Marketing 101: The 7Ps of Marketing – Place (Knowledge)

Hello, I’m Jim Glover, "That Branding Guy" for Once a Day Marketing™. Today we’re beginning a series on the fundamentals of marketing using the 7Ps with a discussion of Place.

One of the key questions every business has to consider is where to distribute their product, or, which are the right places to be selling their product in. There are many outlets to sell products including direct sales, brick and mortar retail, online and catalogs. The sales process might be centered around trade shows in the Business to Business environment. 

To identify the right places to focus sales efforts, start by consider which channels are currently leveraging today to make your product available to customers and potential customers. Seriously evaluate all the ways your customers can buy your product.

 

Then consider these strategic questions:

• Are products being distributed everywhere they should be?
• Which channels are generating the best results?
• Which channels are providing the lowest sales?
• Do you need to make changes to how you distribute product through existing channels?
• Are there new channels your company could be taking advantage of?

Monitor results by distribution method on an ongoing basis to ensure customers are finding your product where they want it to be and you are achieving the results you expect. If a particular channel is working for you, then keep pushing product through it. If another channel has poor results, consider shutting it down.

Also research what your competition is doing. You may be able to identify an interesting practice that you can emulate. Seek best practices from a broad perspective as well, there may be a company doing something creative with respect to how they are pushing their products through a channel and you can do the same thing.

Lastly, you can always ask your customers which distribution methods best meet their needs. Again, the goal is to be where they want to find your product, not necessarily in the channel that you prefer.

Once a Day Marketing™ inspires clients to brand bold. Visit our website at www.onceadaymarketing.com. Contact James Glover at (505) 501-1330 or email glover@onceadaymarketing.com. Listen to Ask Those Branding Guys™ every Monday at11:00am (MDT) streaming live on SantaFe.com KVSF 101.5 FM.

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