Marketing Mix Case

Over the past few decades, a considerable number of studies have been made on marketing mix. The term of marketing mix was created by Neil Borden in 1964. It is a list of the important elements or ingredients that make up marketing programme; it is also a list of the forces that bear on the marketing operation of a firm and to which the marketing manager must adjust in his search for a mix or program can be successful. According to the constantly changing market and environment, the theory of the marketing mix has been revised during different periods. Overall, there are three directions of the marketing mix. No matter what directions a company use, the purpose of marketing mix is to meet the target market, to satisfy the consumers’ needs, and to gain a good reputation and to receive the best profit.

James Culliton (1948) pointed out that the marketer is a decider, an artist, a mixer of ingredients. Like chefs, marketers invent new recipes, follow the recipes of other marketers, and modify existing recipes based on availability of ingredients. Inspired by Culliton, Neil Borden (1964) firstly proposed the concept of marketing mix. Focused on the producer-oriented and indicated the 12 elements of marketing mix: product planning, pricing, branding, distribution channels, personal selling, advertising, promotions, packaging, display, servicing, physical handling, fact finding and analysis. Jerome McCarthy (1964) summarised and regrouped Borden’s elements into the four categories: product, place, price and promotion. These formed the concept the 4Ps. The 4Ps established the framework of the development in marketing theory. Philip Kotler (1967) affirmed that the 4Ps are the core of the marketing mix in his publication. Some researchers pointed out the importance of service marketing and added physical evidence, process, and people as the 7Ps (Booms and Bitner, 1981; Fifield and Gilligan, 1996). Companies increasingly faced a competitive market since 1980s. The political and social factors restricted and impact on the marketing. The original marketing mix only focused on internal factors, Kotler (1986) proposed another two elements: policy power and public relations, to form the theory of 6Ps. Later, Kotler (1986) added four elements to form the theory of 10Ps: probing, partitioning, prioritizing, positioning.

When the market became oversupply, Larterborn (1990) proposed the idea of ‘integrating marketing communication’, he emphasized that the marketing mix should focus on the consumer-oriented. He advanced the 4Cs theory: consumer (replaced product, focus on meeting consumer’s needs), cost (replaced price), convenience (replaced place, response to the development of on-line shopping), and communication (replaced promotion). Another 4Cs by Koichi Shimizu (1973) were: commodity, cost, communication, and channel, which deemed as a new strategy in consumer-centricity leaded to the marketing success. Koichi Shimizu (1979) developed the idea as the 7Cs model. The 7Cs includes: corporation, commodity, cost, channel, communication, consumer, and circumstances.