The 8 Ps of marketing: what the eighth P is and how to use all eight
Seven of the eight Ps are settled and the eighth depends on who you read, so here is the list, the choices for the last one, and a worked example.
Published by AI Knows Us · Updated 13 October 2026
The 8 Ps of marketing are product, price, place, promotion, people, process, physical evidence and a final P that varies by author. The most common choices for the eighth are performance and productivity with quality. The first four come from the original marketing mix, the next three were added for services in 1981, and the eighth P has no single owner, so the right one for you is whichever fills a gap the other seven leave open in your business. If you searched for "8 piece of marketing", this is the list you wanted.
This page defines each P in a sentence, compares the candidates for the eighth, and fills in all eight for one small business so you can see how the list becomes a plan. It builds on the shorter models, so if the idea of a marketing mix is new, start with the marketing mix and the 7 Ps with three worked businesses and return here.
Where the eight come from
The marketing mix began as a short list of controllable levers: product, price, place and promotion. That four part version suited manufactured goods. In 1981 Booms and Bitner proposed three more for service businesses, where the customer is part of the experience: people, process and physical evidence. Later writers added one or two more, and "8 Ps" is the label for the seven plus one.
The first seven, in one line each
| P | The question it answers |
|---|---|
| Product | What exactly are we selling, and what problem does it solve? |
| Price | What do we charge, and what does the price say about us? |
| Place | Where and how does the customer get it? |
| Promotion | How do people find out about it and why do they believe it? |
| People | Who deals with the customer, and are they trained for it? |
| Process | What steps does the customer go through from enquiry to delivery? |
| Physical evidence | What can the customer see that proves we are who we say we are? |
The candidates for the eighth P
No standard body has picked one, so use the table to choose.
| Candidate | What it covers | Choose it when |
|---|---|---|
| Performance | The measured results of the marketing: sales, margin, retention, return on spend | You need the mix tied to numbers a finance director accepts |
| Productivity and quality | Delivering the service efficiently and to a consistent standard | You sell services where cost and consistency decide profit |
| Partnerships | Resellers, suppliers, referrers and alliances that bring or deliver business | Much of your business arrives through other companies |
| Packaging | How the product is presented and protected | You sell physical goods on a shelf or by post |
A sound default for most businesses is performance, because it forces a number onto the other seven. You can check each decision in the mix against a result: did the price change raise margin, did the new process reduce complaints.
A worked example: a neighbourhood bakery with a delivery service
The example below is invented to show the method, and the choices in it are not facts about any real bakery. It uses performance as the eighth P.
| P | Decision for the bakery |
|---|---|
| Product | Sourdough, filled rolls and a weekly cake box. Cut the range from forty items to twenty so quality stays high |
| Price | Premium for the sourdough, entry price for the rolls, a subscription price for the weekly box |
| Place | The shop, a delivery radius of a few kilometres, and a pick up shelf at two nearby offices |
| Promotion | A complete Google Business Profile, photographs of the bakers at work, and a message to the subscriber list on Thursday |
| People | Counter staff trained to name every loaf and its ingredients, and a driver who is also the face of the delivery |
| Process | Order by noon, bake by dawn, deliver by eight; a text message when the box leaves |
| Physical evidence | Open kitchen window, food safety certificate on the wall, branded boxes |
| Performance | Weekly review of box subscribers, repeat purchase rate, waste at close of day and margin per item |
Read down the right hand column and every cell is a decision someone can make this month. That is the test of a useful mix: each P ends in an action, an owner and a date.
How to use the eight in a plan
- Score each P from 1 to 5 for how well it serves the customer today. Do it with two or three people so one opinion does not decide.
- Pick the two lowest scores. Those are your work for the quarter. Spreading effort over eight at once changes nothing.
- Write one action per chosen P. Make it small enough to finish in six weeks.
- Check consistency. A premium price needs premium people and premium evidence. A cut price with a luxury promise confuses the buyer.
- Review with the performance numbers and repeat.
For a mix written into a business plan, see marketing mix in a business plan, and for the distribution decisions behind the third P, see place in the marketing mix.
When eight is too many
Product businesses can work with the first four. Service businesses should add the next three. The eighth P earns its place only when you have a real reason, such as a partner channel or a margin problem. Adding Ps to look thorough produces a long slide and no decisions.
Questions about the 8 Ps of marketing
What are the 8 Ps of marketing?
Product, price, place, promotion, people, process, physical evidence and a choice for the eighth: commonly performance, or productivity and quality.
Who created the 8 Ps?
The four Ps are the base of the marketing mix, and Booms and Bitner added three for services in 1981. The eighth P was added by later writers, which is why sources differ.
What is the difference between the 7 Ps and the 8 Ps?
The 8 Ps add one more lever. The usual additions are performance, productivity and quality, or partnerships.
Which businesses should use the 8 Ps?
Service businesses and any company that wants each part of the mix tied to a measure. A firm selling a simple physical product can stay with four or seven.
Is there an official eighth P?
No. Pick the one that matches your business and state it clearly in your plan so everyone reads the model the same way.
Eight Ps, and the ninth place a buyer looks
Every P in the list is something you control, and every buyer now has a ninth place to check before they reach any of them: the answer an assistant gives when they ask who to use. For a bakery that means the reply to "best sourdough in my area", for a consultancy the reply to "who should I hire for this". The answer repeats back what it finds on your site, your profiles and your reviews, so a weak process or thin physical evidence shows up there as a missing name. AI Knows Us asks those questions of ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude and Google AI Overviews and shows what each says about your business, which gives the performance P a measure it did not have before.