The societal-marketing approach is adopting much wider perspective than just looking at Product, Price, Place and Promotion as for the 4Ps of the Commercial Marketing Mix. There are 8Ps in Marketing Mix for Social Marketing.
Social Marketing focuses on other business stakeholders in addition to just the business and its customers, it considers Publics, Partnerships, Policy and Purse Strings to create the 8Ps of Social Marketing Mix.
The 8Ps of Social Marketing Mix in details
Let’s take a look how different Marketing Mix for Social Marketing is from the traditional 4Ps of Marketing Mix for Commercial Marketing.
1. Product
In Social Marketing, the product offering can be both a tangible good such as anti-smoking medication, condoms and other contraceptives, organic food, etc. as well as intangible services such as annual cancer screening, healthy cooking classes, rebuilding earthquake-stricken areas, waste recycling, etc.
It is necessary to first conduct market research in order to be able to offer a viable product.
The business should find out a genuine problem(s) that exists in the society. Then, learn about the perceptions of the problem(s) – how the general public perceives it and how people feel to act against it. Only then, the firm will be able to offer the suitable product that is a good long-term solution to the social problem(s).
2. Price
There are many issues to consider when setting the price for social products. Pricing can be determined with the help of market research.
Firstly, social marketers need to pay attention to the Net Benefit. The Net Benefit is the difference between the benefit and the cost of taking a certain action. In general, the price of the social product should not outweigh the benefits for an individual. It means that the customer should get a greater value from the product than what that product is going to cost him/her to pay. If the benefit or perceived value is low, then the customer will most likely not purchase that social good or service.
Secondly, when considering pricing decisions in Social Marketing, dignity of the transaction between the seller and the buyer must be taken into consideration. The customers may feel ’offended’ when the good or service is provided to them free of charge.
While some other people may question the safety and quality for the products that are priced too low.
3. Promotion
Social Marketing exists to promote well-being of the society and all the people living in it. This includes telling everybody about the advantages of merit goods and disadvantages of demerit goods.
Merit goods are socially desirable as they bring more benefits to the society than to individual customers, e.g. vaccinations for children, preventive healthcare programs, compulsory early years education, access to public libraries and museums, etc.
Demerit goods are socially undesirable as they bring more harm to the society than to individual customers, e.g. alcohol, cigarettes, narcotics and other addictive substances, high caffeine energy drinks, violent computer games and movies, etc.
The use of marketing to reduce the demand for socially undesirable products is called Demarketing.
Therefore, Social Marketing aims to promote increased consumption of merit goods and at the same time decreased consumption of demerit goods.
Promotional activities will most likely emphasize consequences for the society of using merit goods and demerit goods through the use of below-the-line promotion activities such as slogans, publicity including celebrity endorsements, direct marketing during fundraising events and sponsorship schemes. Above-the-line promotion can also be used to advertise on the Internet through own websites or popular social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, in the radio or magazines.
4. Place
Distribution in Social Marketing must ensure the easiness of accessibility. For example, utilizing local clinics, workshops and mobile vans. To offer the best way of distribution to the audience, marketers should first find out the habits of the target market and their satisfaction with the existing delivery systems.
For charities and other Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), the process of receiving money from people must be made simple, easy and convenient. For example, donations can be received from sponsors who will be scanning QR codes or swiping their bank cards to make a payment.
Additional 4Ps of Social Marketing include Publics, Partnerships, Policy and Purse Strings. Let’s take a look at them below.
5. Publics
Publics include both external groups and internal groups involved with a business organization in relation to conducting Social Marketing.
Internal publics include all the people within the organization who are involved in the approval process, preparation of the campaign and implementation of Social Marketing activities.
External publics include the target audience itself, secondary audiences and any additional audiences, as well as policymakers. For example, parents, family doctors, school principals, etc.
Very often, social marketers will need to go beyond the target audience in order to be successful in promoting their cause(s).
6. Partnerships
In order to be effective in Social Marketing, the business organization cannot act on its own. It has to create partnerships in the community with real people and team up with other organizations. For example, partnerships can be created with medical organizations, school boards, corporate sponsors, media outlets, etc.
Joining with other groups which have common goals is so important. It is because many social issues are so complex and complicated these days that one organization is not able to act on its own to fix the problem.
7. Policy
It is difficult to motivate individuals to change their behavior.
That is why in order to make Social Marketing programs successful in the long-term, they should become a part of how the society works. This can be sustained through implementing appropriate laws and regulations. This will strengthen support from the environment to really make the positive change happen in the long-run. For example, requiring vaccination certificates when enrolling children to the kindergartens and primary schools.
Advocacy organizations that lobby for certain things to happen in the society can supplement social marketing programs, if new policy changes are necessary such as increased funding for breast cancer research.
8. Purse Strings
Purse strings means where the funding come from. Social Marketing is often conducted by for-profit social organizations and non-profit social organizations, hence requires substantial funding to develop social marketing programs.
The funds can come from private donations, corporate donations, governmental grants, own profits generated by the organization, etc.
In different countries, various charities and pressure groups in try to persuade governments to offer TAX benefits to all the people who are willing to donate money to social causes.
In short, the traditional 4Ps of Marketing Mix focuses mainly on commercial activities such as getting the right products to the right customers at the right price and in the right way. While the 8Ps of Social Marketing Mix focuses primarily on achieving the benefits of social change to benefit all the people living in the society. When developing social programs, each element of the 8Ps in Marketing Mix for Social Marketing should be considered as the campaign is developed.
