The science of marketing categorizes all the consumer products and services into four major groups:
- convenience offerings
- shopping offerings
- specialty offerings
- unsought offerings
All the four types of consumer products are, of course, represented by certain goods or services. All the offerings are available in the market, promoted and sold for bringing profit to the company. However, products that represent each of the 4 groups, differ by marketing strategies applied to them, consumers’ perception, and channels of delivering particular products to customers.
Marketing and Delivering Convenience Consumer Products
Convenience offerings are usually products that people use in everyday life, such as bread, milk or matches. People do not devote too much time to choosing what particular brand to buy. Some people do prefer some brands, but will buy another if the favorite one is not available. Convenience products are usually comparatively cheap and sold in many places.
The great number of places where they are found can be explained by the peculiarities of marketing convenience offerings: a company tries to deliver a product to as many places as possible for the offering to always be available to a buyer. This stimulates consumers to buy convenience products even if they didn’t plan the purchase in advance, or to make impulse purchases.
Peculiarities of Shopping Products’ Marketing
Somewhat different are shopping offerings. These products and services are usually more expensive and, therefore, consumers usually do some preliminary research. People compare quality and prices of different manufacturers and retailers, as well as compare brands. Since such purchases are rather significant events for the consumer, he or she devotes some time to exploring opportunities and options.
The peculiarity of marketing shopping offerings is advertising campaigns that educate people on the advantages of the particular product. However, brand name also matters: some people might choose a more expensive brand for its good reputation. For that reason brand building is also an important aspect of shopping goods marketing.
Marketing and Branding for Specialty Offerings
A totally different thing is specialty offerings. Specialty products are expensive, not manufactured in large quantities, and not sold in many places. Marketing of luxury products usually calls for building a strong brand name. These items are not purchased too often, but many people wish to own them as attributes of status and authority. Among such products would be a Harley Davidson motorcycle, a Ferrari or a dress from Dior.
Unsought Products and Services
Unsought offerings is a very specific category of products and services. People usually have no desire to shop for such items, because in most cases these are goods and services people don’t need or use unless some special occasion requires.
Marketing of these offerings is always specific. What companies are trying to achieve is public awareness about their products or services: they don’t hope to sell right away, they hope people will come to the company they know when it’s needed. Towing and funeral services are examples of unsought offerings.
The major 4 types of consumer products in marketing are convenience, shopping, specialty and unsought products and services. Among the main differences between these categories are marketing strategies (one-to-one marketing, 4Ps or value marketing, for instance) applied to each, consumer’s perception, channels of distribution, and importance of brand names.
Alla Kondrat - Alla Kondrat+ is a Feng Shui topic editor at Suite101.com, as well as a full time freelance writer and translator (Russian and Ukrainian). ...
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