Brand Positioning
What is brand positioning? It is a crucial strategic task which great companies like Virgin, Apple and BMW shrewdly use in positioning themselves against the competition.
Positioning is vital to success. Get it right and your brand will be highly successful in today’s competitive environment; get it wrong and a small market shift can see your business sink without a trace.
Brand Exposure brings 30+ years of experience to the crucial task of strategic brand positioning to help your business succeed.
“Positioning is finding the right parking space inside the consumer’s mind and going for it before someone else takes it.
Is Your Brand Positioning Working?
Best Case
Your audience immediately recognises your brand and how it’s different from your competitors.
You have optimised your market mix with a unique offering and your brand is perceived as meaningful and credible with a distinctive point of difference.
Neutral Case
The market place knows your brand but it is not clear why they should buy your brand instead of someone else’s.
Customers don’t go shopping for your brand; instead they compare your price and features against competitors and you often need to discount to keep up sales.
Worst Case
People don’t find your brand that appealing or different in any meaningful way or worse; think your offer is inferior – despite what your company thinks.
You are continually forced into deep discounting – draining your business of cash and returns on investment.
Optimise Your Positioning Strategy
Relevance is the Key
In every market, customers search for products or services that match the attributes they want and price expectations they have.
Ironically though, the attributes they search for are not the features and benefits listed on a pack or website, but how a purchase will make them feel.
If you satisfy these hidden needs your brand will be relevant and appealing to a segment of the market – the goal of great brand positioning.
Difference is ideal
A key factor in brand positioning is that your brand must be memorable and different.
The right positioning means your brand is perceived by customers and non-customers alike to be unique and truly different from the other brands on offer.
This is called a point of differentiation and if this difference is the most relevant attribute to your market segment, your brand is truly well positioned.
A credible offer
Once a brand has settled on the ideal positioning, your marketing messages must always be in line with this promise.
That includes the core message, the packaging, website, point of sale – as any deviation the customer finds can sink the credibility of a brand.
Once the right positioning has been established, it should be experienced each and every time or the customer is left with an empty promise.