The Four P’s of Marketing

The term marketing mix is not alien to anybody associated directly or indirectly with processes associated with Marketing. Marketing Mix is the very foundation of the subject of Marketing, upon which the strong fundamentals and principles of marketing are formulated. The term was coined and popularized by none other than Niel H. Borden, who is known to have propounded many a theories in the field of marketing.

He started using this term as early as in 1940 in his teachings after his contemporary academic expert James Culliton summarized the function of Marketing Manager as the “Mixer of ingredients”. The mixed elements as per Borden’s perception were product, price, place, plan, brand, distribution channel, personal selling, advertising, promotion ,personal package, display, service, physical analysis and fact handling. E. Jerome McCarthy ,another researcher later on grouped these all ingredients in four categories or heads ,that were later on propounded by Borden as the four “ four P’s of Marketing” in 1964.

These four P’s are namely Product, Price, Place and Promotion.

These are classified and known so because a manager in the field of marketing can have direct control over these four elements.

The goal is however to generate a positive response from the customer through the optimum use of above mentioned elements. Further description of these four elements is presented as follows

Product: Product is nothing but the actual physical thing that is sold to the customer .It also includes any other discount, facility, offer or convenience that comes in the way of the customer through his act of purchasing the product. A manager can control several attributes of product to make it more marketable and popular amongst customer. These attributes include things like appearance, functionality and other warranty and service conditions of the product.

Price : Price includes the selling price of the product along with the discount and other financing options available .A manager should price the product competitively in the market

Place: this factor covers the distribution channel of the product and the other logistics that influence the transactional and facilitating attributes of the product.

Promotion: promotional decisions include advertising, public relations and other media related activities. While taking such decisions a manager should do a break even analysis so that costs are controlled and profit is maximized.