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Pricing Strategies:
Integrating Marketing Mix Price Programs
Develop targeted marketing pricing strategies for your business. As price is a key element in your efforts, you need to create marketing plan programs that focus on marketing mix prices; including promotional, product line, value, loss leader pricing, and more.
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Development of pricing strategies is a key marketing function and a critical part of your business' marketing mix.
You can lose business or gain business depending on whether your marketing mix price tactics fit the market and the product.
Your pricing must take into account where the product (or service) is in its product life-cycle (introduction, growth, maturity, decline), as its life-cycle stage is a significant influence on the price strategy decision.
Pricing must also reflect the market; the supply and demand for the product (marketing mix product focuses you on that aspect). You can have a great product but if it is priced too high it will not sell. If it is priced too low and doesn't contribute profit - then you will be out of business fairly quickly.
Pricing Strategies:
Some strategies to consider are loss leader, market penetration, price skimming,psychological pricing, promotional pricing, value pricing, product line pricing, and much more. You need to understand when, where, how and why to use different strategies.
Your strategy needs to find the balance between covering your fixed and variable costs, competing with other businesses in the market, reflecting where the product is being positioned, where the product is in its life-cycle, and charging a price that customers will pay (customers will often have a perceived value in mind).
As you develop and implement your strategies make sure that the market will accept your price(s) - just because you think the price is right, doesn't mean your customers or the market will think so too. Create marketing plan strategies that fit the market!
It is important to be aware of pricing strategy parameters and the criteria for deciding on which one (or more) of many strategies to use.
Each price strategy needs to be assessed individually for your business conditions, your market, your buyer behavior, your competition, your product life cycle, your promotion program and budget, and finally for your distribution method.
The Relationship between Price,
Competition and the Market
Unless you are the only supplier in your market (which is highly unlikely), you will need to have a good understanding of your competitor's price structure and an additionally good understanding of your costs to either manufacture the product or the service.
When building your price strategy make sure that you consider the value of any differentiation between your product or service and competitive products or services.
Your strategies also need to consider discounts (for example, for early invoice payment, for cash payment instead of credit card or check), rebates (for example, for large volume purchases), financing costs - if your product can be a financed purchase such as a car, and more.
Ensure that you build strategies (and you can use more than one strategy by setting pricing for different market segments, different areas, different customers) in-line with your other marketing mix elements and by keeping your product life-cycle in mind.
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Return from Pricing Strategies to the Importance and Definition of Marketing.
How to build a strong Marketing Mix Program?
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Marketing and Life–Cycle
Marketing is a requirement for all businesses: without marketing strategies and tactics your business will struggle to survive.
Not all marketing activities are planned: you might be building your brand recognition through a social media campaign (that's marketing); you might be conducting market research to analyze your competitors and/or segment and target your potential market or to develop the most desirable features, advantages and benefits of your products or services (that's all marketing).
Marketing is pretty all–encompassing; and a challenge for many business owners. The additional challenge is recognizing that the different stages of your business life–cycle: start–up, mid–cycle, mature or late–in–life.
During start–up you need to develop your marketing strategies to grow sales; for example, you might want to use a market penetration pricing strategy to build sales quickly.
During mid–cycle, you need to grow your customer base (often through lead generation) and that need requires different marketing strategies, such as cold calling on prospective clients, email marketing, newsletter and blog sign ups and distribution (all to grow your list of prospects).
During the mature cycle, you need to build your marketing efforts around your brand; your competitive advantage can be in your reputation, history, and identity and on what differentiates your business from your competitors.
Marketing your products and services is not something that you do once (such as a marketing plan) and then never change or do again. You need to be continually researching and building your strategies and tactics to be ahead of the market, and ahead of your competition.
The market is constantly evolving; ever more rapidly with the impacts of globalization and technology. You need to invest resources into marketing to ensure that you build and sustain your business.
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Outsource Your Marketing
If you need support in your marketing efforts, or if you'd like a review of your marketing plan, contact us for more information on our marketing services.
If marketing is not your core strength, or if you don't have enough staff to commit to developing your marketing efforts (and acting on the plan), outsourcing your marketing strategy and implementation will allow you to concentrate on developing your business.
Start with a marketing plan that includes the necessary research, strategy development and implementation action plan. We provide you with the plan tactics, budget, schedule and key performance measurements.
Execute the plan yourself or have us at Voice Marketing Inc. manage the execution for you.
Once the plan is implemented, we report on the actions we've taken, the performance of the tactics employed, and on the results.
You'll feel confident that your business marketing is being effectively managed and continually evolving.
We specialize in providing services to small business owners and understand that marketing efforts must be customized for each business' unique needs.
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