The 4 Ps of marketing: examples you can copy the shape of

The 4 Ps are Product, Price, Place and Promotion: what you sell, what you charge, where people can get it, and how they come to know about it. An example is only useful if all four lines point the same way, so here is the shape, written out for well known brands and then for four ordinary businesses. IKEA: flat pack furniture you assemble yourself, deliberately low prices, huge self service stores on the edge of town plus a growing online range, and a famous catalogue and showroom experience doing the promotion. Every line supports the same promise, which is design you can afford today. That alignment is the whole point of the model.

Read the examples below for structure rather than content. The useful exercise is to notice how each Price decision is forced by the Product decision, and how Place quietly decides what Promotion can say.

The four lines, in one sentence each

• Product. What the customer gets, including the range, the quality level, the packaging, the warranty and the service around it.
• Price. The number, and everything attached to it: discounts, payment terms, bundles, subscription versus one off.
• Place. Where the buyer can obtain it: your own store or site, retailers, marketplaces, distributors, app stores, your clinic.
• Promotion. How they hear about it and are persuaded: advertising, search, social, public relations, sales teams, referrals.

Three well known brands, on four lines

	Product	Price	Place	Promotion
IKEA	Flat pack furniture and home goods, self assembly, coordinated ranges	Low, with the saving explained by the customer doing the assembly and transport	Large out of town stores laid out as a route, plus online and smaller city formats	The catalogue, the showroom itself, the restaurant, broad brand advertising
Apple	A small number of hardware lines, tightly integrated with its own software and services	Premium, held firm, with trade in and instalments instead of discounts	Its own stores and website, plus selected carriers and authorised resellers	Launch events, product led advertising, retail staff as the demonstration
McDonald's	A short, standardised menu, with items added for local tastes in each country	Value tiers at the bottom and bundled meals above them	Franchised outlets chosen for footfall, drive through, and delivery apps	Mass advertising, sponsorships, the app and its offers

Notice what happens if you move one line. Apple at IKEA prices stops being Apple, because the Price is carrying the positioning. IKEA in small high street units cannot run the same Product, because the Product depends on warehouse volume. The mix is a system.

Worked example one: an independent coffee shop

• Product. Single origin filter and espresso, a short food menu baked on site, oat and soy as standard, retail bags of beans with the roast date printed.
• Price. Set above the nearby chains and justified by the beans and the barista, with a loyalty card instead of discounting and a lower priced filter option so the entry point is not intimidating.
• Place. One site chosen for morning footfall near offices, takeaway window for the commute, beans sold at the counter and on a simple online store, no delivery apps at launch because the margin and the handling do not suit it.
• Promotion. A complete Google Business Profile with photos and hours, reviews asked for in person at the counter, Instagram showing the roast and the staff, a local office drop of tasting vouchers.

The consistency check passes: a premium Product justifies the Price, the Place puts it in front of people willing to pay it, and the Promotion is all local and all about craft.

Worked example two: a business software tool

• Product. A scheduling tool for clinics, with one job done properly, integrations to the two calendar systems clinics already use, and onboarding included.
• Price. Per clinic per month in three tiers by number of practitioners, annual billing discounted, a free trial without a card, published on the pricing page.
• Place. Sold direct through the website with self serve signup, plus a listing in the two software directories clinic managers search, and a referral arrangement with practice consultants.
• Promotion. Content answering the operational questions clinic managers search for, a comparison page against the incumbent, search advertising on high intent terms, and a webinar run with an industry association.

Worked example three: a direct to consumer skincare brand

• Product. Four products, not forty, with full ingredient lists, dermatologist tested claims that can be substantiated, recyclable packaging and refills.
• Price. Mid market, with a subscribe and save option that makes the repeat purchase the default, and bundles for the routine rather than discounts on single items.
• Place. Own website first so the customer relationship and the data stay in house, then one marketplace for reach, then selected pharmacy retail once the brand is known.
• Promotion. Creator content and customer photos, before and after reviews with permission, search for ingredient and problem queries, email for the refill cycle.

Worked example four: a dental clinic

• Product. General dentistry plus two named specialisms, evening appointments, treatment plans written in plain language, finance available for larger work.
• Price. A published price list for common treatments and a free initial consultation for the specialisms, because the barrier is uncertainty rather than money.
• Place. One practice with parking, online booking that actually confirms the slot, and a referral path from local general practitioners.
• Promotion. Local search, a review request sent the afternoon of the appointment, before and after cases published with consent, and a school and workplace talk programme.

The consistency test

Write your four lines on one page and read them as a stranger. Three questions.

1. Does the Price match the Product? A premium product sold cheaply confuses the buyer and loses the margin that pays for the quality.
2. Does the Place reach people who want that Product at that Price? Premium goods in a discount channel get judged by the channel.
3. Can the Promotion honestly describe the other three? If the advertising has to overstate the product, the mix is wrong, not the advertising.

Any clash you find is the thing to fix. It is almost always cheaper to change one of the four than to spend more on Promotion to cover a contradiction in the other three.

This page covers worked examples of the four Ps. For where the model came from, how the seven Ps extend it for services, and a blank template to fill in, the marketing mix page covers that ground, and the business plan version shows how the section is written up for investors.

Where people get stuck on 4 Ps of marketing

What is an example of the 4 Ps of marketing?

IKEA is the clearest. Product: flat pack furniture you assemble. Price: deliberately low, paid for by that assembly. Place: large self service stores plus online. Promotion: the catalogue and the showroom experience. All four support one promise.

How do I write the 4 Ps for my own business?

One line each, in the order Product, Price, Place, Promotion, on a single page. Then run the three consistency questions above. Keep it to a page so the clashes are visible.

What are the 4 Ps for a service business?

The same four, with the Product line describing the service, the people delivering it and the proof of quality. Many service businesses then extend to the seven Ps to cover People, Process and Physical evidence explicitly.

Which P should you change first?

Whichever one contradicts the other three. If nothing contradicts, Price is usually the fastest to change and the quickest to read a result from.

Are the 4 Ps still used?

Yes, as a planning checklist and an audit. It remains the shortest list of what a business genuinely controls, which is why it has outlasted every framework built to replace it.

A fifth line worth writing underneath

Every example above assumes the buyer encounters your Promotion or looks you up. A growing share now asks an assistant instead, and takes the three or four names it offers as the shortlist. ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude and Google's AI Overviews each answer that question differently and cite different sources, and what they summarise is your mix as other people have described it: your product, your price if it is published anywhere, where you are available, and what reviewers say.

So it is worth checking against the four lines you just wrote. Ask the buying question a customer would ask, keep your own name out of the prompt so the answer comes back clean, and compare what comes back with your mix. AI Knows Us tracks what those answers say about a business.