Scientific marketing is very broad. There are different methods and tools for marketing, and marketers may prefer some of these methods to others depending on the type of business and conditions. But in the end, the main goal of every marketer and seller is to be able to sell their product or service to the customer.
Although today all the efforts of organizations and companies are to provide products and services that can solve a customer’s need, and so to speak, it should be said that customers include a wide range of people with different needs, desires and tastes. In other words, each customer is looking for different benefits from a particular product. As a result, the task of a content marketer is to be able to present his products and services in line with the needs and demands of different types of customers. The more flexibility a business has in how to offer products to different types of customers, the more likely it is to sell. One of the strategies that have come with the help of marketing, especially content marketing, is Kotler’s marketing model.
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Valuation of the product by customers
As we said, products and services are a means to meet the needs of customers. But these needs are different in different customers. So before we introduce Kotler’s product level model and explain how this model can help marketing. Let’s introduce three different levels of how customers value a product:
Need: lack of a basic need such as basic food
Want: A need that is formed based on the culture and individual personality and lifestyle of people. For example, the need for entertainment
Demand: A set of demands along with the ability to pay for the product. Like expensive and luxury products.
Customers choose a product based on their perception of the value of that product. The customer feels satisfied with the purchase when the actual value of the product is equal to or even greater than the value perceived by the customer.
What is Kotler’s product levels model?
Philip Kotler, known as the father of modern marketing, created this model to help businesses understand different customer needs. In Cutler’s mind, there are 5 levels of needs, which include functional to emotional levels. Each level in this model represents different product categories and how to satisfy different customer wants and needs. These 5 levels are:
1. Core Product
This is the level of a product that satisfies a basic customer need or want. The main benefits are the service or benefit for which the customer buys the product. For example, a traveler’s goal for staying in a hotel is a quiet environment to relax.
2. Generic Product
At this level, the marketer transforms the core benefits we mentioned in the first level into a core product. For example, a hotel must offer a well-equipped room to provide the main benefits to its guests. Of course, in this layer, only features of the product that meet the basic needs of the customer are presented. This means that the product is functioning at its most basic level.
3. Expected Product
Expected product is a set of features and conditions that a customer expects to get when purchasing a product. For example, a hotel guest expects the room he stays in to have a clean and tidy bed, clean towels and healthy lamps.
4. Augmented Product
In this layer, the company adds additional and improved features to the core product, which makes the product features exceed the expectations of the customers. Companies in this layer try to make their product more competitive among similar products. For example, a restaurant may attract customers by adding live music.
5. Potential Product
This layer contains all the changes that a company may add to its product in the future. The goal of these changes is to increase customer satisfaction and keep customers engaged with continuous product improvement.
Why is Kotler’s five product level model important?
Kotler’s five-level product model helps sales professionals and content marketers understand what customers need so that they can adapt their products to their needs and thereby attract customer satisfaction. This model allows the content marketing team to attract different types of customers with different needs in product introduction and copywriting.
How to use Kotler’s five product level model
You can use the following steps to implement Kotler’s marketing model in your content marketing strategy.
1. Product feature identification
Identify product features and see which level of the Kotler model these features correspond to. This helps the company understand what aspects of the product it can adapt to meet a wider range of customer wants and needs.
2. Collect customer feedback
You can evaluate the features of a product and the extent to which it meets the needs of customers at each level by asking their opinions. For example, a company can send survey forms to customers and thereby gain a good insight into how to match the product to the customer’s needs. Sample questions of these survey forms are given here:
- How do you know the value of this product?
- What desire or need does this product fulfill?
- What made you decide to buy this product?
- What do you think are the most important features of this product?
- What are your expectations from this product?
- What would you like the company to add to the product?
3. Adapting the product to different levels of the Kotler model
When a company has information about how its product meets each level of customer wants and needs, it can adapt the product to better attract customers at each level. This means creating different versions of the product with more or less features and then marketing content for each version of the product according to the target audience at each level.
4. Sales evaluation
Content marketers should evaluate sales after implementing each strategy. By evaluating sales, it is possible to make better decisions for future strategies.
Advantages of Kotler’s five-level product model
- Increase customer satisfaction
When a company meets the needs and wants of customers, customers will feel more satisfied.
- Attract more customers
Many customers may want to buy a product in a certain layer. As a result, it is possible to attract a wider range of customers by adapting the product to more levels.
- Save money
Businesses can save on marketing costs by using Kotler’s model to better understand the needs and wants of their customers.
- Retain existing customers
By paying attention to the needs and desires of its audience, a company shows that it values them. This increases customer loyalty.
- Sales increase
Increasing customer satisfaction, attracting more customers and keeping existing customers will ultimately increase sales.