If you’re a marketer or an entrepreneur, you’ve probably heard about the need to utilize brand positioning. But is this concept too abstract and unclear?
If so, you have found the right article. We’ll explain how to utilize brand positioning in your market.
What is Brand Positioning?
Put simply; brand positioning is the process of positioning your brand in the mind of your customers.
Popularized in Reis and Trout’s bestselling Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind, the idea is to identify and attempt to “own” a marketing niche. This would be for a brand, product, or service. It would utilize various strategies including pricing, promotions, distribution, packaging, and competition.
The goal is to create a unique impression in the customer’s mind. The goal is to ensure the customer associates something specific and desirable with your brand. Something that is distinct from rest of the marketplace.
Reis and Trout define positioning as “an organized system for finding a window in mind. It is based on the concept that communication can only take place at the right time. And only take place under the right circumstances.”
In other words, brand positioning describes how a brand is different from its competitors. It describes the where, or how, it sits in customers’ minds.
Why is brand positioning important?
By shaping consumer preferences, brand positioning strategies are directly linked to consumer loyalty. They also linked to consumer-based brand equity and the willingness to purchase the brand.
Effective brand positioning can be referred as the extent to which a brand is perceived as favorable, different and credible in consumers’ minds.
Brand positioning in 3 simple steps
To create a unique and successful positioning for your brand, you need to analyze the following:
Understand what your consumers want
Understand what your company’s and brand capabilitiesare
Understand how each competitoris positioning their brand
Once you’ve done that, you will need to choose a positioning statement that:
Will resonate with your consumers
Can be delivered by your company (capabilities)
That is different from your competitors
An easy way to define a brand positioning statement is to summarize it in three words. For example, “vegan, traditional & feminine.” You must be as specific as possible.
The remaining challenge is to then reflect this brand positioning in everything that you do. This includes brand personality, packaging design, product, service, visual identity design, and communications.
Useful positioning example
A great example of a powerful brand positioning is one of the Australian Yellow Tail Wines.
Their objective was to enter the US Market and to be perceived very differently from the vast majority of wine brands. Note that all sell complicated products with sophisticated and hard-to-understand wine terminology.
Yellow Tail focused their positioning strategy on being perceived as
“approachable, easy-to-choose, and fun.”
This is how they achieved this brand positioning:
The product
Yellow Tail developed wine that is soft and sweet and as approachable as beer and ready-to-drink cocktails.
It resulted in an easy-drinking wine. This was a wine that did not require years of experience to develop an appreciation for it.
The name
A fun and adventurous name that represents the tail of a Kangaroo. This reflected a link to the Australian origins.
The visual identity
The company designed a fun, colorful, and unintimidating packaging design.
The communication strategy
They focused their communication on in-store activities. These activities helped the product be perceived as approachable and down-to-earth.
The price
Offering a price of less than $10 to be perceived as “approachable”. This targeted every festive occasion.
Positioning statements versus taglines
Brand positioning statements are often confused with company taglines or slogans. Positioning statements are mainly for internal use.
They guide the marketing and operating decisions of your business. A positioning statement helps you make key decisions that affect your customer’s perception of your brand.
A tagline is an external statement used in your marketing efforts. Insights from your positioning statement can be turned into a tagline. However, it is important to distinguish between the two.
Brand positioning strategy
To create a positioning strategy, you must first identify your brand’s uniqueness. You must know what differentiates you from your competition.
There are key steps to effectively clarify your positioning in the marketplace:
Determine how your brand is currently positioning itself
Identify your direct competitors
Understand how each competitor is positioning their brand
Compare your positioning to your competitors to identify your uniqueness
Develop a distinct and value-based positioning idea
Craft a brand positioning statement
Test the efficacy of your brand positioning statement (see below)
How to create a brand positioning statement
There are four essential elements of a best-in-class positioning statement:
Target customer
What is a concise summary of the attitudinal and demographic description of the target customer group. These are the customers your brand is attempting to appeal to and attract.
Market definition
What category is your brand competing in? In what context does your brand have relevance to your customers?
Brand promise
What is the most compelling (emotional/rational) benefit to your target customers? This is the benefit your brand can own relative to your competition.
Reason to believe
What is the most compelling evidence that your brand delivers on its brand promise?
After thoughtfully answering these four questions, you are ready to craft your positioning statement. Here is a simple template:
For [target customers], [company name] is the [market definition] that delivers [brand promise] because only [company name] is [reason to believe].
Utilize brand positioning … examples of taglines
Once you have a strong brand positioning statement, you can create a tagline that helps establish the position you’re looking to own.
Here are ten examples:
Mercedes-Benz
Engineered like no other car in the world
BMW
The ultimate driving machine
Southwest Airlines
The short-haul, no-frills, and low-priced airline
Avis
We are only Number 2, but we try harder
Famous Footwear
The value shoe store for families
Miller Lite
The only beer with superior taste and low caloric content
Nike
Just do it
Coca-Cola
The real thing
Volvo
For life
Home Depot
You can do it. We can help.
How to evaluate a brand positioning strategy
An intelligent and well-crafted positioning statement is a powerful tool for bringing focus. The focus is to build clarity for marketing strategies, advertising campaigns, and promotional tactics.
If used properly, this statement can help you make effective decisions to help differentiate your brand. Differentiation that will attract your target customers and win market share from your competition.
Here are 15 criteria for checking your brand positioning:
Does it differentiate your brand?
Does it match customer perceptions of your brand?
Does it enable growth?
Does it identify your brand’s unique value to your customers?
Does it produce a clear picture in your mind that’s different from your competitors?
Is it focused on your core customers?
Is it memorable and motivating?
Is it consistent in all areas of your business?
Is it easy to understand?
Is it difficult to copy?
Is it positioned for long-term success?
Is your brand promise believable and credible?
Can your brand own it?
Will it withstand counterattacks from your competitors?
Will it help you make more effective marketing and branding decisions?
Integrating brand positioning in the customer’s mind
To position your brand in your customer’s mind, you must start from within your business.
Every member of your organization that touches the customer has to be the perfect expression of your position.
And, since everyone touches the customer in some way, everyone should be the best expression of your position.
Now comes the hard part. You must put up everything that represents your brand on a wall. List all your brand’s touch points.
That is every point of interaction with your customer.
With a critical, yet intuitive eye, ask:
How can I more fluidly communicate my brand’s desired position?
Does every touch point look, say, and feel like the brand I want my customers to perceive?
Many marketers don’t have the clarity and conviction of following through on their words. Without certainty, you default to the status quo. Not a good thing, I assure you.
Turn everything you do into an expression of your desired positioning. If you do it well, you can create something special.
This takes conviction. This conviction to actively position your brand means you have to stand for something.
Only then are you truly on your way to owning your very own position in the mind of your customer.
The bottom line
In volatile markets, it can be necessary, and even urgent, to reposition an entire company. This rather than just a product line or brand.
This is especially true of small and medium-sized firms. Many of these often lack strong brands for individual product lines.
In a prolonged recession, business approaches that were effective during healthy economies often become ineffective. In such situations, it becomes necessary to change a firm’s positioning.
