Difference of Marketing Product and Service Essay

A product is normally a thing that sold to people and mostly is tangible. Basically, the marketing of product is particularly focused on 4P’s in marketing mix namely product, price, place, and promotion (Ehmke & Fulton & Lusk, n. d. ). The marketer needs to analyze the major demand of customers in a specific market in order to find out a product that can respond the market demand. Firstly, it is necessary for marketers to focus on the strength as well as eliminate the vulnerabilities of marketed products in order to improve products to meet customer’s demand as much as possible. Secondly, the price is an important factor in product marketing because of the price must be set to match with the purchasing power of a target group. The marketer should understand the nature price of selling products. For example, the perfume price might be high because it is considered as luxury good and the instant-noodle price might be low because of it is considered as convenience good. Thirdly, the place of product marketing refers to distribution channels to deliver and sell the product to customers. Lastly, the marketer also needs to create the promotion on the product in order to persuade customers and motivate the sale in a short term. On the other hand, a service is the action that provide for customers and also has a different characteristics from the product (Milliman, 1997). Therefore, the service marketing is somewhat different from product marketing. The service marketing is generally used service marketing mix or 7P’s which is extended from 4P’s by adding people, process and physical evidence (Rafiq & Ahmed, 1995). It is essential for any service industry to employ appropriate staffs or people. Hiring and training a good staff will impact positively on the organization because most of customers will judge the quality of service from staffs. Therefore, a company should hire a staff that has interpersonal skills, communication skills and good service know ledges in order to provide high quality of service to customers. In addition, process is a system used to support a company in delivering the service. Process also demonstrates the overall performance of the organization. For example, Macdonald consumers will get the order within 2 minutes. The marketer needs to focus on the process due to meet the customer’s satisfactory getting the service on time. Lastly, physical evidence is external factors that related to the environment around a service area impacting the customer’s impression. Fir Example, a Thai massage and spa uses eye-catching advertising billboard locating in front of the shop and traditional decoration and atmosphere to attract foreign customers. To sum up, the marketer generally uses 4P’s in product marketing including product, price, place and promotion. On the other hand, the service marketing involves 7P’s which people, price and physical evidence were added. Because of the difference in characteristics, there are more factors in service marketing and the marketer must more concern about the customer’s satisfactory during service time. Hence, the service marketing is somewhat different and also more complicated than product marketing. I think product and services marketing are significantly different because of characteristic of itself. The first characteristic of services marketing is intangibility; it cannot be seen, touched or felt prior consumption. On the other hands, product marketing is tangible, the customer is able to touch, feel, taste or smell the product either before or after purchasing. For example, when customers walk through a restaurant, they might get the food smell from the restaurant but they cannot know how well of service if they do not buy the menu. Secondly, products can be stored in order to sell to the customer in the next time whereas services marketing mostly are unable to be inventoried, they are perishable. Hence, the value of service always exists at the point when it is required. Therefore, it seems to be very difficult to match supply with demand in service marketing. Thirdly, the other difference of product and services marketing is the level of relationship between the client and provider. Undoubtedly, there is much more personal contact required in services marketing than product marketing. In case of product marketing, customers and sellers may face each other just once time when they are dealing products and they might have no chance to see each other again. However, in services marketing, consumers and service providers may have to see each other frequently throughout until the contract is ended or until the last thing that consumers expect to gain from a service provider. There is a difference in price setting between both marketing. With product marketing, the price is easy to set by calculating from value, the strength of a brand, the quality of material and the demand in market. Furthermore, the customer can ask for discount from vendors so there is high flexibility and a standard in the price setting of product marketing. On the other hand, service marketing is quiet difficult to set fairly price. Mainly, service companies have to calculate from the cost of hiring employees and servicing time. Some companies also charge initial fee and service taxes to customers. Additionally, the service price is considered less flexible because mostly consumers cannot ask for discount from service providers. Reference http://www.extension.purdue.edu/extmedia/EC/EC-730.pdf