Marketing - the 2nd of the 4P's

PRICE is the second P of the 4 P’s of marketing

This is one of the most important elements, as it is the only element that generates turnover. The other 3 P’s are costs – costs to produce, cost to distribute and costs to promote. Your price (or prices) must support all these other elements. It is difficult to get right, as it must reflect the supply and demand relationship. Pricing too high or too low can lead to a loss of sales. But – you can’t just price low to make sure you get every sale, if you can’t fulfil them properly. Pricing too low is a common mistake of the small business! I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve told a business they need to put their process up.

Pricing needs to take account of:

Fixed and variable costs

Competition

Your objectives

Proposed strategies for positioning your products

Target customers and their willingness to pay

There are various pricing strategies that can be adopted:

Penetration pricing – low price to increase market share. Then increase the price later.

Skimming pricing – initial high price, the slowly lowers it to make the product more widely available.

Competition pricing – price matching or lower than competitors to gain market share.

Price by product line – different products have different price points. Similar products with different features enables a business to maximise turnover and profits

Bundle pricing – groups of products are priced at less than the sum of the individuals.

Psychological pricing – charging 99p instead of £1, for example.

Premium pricing – to show the exclusiveness of the product or service

Optional pricing – the business sells optional extras to maximise turnover and profits.

Cost based pricing – this is cost plus mark-up, which can work, especially where costs change often, but it’s a dangerous policy, as most businesses underestimate their costs.

The 3rd and 4th P's are Place and Promotion, and will be ehre soon. Then the extra 3P's of marketing services.