by Mike Stratfold

Created on: November 11, 2009

From what the experts say lets have a look at marketing from a practical and theoretical viewpoint to understand its meaning in depth.

In terms of marketing you have to consider many things including your target market, which is your targeted customer and your marketing mix as discussed below.

There are seven main areas that marketing managers look at called the marketing mix which is the critical part of a marketing plan.First we need to address the product itself, then the price, then the place or location that you sell the product, then promotion, then physical, people and processes.

lets firstly look at :

1. Product.

The product is critical considering the type and style and branding of the product. Most marketers try to differentiate their products from their competitors in some way to make their product more appealing. The product life cycle is a model that helps marketers to identify the length or shelf life of the product in the market place. For example it might be three years before coca cola develops a new brand of coke.

2. Price.

The price is critical in determining the perceived quality of a product , thus the higher the price the higher the perceived quality and vice versa.There are a few strategies that marketers can utilize here, for example, psychological pricing which means instead of charging 10.00 dollars for a product it is 9.95 as it appears cheaper.

3 Place.

This is the location where you sell your product whether it be a shop front or a website . Once again if you have an exclusive product your store or website has to look expensive. If your product is cheap and nasty then your store also has to look cheap and nasty.

4 Promotion.

Promotion consists of four elements Advertising, Sales promotion, Personal selling and Public Relations.

Advertising is the main area that people are normally concerned with which involves the message that you are trying to portray to your customer. You can advertise on the television, the radio, in a movie, in a newspaper, on a bus, on the web. Some people have even sold parts of their body to use as advertising space. But I suggest you dont adopt this strategy.

Sales promotions means things like two for the price of one, twenty percent off, one day only sale.

Personal selling is how good your sales staff are and can they sell your products to your customers.

Public relations is how you or your company deal with the media and thus how people perceive your company and potentially your product. For example,

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