Consumer-Focused Marketing Mix

1. The 4 Cs

The 4 Cs model refers to a type of marketing mix that is customer focused: how is your product fulfilling the wants and needs of the customer better than your competition?

The 4 Cs model focuses on the following:

• Customer’s needs and wants
• Convenience
• Cost to the user
• Communication

The 4 Cs model shows that the customer’s needs and wants are quite important. If you’re not meeting the customer’s needs and wants, you’re not making the right product. It is also important to consider convenience. Is it easy to buy? Is it easy to find? Is it easy to sell? Is it easy to service? Also, how do you communicate with the customer to make sure that they’re getting the information they need in order to purchase your product?

This model demands that businesses think like their customers. Realistically, you could have the best product in the world, but if you do not consider who is actually buying your product, you put yourself at a distinct disadvantage.

You need to look at marketing your product not necessarily in terms of the logistics of moving it from place to place but from a customer’s point of view. What are the things that customers expect? From the customer’s point of view, what will fulfill their wants and needs and convince them to buy your product?

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2. The 4 Cs Versus the 4 Ps

Now, by comparing the 4 Cs and the 4 Ps, we extend our focus beyond the things that are under our direct control as a business.

If you recall, the 4 Ps model focused on things that were internal to a business:

• Product
• Price
• Place
• Promotion

By bringing in the 4 Cs as a comparison, we now take a look at this from the other side. How does a customer see those things, and how are we, as a business, fulfilling their needs from the customer’s point of view?

Product Versus Consumer Needs and Wants
The consumer has to want or need the product in order for you to even have a chance in the marketplace. You could have the best product out there, but if it doesn’t meet the consumer’s basic wants and needs, you might as well not even make it as the people will not want to buy it.

Place Versus Convenience
In the modern world, consumers can buy goods without leaving their homes, so for many companies, place may be an outdated descriptor. It is more important that the purchasing process be simple and intuitive. Is it easy for the consumer to go and get it or order it online? If your website is too complicated or your business is too far out of the way or in a place where people don’t want to go, then consumers will have to work to get it. Unless it’s an incredible want or an amazing need, people simply won’t bother to go out of their way to find something. Consumers like things that are easy.

Price Versus Cost to the User
A product also has to have the right price. If you price your product too high, then consumers will simply substitute that product for something else that fulfills that same want and need. Another possible consequence of very high pricing is that the consumer may simply not want it anymore or may not have the ability to pay for it. At that point, your product just sits on the shelf, and if it sits on the shelf, you’re not generating sales. If you’re not generating sales, you’re out of business.

Promotion Versus Communication
Promotion can be one-sided, with the company appearing to have too much control over the price and availability of the promotion. Communication conveys a two-sided dialogue in which the company is cooperative with the consumer and provides any information they need to make an informed purchase. How do you communicate to the consumer what your product is, what its cost is, and where they can find it?

think about it

How many of you love getting phone calls from telemarketers? Well, telemarketing can be effective. However, in order for it to be effective, the consumer has to actually listen to the sales pitch on the phone. If the consumer doesn’t listen to the sales pitch, you are not communicating with the consumer, and all of your efforts put forth for the product, place, and price simply go out the window. If you have a commercial that’s incredibly annoying, people will mute it, fast-forward, or change the channel. Again, you’re not promoting your product because you’re not communicating.

It’s also important to make sure that you hit the right demographics. If, for instance, you make a commercial that’s aimed at a younger crowd but your product is intended for a different age group, it’s not going to be effective.

EXAMPLE

Suppose you are promoting a denture cream but you want to advertise it on MTV. That would be the wrong place to put the advertisement. Not a lot of people watching MTV need denture cream, so you are not communicating with your consumer.

Any advertisement has to be in the right place; it must be something the consumer is willing to listen to, and it must inform them about the product, place, and price.