Marketing strategy - SIVA replaces 4P’s?

By TJ MacDonald |

For decades market leaders and those who aspire to market leadership have tuned and re-tuned their marketing strategy to optimise their 4Ps. Their marketing mix has seen a constant ebb and flow of emphasis on Product, Promotion, Price or Place (or Position, if you prefer.)

With the diversity of opinions not just on terminology but also about the actual functions of ‘marketing’, the poor 4 Ps seem to be competing one another for centre stage.

and then along came Jones
…Slow talking Jones
Along came long, lean, lanky Jones.

So what does he know about marketing strategy, marketing mix - or marketplace learning for that matter? I have no idea, just a tune that’s popped into my head and won’t leave.

Actually, it wasn’t Jones that came along, but Dev and Shultz - in the Marketing Management Journal of the American Marketing Association (AMA). So my apologies to anyone not old enough to recognise the song recorded by Ray Stevens many years ago.

Anyway, Professors Dev and Shultz point out that the long-accepted model of marketing mix is a little outdated. They propose demand/customer centric version as an alternative to the well-known 4Ps supply side model.

SIVA, as they labelled their new model, is presented in an online article from the AMA. Here is what they say, with some simple summaries added in case you skip detail:

Customer-Centric Approach Goes Beyond 4 Ps

The four Ps don’t reflect 21st century market realities, according to Chekitan S. Dev of Cornell University and Don E. Schultz of Northwestern University.

The four Ps framework has provided the de facto methodological approach for managing marketing activities since the mid-20th century, but now a new approach is required, the authors write. Their article, “In the Mix,” focuses on a new customer-centric marketing mix that includes solutions, information, value, and access (SIVA). Using the model to respond to customer questions, marketers can better meet current market dynamics, and improve customer relationships.

SIVA reconceptualizes marketing approaches from customers’ viewpoints, opening a host of possibilities for marketers, the authors suggest.

Solution: How appropriate is the solution to the customers problem/need*

Marketers are obsessed with developing “the next new thing” in products, rather than solving customers’ existing problems, according to the authors. The new mix’s “solutions” component addresses this issue.

“Understanding consumer problems, instead of developing products and trying to fit them to customers needs, is the new marketing imperative for researchers and practitioners alike,” the authors write.

Information: Does the customer know about the solution, and if so how, who from, do they know enough to let them make a buying decision.*

SIVA’s “information” component addresses the customer question, “Where can I learn more about it?” Dev and Schultz write that “simply having customers and prospects hear us so they can either (1) purchase or (2) learn more is today’s major communication challenge.”

Value: Does the customer know the value of the transaction, what it will cost, what are the benefits, what might they have to sacrifice, what will be there reward?*

The “value” component looks at the total sacrifice a customer must make to obtain a solution. Smart marketers realize taking customers’ minds off pricing and focusing on value can motivate them to pay more, according to the authors. “As long as we think of price alone, we’ll miss the nonprice elements of value….”

Access: Where can the customer find the solution. How easily/locally/remotely can they buy it and take delivery.*

Last, the “access” component helps consumers know where to find solutions. Dev and Schultz write that “marketers should think in terms of service businesses that are obsessed with bringing the customer to the solution.”

These four SIVA components combine to allow marketers to act as servers, rather than suppliers. Using the customer’s point of view can only improve marketers’ odds of success, according to the authors.

The AMA online article (Adapted from an article in Marketing
Management, January/February 2004) can be found at http://www.marketingpower.com/content25164.php
* Thanks also to Wikipedia for simple summaries of the SIVA elements.

BUT IT DOESN’T STOP THERE

If you have read my earlier posts you will know where I’m heading with this. Rather than get on my soapbox again I’ll simply say:

S+I+V+A = [Marketplace Learning needs]

So go ahead, embrace SIVA (Just remember – that’s S.I.V.A, not Shiva - I’m talking business here, not religion.)

Only, when considering the Solution, Information, Value and Access you are going to provide as part of your marketing strategy, don’t forget to start planning how you are going to service all those marketplace learning needs that are waiting to be fed.

More on that soon. In the meantime…
Learn well; Lead well; and Thrive!

TJ MacDonald