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Pricing as an Element of the Marketing Mix

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Pricing as an
Element of the Marketing Mix

THE COMMERCIAL EXCHANGE

Although people often think of marketing as synonymous with advertising or salesmanship, it is actually much broader. Marketing consists of the full range of activities involved in facilitating commercial exchanges and having all of these activities be guided by a concern for customer needs.

The central idea here is that of the commercial exchange (see Figure 1.1). This is where a seller provides a product to a buyer in return for something in exchange (usually an amount of money). The product could be something tangible, which is referred to as a good, or the product could be the result of human or mechanical effort, which is referred to as a service. The buyer could be a consumer - an individual who purchases a product for his or her own use - or the buyer could be a business customer - an individual or group who purchases the product in order to resell it or for other business purposes.

One aspect that makes the commercial exchange a very important idea is that it describes an interaction that is voluntary. Both the buyer and seller participate in the exchange voluntarily because the exchange will lead them both to be better off. For example, consider the vendor in the street selling Chocolates. You pay in your money and get a large package of M&M’s. You do that voluntarily because you would rather have the bag of candy than the money. On the other hand, the Mars company, which produces M&M’s, also engages in this transaction voluntarily. As we know, the company would rather have your money than that extra package of candy.

Product

Something In Exchange

• Product : goods or service
• Buyer : consumer or business customer
• Something in exchange : price Figure 1.1

Although we tend to take commercial exchanges for granted, we shouldn’t forget that there is

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