to setting up a marketing plan, for example setting out marketing objectives and goals, how you will measure success etc etc. To my mind this would include persuasion as part of the strategy.
Process and physical evidence in an online environment most certainly do fit into your 5th P. As you say, setting up pathways to drive people through your site, or blog, to making a purchase is certainly important. The physical evidence, i.e. the design of your site, is clearly a big motivator for customers in buying your product. Not only the way it looks but also the way it works.
It looks increasingly to me like there are 7Ps of online marketing… Product, Price, Place, Promotion, People, Planning and of course Persuasion.
Andrew, great post. I agree with you that “The final and most recently added P is Planning. Think short, medium and long terms (i.e.1,3 and 5 years) with a series of objectives, strategies and tactics i.e. where you want to get to, how you will get there and what will actually happen.”
Thanks for sharing your views.:)