The traditional Seven Ps of Marketing

In addition to the traditional four Ps of marketing (Product, Pricing, Promotion and Placement), customer services marketing brings in an extra three, making seven in total. They are collectively known as the extended marketing mix. The extra three Ps are:

People: Anyone coming into contact with customers will have a definite impact on overall customer satisfaction. They may be part of a supporting service or directly involved in a total service. People are always very important because in the eyes of the customer, they are inseparable from the overall customer service . Because of this, they must be well trained, well motivated and be the right type of person for the job. Customers are also referred to under 'people', as they can have an effect on the customer's service experience, (eg at a sponsored event).

Process: This is the entire process in providing a service and the specific behaviour of the people involved, all of which can be crucial to the customer's satisfaction.

Physical evidence: Unlike product evidence, a service cannot be actually experienced before it is supplied, which makes it a very intangible item. This means that prospects could think that there is a greater risk in deciding whether to use a particular service. To reduce this perception of risk, and also to improve the opportunity for success, it is vital to provide potential cnew ustomers with the opportunity to see what the potential service would be like. This is normally done by providing physical evidence like as case studies or magazine articles.

Top 7 questions to determine qualified sales leads

There are seven main questions used to determine if the contact or business is a qualified prospect:

1) Does this contact or business need my company’s services or products?

2) Does this contact or business perceive a need or problem that may be met by my company’s product or service?

3) Does the contact or business have a real desire to fulfil this actual need or solve this problem?

4) Can this contact's desire to fulfil actual needs or solve problems be converted into a belief that my company’s product is needed?

5) Does this contact or business have the financial budget to pay?

6) Does this contact have the company authority to buy?

7) Is this potential contact's purchase large enough to be a profitable sale?

These are the questions that we ask, and you should ask them as well, during the prospect qualification process (which is the most important part of the lead generation process).