The Letter P and Business
Dealing with People: A Guide to Marketing Consultation.
Chapter 2: The Letter P and Business.
Keywords:
Purpose
Position
Plan
Profit
Starting a Business Begins with Purpose.
A challenging thing is finding a purpose that you won’t give up on. This isn’t something shallow like money or fame. Your purpose as a brand is the reason your products/service/perspective serves the public. A great way to think about this is to look at mission statements by other companies. Google’s for instance, is “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.” What is it that you/your product do (in the practical sense) in relation to the public? How will you do it in a way that’s unique to you? Invest your time and your effort into thinking a purpose that moves you. If you don’t fully believe in your purpose, how will the public? Once you discover your purpose, you can rest easy on a strong foundation, and you can begin working on your position.
What’s Your Position in the Market
Your foundation is the key element in getting you started, but where do you go once you’ve discovered what drives you? How do you find the place where what you offer can thrive? You need to find your position. Positioning yourself in the market basically means pushing around variables to satisfy customers in your target market, adding value to your business, and helping to distinguish yourself from competitors. The variables that you have topics around are called The Marketing Mix, or The 7 P’s of Marketing.
The 7 P’s of Marketing
There were originally 5, and many people like to add more, but I like keeping them separate. understanding and developing your marketing mix i the first bricks on top of your foundation.
Product: What do you do/make/provide?
Process: What happens when I make the product? What happens when people buy/use it?
Packaging: Once people commit, how do they receive what you offer? How does that experience happen?
People: Who wants that? What age group/demographics?
Place: Where do they have to go to get it? Where do you need to find them?
Price: How much does it/will it cost? How much does it cost to make/sell? How much will people pay?
Promotion: What’s you’re message? How do the other 5 P’s work in relation to this?
All of these questions are what put you on the right track to set up your plan and begin your journey as an Entrepreneur, Entertainer, Creative, or Freelancer. Infuse your purpose into every aspect of your marketing mix, and it will drive you into a prosperous future if you work hard at it. The important thing is to head in the right directions, you accomplish this with a solid plan.
Plan Your Work, Work Your Plan
You’ve gotta have a plan when the rubber meets the road. A business plan may sound like a formal report that you need to turn into your teacher, you may even think that “the world is an ever changing place, I’ll figure it out as I go!” That’s all good and well, be prepared for surprises, and keep your schedule loose. While a sailor navigates the water, he adjusts to the wind. A plan helps you understand your general course, and keeps you focused. Here the basic structure of a business plan:
Executive Summary: A brief explanation of your company and why it’ll be successful, mission statement and team included with some financial information about growth plans.
Company Description: Explain how your business solves problems/provides your service. Explain your niche.
Market Analysis: Understand your target market, do some competitive research and what works for your competitors? Explain how you can do it better.
Organization and Management: Explain the legal structure of your company. If it’s just you, explain who’ll need as you grow.
Service or Product Line: Describe what you sell/offer. Explain how your offering benefits the customer and your product life cycle. Outline any intellectual property and any research and development you do or intend to do.
Marketing and Sales: Describe how you’ll attract and retain customers. Explain how you’ll make the sale happen and how you plan to evolve over time. You’ll need this section later for projections also.
Funding Request: If you need to ask for money, you want to outline how much money you’ll need and how you’ll use it over the next five years. Ensure you include how you intend to earn it back and how long it’ll take.
Financial Projections: Forecast your success to convince the reader you’ll be stable and successful over years. If you’re already up and running, make sure you include balance sheets and any statements you’ve accumulated.
Appendix: Finish your plan with your additional materials, this might include bank statements or financial documents, media kits, graphics, or any range of necessary certifications and materials that a potential investor or customer might scrutinize.
All these things might seem complicated at first, but building a business is like building a boat. Once you’ve accomplished your technical tasks, all you have to do is navigate and sail until you’re ready to expand your fleet. All great journeys have a beginning, and this plan will be your tool kit along the way, a basic set of tools for you to access and fall back on for future reference. We’ll go over all these sections in this book for the next few chapters.
It Pays to be Prepared
Every business makes money at a different rate, there’s no exact timeline for turning a profit on your entire business, but there are trends. There can be businesses that begin generating money in the first day with low overhead and high growth markets, but most don’t see returns until the third or even fifth year. The important thing about this fact is that planning will help you bridge the gap between expenses and profit. Keep these things in mind when you’re worried about profit:
Innovation is exciting, but value is a principle.
Keep the cost of production low.
Always charge the cost of doing business.
If you can’t reproduce results, it’s a bet not a business.
It pays to be prepared and to think outside the box, but being an original is the secret to making your business successful. In summary: the letter P is clearly important in business. Understand your purpose, evaluate your position, set up your plan, and profit accordingly.
Thank You.