THE MARKETING MIX

Product

3
Place .MARKETING Price
MIX

Promotion
4. In the marketing mix, what is meant by
product?
A product is a good/service that is developed to satisfy
customer needs.

The following is a diagram of a product life cycle. This shows

the various stages a product goes through.
Product life cycle- the stages

sales
SATURATION
MATURITY
GROWTH
DECLINE
LAUNCH

Time
What is product portfolio?
This is where a business has a range of
products that are available to be sold. If a
business is to reliant on one particular product
it will reach the decline stage and then come
into difficulties.

EXAMPLES OF PRODUCT PORTFOLIOS

BUDWEISER- Bud Light
BULMERS CIDER- Bulmer's Pear Cider
PEPSI Diet Pepsi- Pepsi Max
ADIDAS- 6 stud football boot
- multi stud boot
- predator boot
- blades

VOLKSWAGEN Beatle
- Pass at
- Golf
- Bora
5. How should a product be designed?
The design of the product should address
1. After sales service this recognises that
customer may need knowledge on the particular
good/service after the time of sale.
Example Toyota offer a 3 year guarantee on every
new car sold.

2. Packaging The product purchased must protect

the goods from any handling damage, tampering
damage etc. It should be designed for easy
storage and display and where appropriate with
bar code for ease of scanning.
3. Aesthetics this deals with how the product
looks, smells, tastes, sounds. The product
should appeal to the customer needs. This
will greatly affect the influence of a sale. Eye
catching designs live long in the memory of
shoppers.
4. Social Responsibility This deals with the impacts
of the product on the various stakeholders. Green
products TRY to minimise their impact on the natural
environment. Over the past 10 years in this country
there has been a improved awareness amongst
stakeholders to be eco friendly. Certain eco-friendly
businesses are gaining a loyal customer base on the
basis of their greener attitude towards product
development, packaging, transport, disposal etc.

EXAMPLE
= use of biodegradable bags instead of plastic
= recycling of paper, bottles
6. What is meant by branding?

Branding means
creating an identity for a product that clearly
distinguishes it from the competition
EXAMPLES Pepsi, Nike, Levi's, Mercedes.

A brand leader is the brand with the biggest share of

a particular market.
EXAMPLES
Lyons tea largest in Irish tea market
Goodfellas pizza leader in Irish pizza market
What are own label brands?

Own label brands are sold by the larger retailers with the
retailers own name/own brand on them. They are goods that
are usually sold at a lower price than leading brands.
Example
Homestead, Euro shopper, St Bernard
What does GI (guaranteed Irish) symbol on packaging mean?

This GI symbol is used to make goods that are manufactured in

Ireland easily identifiable to Irish consumers.
Its main purpose is to encourage Irish customers to buy Irish
products
7.What pricing strategies should a firm
follow?
There are a number of pricing strategies used
by businesses.
MARK UP: this means adding a standard
percentage to the direct cost of the product.
The mark up helps to pay for the overheads
of running the business with a profit to also
be added.
Example: Buy at 10, Sell at 14 40% mark up
High price strategies

Price leadership Firms can deliberately

charge a higher price to create an impression
of superiority.
Price skimming this is done in the launch
stage. Company will increase the price of a
product to cover development costs.
Profit maximising pricing setting a high
price to deliberately make as much profit as
soon as possible.
Psychological Pricing This means setting
a price based on customer expectations.
 Low price strategies
Penetration Pricing a business sets a low price
to push other companies out of the market. They
are looking for largest market share from an early
stage.
Discriminatory Pricing different prices are
charged to different groupings for the same
product. This is to do with age, status etc.
Example Bus Eireann charge students less than
the full time employees.
Predatory pricing- This is where a company
will greatly reduce prices in order to push
competitors out.
Example Aer Lingus adopted this approach
with Ryanair on the cheaper flights route

Price War this is where competing firms

continously cut prices to retaliate against rival
firms. Customer benefits greatly if this
situation continues for a long period of time
Loss Leader This is a where a business that
sets a particularly low price on products can
greatly benefit from the bond developed. This
improves the chances of future repeat
purchases and the business will profit as a
result.
 1. What is distribution/place?
The channels of distribution are those methods
whereby goods get from manufacturer to the
customer.
 THE CHANNELS OF
DISTRIBUTION
MANUFACTURER MANUFACTURER MANUFACTURER

WHOLESALER

RETAILER

RETAILER

CUSTOMER
CUSTOMER CUSTOMER
Example Example Example
 2. What are the factors that influence
distribution?
Target Market- Do the customers shop with this retailer
Product Image the retail outlet should reflect the product image
i.e. designer clothes not to be sold in a hardware store
Ease of Delivery how easy is it to supply the retailers location
Payment Arrangement some retailers may look for cash on delivery,
credit may be offered etc
 THE PROMOTIONAL MIX

1. Sales Promotion 2. Personal Selling

PROMOTIONAL

MIX

3. Public Relations 4. Advertising

 3. What is promotion?
This refers to the method made by the
business to communicate there product to
the target market

4. Sales promotion providing

incentives to customers that attract them to
certain products
Examples free samples, competitions, extra %
free, merchandising, giveaways, promotions,
catalogues.
Merchandising is displaying goods to
customers in an attractive manner in
shops
Example
- new spicy cocktail sausages new to
market
- new juice drink on the market handed
out in samples
- Window displays
5. Personal Selling
This is where the seller tries to
verbally persuade the customer to
buy a product/service.
This is normally done by sales reps.
This is important for an existing
business as they keeps the link
between the customer and any new
products to the market.
This loyalty can be rewarded with a
lifetime of sales if they create a
good impression.

Telemarketing means communicating

by phone to sell products. Businesses
use free-phone 1800 numbers to
contact sales staff on product
queries.
This is a cheaper method of selling
than personal selling
Note:
TV selling is also popular in todays
society. Channels like shopping
channel, QVC now are effective in
selling products. This type of selling
is seen as cheaper and less attractive
goods rather than quality
sophisticated products.
6. Public Relations
This involves establishing and maintaining a
good public image for a business.
PR is used to build a good reputation for a
business. In large companies a PR manager
is in place to deal with promotional
activities.
Examples:
Press statements to local/national media
Trade fairs
Sponsorship of sports teams AIB linked
GAA club championships
7. Advertising
Defined as the communication aimed
at the target market
There are two type of advertising:
Informative Advertising
This is relaying factual information to
the customers in a direct method
Persuasive Advertising
Try to persuade customers to buy or
behave in a certain way
 Persuasive Advertising may be
competitive, generic or image based
advertising

Competitive Advertising comparing one

brand with another.