Anatomy of a Product

EDIT: I would like to introduce Ajay Arora. He is a marketing consultant with experience of over a decade behind him. He has successfully set up and run various marketing campaigns. Ajay will be contributing ideas and advice in the field of marketing.
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Perhaps the best know product and brand name in the world is ‘Coca-Cola’, also know as ‘Coke’. “If you don’t know what it is, Welcome to Planet Earth” - this was one of Coke’s add campaigns in the 90s. Only Coke would dare to launch a marketing campaign of this nature because everything about it like the bottle shape, the colours, packaging design and the logo are instantly recognisable, distinctive and familiar to almost everyone in the world.

What is a Product?

The product forms the core of marketing. Customers buy products to solve problems or to enhance their lives. Therefore the seller has to ensure that the product can fully satisfy the customer, not just in functional terms, but also in psychological terms. The product is extremely important because it is the final test of whether the seller has understood its customer’s needs.

By definition, “a product is a physical good, service, idea, person or place that is capable of offering tangible and intangible attributes that individuals or organisations regard as so necessary, worthwhile or satisfying that they are prepared to exchange money, patronage or some other unit of value in order to acquire it.”

The definition includes tangible products (e.g. phone, car, computer, pen etc.) and intangible products (e.g. services of say a doctor, business consultant, plumber etc.).

Whatever the product is, whether tangible or intangible, it can always be broken down into bundles of benefits that mean different things to different buyers. The figure below shows the basic anatomy of a product as a series of four circles representing the core product, the tangible product, the augmented product and finally the potential product.

Core Product

The core product represents the heart of the product, the main reason for its existence and purchase. The core benefit of any product may be functional or psychological and its definition must provide something for the seller to work on to develop a differential advantage. Any car can get you from A to B, but add on to that the required benefits of spaciousness, fuel economy or status symbol, and a definition of a core product to which a market segment will relate begins to emerge.

Tangible Product

The tangible product is essentially the means by which the seller puts flesh on the core product, making it a real product that clearly represents and communicates the offer of the core benefit. The tools used to create the product include design specification, product features, quality level, branding and packaging. E.g. a car that represents the core benefit of a ‘fast and mean status symbol’, is likely to have a larger engine, sexy design, leather upholstery, lots of gadgets, built-in CD player, definitely be available in black or red metallic paint etc.

Augmented Product

The augmented product represents add-on extras that do not themselves form an intrinsic element of the product, but may be used by producers or retailers to increase the product’s benefits or attractiveness. E.g. a computer manufacturer may offer installation, user training and after-sales service to enhance the attractiveness of the product. None of this actually affects the computer system itself, but will affect the satisfaction and benefits that the buyer gets.

Potential Product

Finally, the potential product layer acknowledges the dynamic and strategic nature of the product. The first three layers have described the product as it is now, but the seller also needs to think about what the product could be and should be in the future. The potential product can be defined in terms of its possible evolution, for example new ways of differentiating itself from the competition.

Marketing is a fascinating subject that can really help your business grow. In my future posts, I will share many interesting things that I have learnt over the years in this field.

“The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sells itself.” - Peter F. Drucker

Reference: Frances Brassington & Stephen Pettitt, Essentials Of Marketing (2005), Harlow: FT/Prentice Hall.

Tagged as: Anatomy of a Product, Marketing, marketing a product