The four p's, revamped!

Confession: at one time in my life I was a marketing major. While that did not last the entire way through college, I’ve taken my fair share of marketing classes at ONU. This week, David Scott addressed the main takeaway from my marketing classes in his book The New Rules of Marketing and PR: the 4 P’s- product, place, price, and promotion.

Everyone seems to have their own opinion on the importance of the four P’s. Some insist they are essential for any strong marketing or public relations campaign. Some, including Scott, voice that the rules are outdated and do not focus on the consumer. I’m hear today to offer a new way to apply the four P’s rule. I ran across a great article from Bernstein Crisis Management that suggested a new set of p’s to use when dealing with a marketing or public relations crisis situation:

·      Policy: goals and aspirations of the organization should be withheld and strewn through a crisis management situation.

·      People: identity key people involved with responding and communicating during the crisis situation.

·      Plan: complicated plans fail during a crisis. Crisis plans need to be simple, clear, and easy to implement.

·      Platform: the infrastructure that will be used during a crisis situation.

I really enjoyed this striking different list of 4 p’s of marketing and public relations. Crisis situations are their own type of beast in the world of public relations- situations that require careful planning, strategy, and implementation. I think designing a four p’s list for crisis situation provides great guidelines for marketing and public relations organizations across the country.