How Iconic Brands Breathe Life into their Marketing

The marketing mix relies on four core principles - product, price, place and promotion - for campaign success, but these alone won't give you the results you need if your strategy has gone stale.

With personalization being so important when it comes to targeting and engaging with consumers, it's vital that marketers are able to leverage campaigns to create an authentic connection with their audience. This is why place is often the most crucial factor of any strategy in the marketing mix, as it determines how and where consumers interact with a brand.

Innocent Smoothies

Coming in at a higher price point than its main competitors, Innocent Smoothies had to focus on one of the other elements of the marketing mix. The company not only promoted itself as an ethical brand in which consumers could trust, but also rethought its supply chain.

The short-term nature of its fresh juice products led to limitation and warranted a high cost to compensate. This caused Innocent to change its relationship with suppliers and retailers, allowing waste to be reduced.

Arguably the most important element of Innocent Smoothies' marketing is the way it connects with its consumers. From its fun approach to content marketing on its packaging to its annual Age UK initiative that invites all of its buyers to get involved with a creative knitting challenge, the smoothie manufacturer understands its audience and works hard to build an authentic relationship with them.

This is only possible because Innocent is careful to align its marketing strategy with its brand ethos by prioritizing sustainable packaging, promoting recycling and tackling key topics like gender inequality.

Lush

In a world where loyalty is key - and customers want to feel rewarded for it - cosmetics retailer Lush bucked the trend. As many of its competitors were introducing loyalty schemes or membership cards, Lush refused to comply and instead focused on the place of its marketing mix.

By prioritizing the quality of its products to explain its higher-end prices, and by championing a number of causes, including animal rights, Lush creates a community of ambassadors.

There is also a level of exclusivity that comes with Lush products only being available in its own stores and its conversationalist approach to selling on the shop floor. This gives customers a sense of being valued without the brand needing to offer a loyalty scheme or discount card.

Lush has also used social media to connect with its consumers and encourage them to support its campaigns. This ensures there is an open dialogue between the brand and its most evangelical customers, which, for a company that takes PR so seriously, is key.

Domino's

The once failing pizza chain saved itself by breathing new life into its marketing by embracing digital. Understanding that its consumers were becoming more and more online-driven, Domino's adapted its business model to make the most of this changing consumer behavior. It started offering mobile-friendly ordering, personalized messages and an app to allow consumers to track their orders. This, along with a quirky user interface, saw the brand connect with its target audience.

By focusing on the place of the marketing mix, as well as promotion, it ensured that its brand is where its consumers are, allowing the two to interact and build a connection that fosters loyalty.