Business marketing utilities are the elements needed for an exchange or purchase to take place between your company and your business customers. Utility refers to the value or benefit a customer receives from the exchange, according to the University of Delaware. There are four types of utility: form, place, time and possession; together, they help to create customer satisfaction.
Form- Form refers to the product or service you offer your customers. Your marketing team carries out research into customer needs to develop a specification for a product or service. Your product development team can then develop a product or service that meets customers’ needs and provides your customers with important business benefits such as lower costs, improved productivity, easier installation or stronger competitive advantage. Your marketing team is creating utility by transforming customers’ needs into product or services that deliver added value.
Place- The utility of place refers to the availability of a product or service in a location that is convenient to your customers. In business marketing, place can refer to the convenience of your distribution channels or direct sales operations. By improving the utility of place, you are ensuring that your customers will find it convenient to buy your product. If you market services, you can improve utility for your customers by developing self-service facilities on your website, for example. Customers can find answers to straightforward technical problems or post questions on a forum where your team or other customers can provide answers.
Time- By focusing on the utility of time, you can ensure that products and services are available when customers need them. Logistics plays an important role in improving the time utility. By developing an efficient supply chain, you can ensure that products are delivered on time. Late delivery could impact your customers’ own productivity and efficiency if your company is part of their supply chain. In service marketing, you can deliver utility by offering service and support 24 hours a day, seven days a week. That kind of service would add real value if it reduced customers’ downtime.
Possession- The utility of possession gives your customers ownership of a product or service, enabling them to derive benefits in their own business. If you provide customers with a high-performance component, for example, your customers can use that component to improve the performance of their own product. Possession has given them a strong benefit. You can improve the value of possession by offering business customers financing options, for example by leasing products rather than outright purchase.
Mention any two channels of distribution.