Five Types of Utility in Marketing That Create Value

In the beginning, marketing was all about leaving a strong impression on customers. However, the focus has shifted over the years. Nowadays, brands want to create value and offer solutions to their targeted customers.

Instead of publishing flashy ad campaigns, businesses rely on different marketing tools to make engaging, useful, and relevant content. After all, the competition is fierce and you need to create something unique to stand out. And consumers are more likely to notice you if you come out with a strategy that shows you want to bring value to the table.

So, today, it is important to appeal to the psychological motivations that encourage customers to make a purchase. How can you do this? You have to think like a customer. How do your consumers spend their money? What do they look for when deciding what to buy and how much to spend?

You need to analyze your prospective consumers to get answers to these questions. Then, you should design consumer campaigns that present the value of your product or service. Admittedly, this isn’t easy as customer preferences are constantly changing. However, it is possible to communicate the value in a way that captures the interest and attention of your audience.

The five types of utility in marketing help businesses develop solutions that are useful to consumers. In this article, we’ll mention the types of utility in marketing, why they matter, and more.

Here we go!

What Is Utility in Marketing?

In a nutshell, utility in marketing is value. Let’s look more closely at this.

Utility marketing refers to the process where a brand communicates the value or usefulness of goods or services to its customer. Basically, utility marketing wants to convince the customers that purchasing these products/services will provide value to them. This is beneficial for businesses. Why?

Well, consumers sometimes don’t understand how a product can satisfy and meet their wants or needs. Marketers’ job is to clear up this confusion by pointing out why a certain product is worth their time and money. That’s where utility marketing steps in, showing consumers why they need the product in their lives.

What’s more, utility marketing helps brands understand what motivates their audience to make a purchase. By getting to know your customer motives, you are able to develop a marketing campaign that will appeal to your follower base. Also, this will build brand awareness and drive more sales.

Helping you along the way are five types of utility in marketing. We’ll explain them further soon.

Why Is Utility in Marketing Important?

As we previously said, most marketing efforts strived to make an impression in the past. This doesn’t come as a surprise. After all, consumers are more likely to choose your brand if they notice you on billboards, TV ads, and other. However, companies are now competing to catch attention both online and in-person. That’s why they had to change their approach.

Over the years, people have become overwhelmed by ads they encounter on their computers, smartphones, and in person. As a result, they began to tune out marketing efforts that want to impress them. For instance, banner blindness is a phenomenon in internet usability where users ignore banner-like information. In fact, 86% of consumers suffer from banner blindness which is a challenge in digital marketing.

It’s obvious that customers want a different approach. They are looking for utility. Brands should offer consumers useful products or services that come with a specific benefit and satisfy their needs and wants.

Furthermore, utility in marketing is vital because it increases brand loyalty and connects companies with their customers.

Now that we know what utility marketing is and why it is important, let’s discover five types of utility in marketing!

Five Types of Utility in Marketing

Your marketing efforts will be more effective when you take into consideration the five types of utility. You’ll be able to discover different ways to add value to your products or services. The five types of utility are:

Each of these can transform your ad building and sales process for the better. To help you along the way, we’ll delve deeper into the above-mentioned types of utility in marketing to see which value it brings to customers.

Form

Form utility refers to the value a customer sees in a finished product. Consumers often buy items like furniture, vehicles, computers, and smartphones from companies as they are unable to assemble them themselves. Although some brands sell parts and enable people to put products together, customers value finished forms more.

For instance, let’s say that your company specializes in vehicles or electronic devices. Obviously, these are complex products for customers to make on their own. So, you can encourage consumers to buy your products by emphasizing that they will get a complete item that doesn’t need any additional work.

Time

Another crucial utility in marketing is time. Is your product available right when customers are looking for it? Will you replenish it quickly? Consumers don’t want to wait a long time for products to get back in stock or delivered. That’s why the time utility is important for marketers. Companies that are able to make their products or services available to customers in a timely manner can easily convince them to buy.

Furthermore, consumer demand for products varies depending on the season. For instance, sales of coats spike in the winter. On the other hand, ice cream is popular during the summer. Of course, the demand for some products — such as groceries — is the same throughout the year. Businesses only need to ensure they are available and delivered on time.

Let’s see which other types of utility in marketing you need to keep in mind!

Place

Place utility refers to the value customers put on where they purchase products or services. This is an important utility for those looking for items that are usually easy to obtain. Convenience stores facilitate the whole process, enabling customers to purchase items on the spot instead of having to drive to a factory or warehouse. Consumers find what they need in a place near home, school, or work.

As you can see, place utility has to do with convenience. This is a component that is becoming increasingly important to busy customers. You can create place value by opening stores in convenient locations. You can leverage this utility as a marketer differentiator that will make you stand out in the industry.

Possession

Possession utility in marketing describes the satisfaction customers feel when they buy a product or service. It also refers to the freedom they have to use that product/service as it was intended to by the company. They experience this value when they drive a new car off the lot or when a brand delivers their order to their home.

There are many ways to promote products or services in a way that makes them more appealing to customers. By highlighting features of a product/service, you can attract potential consumers and increase sales.

It’s time we take a look at the last type of utility in marketing on our list!

Information

Information utility used to be neglected in the past, but more and more marketers have started to add it on their list. With the competition becoming fierce, information can make or break your marketing campaigns. Nowadays, it’s paramount to interact with your customers and deliver as much data as you can.

So, information utility in marketing refers to the communication brands engage in with consumers in order to encourage them to make a purchase. This includes product details, service information, and promotional messages, among other things. The goal is to catch the attention of interested buyers.

If you deliver the right information at the right time, you can improve your chances of making a sale!

Value Is Everything Nowadays

When thinking about your next marketing strategy, you should keep in mind that it needs to create customer value. Remember these five types of utility in marketing and think how you can implement them. Of course, you don’t need to include all five types in your campaign to increase conversion and improve customer satisfaction.

Just commit your brand to one goal — bringing value to your customers.