Why the 4E's of Marketing are replacing the old 4P’s?

Why the 4E's of Marketing are replacing the old 4P’s?

The world of Marketing have clearly changed, many of the tools and assumptions that we grew up with, many of them are out of date and no longer valid, realizing this fact, The Chairman and CEO of Ogilvy One Worldwide, Brian Fetherstonhaugh, advocated the replacement of the traditional marketing mix – known as the ’4 P’s’ with a modern day version – the ’4 E’s’. 

According to Fetherstonhaugh:

• Product has become Experience
• Place has become Everyplace
• Price has become Exchange
•  Promotion has become Evangelism

 From Product to Experience

Rather than focusing your marketing efforts on the products that your organization provides, of which for one reason or another we may change at a later stage, Experience focuses on the end to end customer experience (customer journey), you are no longer selling products/ service; you are now offering solutions that satisfies a customer’s need.

For a company to survive in today’s highly competitive global economy, it has to be flexible enough to transform its scope of work when the time, otherwise it will face the threat of bankruptcy, although most of us do remember Atari and Kodak, who were the pioneers in their technologies in the 80’s and 90’s, most of the younger generations will not be able to make that connection or remember these two giants.

Companies that focus on promoting their company brand on the other and adopts an experience approach to their customers, such as IBM and Apple, who over and over again were able to transform their scope radically and grow stronger, they realized the importance of this transformation which reflects in the way they promote their brands.

From Place to Everyplace

‘Everywhere’ reflects consumers’ ability to access your solutions at their own convenience, business developers need to learn how to ‘intercept’ their customers rather than ‘interrupt’, customers must be engaged when they are more likely to be receptive to you, knowing how hard this can be, your marketing efforts must be designed in a way to make sure that when the right time come, you are there on their minds. Therefore a strong presence needs to be developed both Online and Offline

From Price to Exchange

The evolution from Price to Exchange highlights the need to recognize value, In today’s world, Price still matter yet you need to demonstrate the value you are offering your customer in exchange for what he is paying, although most people think that the majority of the market are price oriented, if this was true then everyone will be buying their products straight from China! There are plenty of cases were customers will not go with the lowest price rather choose to the solution that offers the highest value.

So as long as you justify your price to your customer by highlighting the value he is receiving in exchange, your chances will be higher in being able to close the sale.

From Promotion to Evangelism

These days it is not only important to promote the products you are selling, you must learn how to things one step further by turning your customers into brand evangelists, If you are promoting a technical solution, take it further by educating and training your potential customers about the technicalities of your solution, when you provide a training seminar for X company or Y Contractor, offer useful information about the solution and educate your guests (add value), you will be able to build rapport with them and seize the coffee break time and lunch time to build personal relationships with them, This will produce a positive impact on your business.

Now that they are trained by you, they are more likely they will buy your solutions as they will feel more related to what you do, they will start promote and advocate your solutions within their own networks, colleagues and concerned people for many reasons, they now know you on a personal level, they have built a relationship with you based on trust and they are certified by your brand as experts within the area of your training; they will include the training certificate on their CV and even add it to their LinkedIn profiles, all these steps would only create a positive impact on your sales as it will allow word of mouth to spread far more than any other marketing tool.

Also, participating in Exhibitions, Conferences in  and networking events can further enhance your brand awareness and presence, however, you must be careful when using such approach as participating will require you to be prepared; you will need a well-designed booth, Brochures, Catalogs, a comfortable environment and a big screen that plays your corporate videos, participating without preparation will not add any value to your brand image and will only be a waste of your marketing budget, booking a seminar session within the exhibition to raise awareness about your solutions to participants allows you to know who your target audience is as the the majority of the attendees are those who are most likely to be interested in your scope of solutions.

Applying the new 4E’s of marketing rather than the old 4P’s will produce a better impact on your brand image and eventually translate into revenues to your business.

References:

Fetherstonhaugh, B. (2009) ‘The 4 P’s are out, the 4 E’s are in’ Oglivy & Maher website [Online] Available at: <http://www.ogilvy.com/On-Our-Minds/Articles/the_4E_-are_in.aspx>