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Marketing Plan
Marketers have essentially four variables to use when crafting a marketing strategy and writing a
marketing plan. They are price, promotion, product and distribution (also called placement).
They are sometimes referred to as the four p's.
A marketing mix is a combining of these four variables in a way that will meet or exceed
organizational objectives. A separate marketing mix is usually crafted for each product offering.
When constructing the mix, marketers must always be thinking of who their target market are.
Mix coherency refers to how well the components of the mix blend together. A strategy of selling
expensive luxury products in discount stores has poor coherency between distribution and
product offering.
In the long term, all four of the mix variables can be changed, but in the short term it is difficult
to modify the product or the distribution channel. Therefore in the short term, marketers are
limited to working with only half their tool kit. This limitation underscores the importance of
long term strategic planning.
Some commentators have increased the number of p's in the mix to 5, 6 or even 8. "People" is
sometimes added, recognizing the importance of the human element in all aspects of marketing.
Others include "Partners" as a mix variable because of the growing importance of collaborative
channel relationships.
STP
Market segmentation is the process of grouping a market into smaller subgroups. This is not
something that is arbitrarily imposed on society: it is derived from the recognition that the total
market is often made up of submarkets (called segments). These segments are homogeneous
within (i.e. people in ...