Positioning

Today, almost everyone can manufacture but few companies can properly market a product and even fewer properly position a product. Intense competition has forced corporations to become more strategic in their thinking, making the traditional relationship company/customer models out of date. Today's consumers are bombarded with choice - 25,000+ new products in per year; supermarkets with 40,000+ SKUs; 150 TV channels, 1,000+ ads viewed per day. Production is up, prices are down, distribution channels are full and the print and electronic media is jammed delivering "sameness". How do you break though the clutter? How does it all work?

Research tells us that consumers attempt to make judicious choices in the marketplace. To do so, consumers are generally willing to process advertising information that is newsworthy or relevant and when information seems relevant, accept the advertising message as a means of understanding the information presented. Consumers may scrutinize it further in relation to other information they have stored in memory to determine whether to accept or reject a message advocacy.

The primacy of acceptance implies that there is a window of opportunity to persuade people before they engage in scrutiny of a message. Indeed, the initial exposures to an ad typically enhance consumers' favorableness toward the advertised brand. Therefore the critical role of positioning is thus to sustain acceptance by reducing consumers' motivation to unaccept.

To be remembered and used as a basis for decision making, positioning information needs to receive additional processing. This additional processing takes the form of associations between the information presented in an ad and consumers' prior knowledge of a brand stored in long term memory "the repository for all information".

The mind stores information like a hard drive in a relational nature. Within the mind's file directory, concepts are segmented and stored; first by category (i.e. alcoholic beverage), then by sub-category (vodka) and eventually over time by specific attribute or image (sophisticated). The mind is constantly gathering, sorting and ranking useful beneficial images (an image is people and occasions) or attributes (i.e. #1 peer approval, #2 good taste, #3 good time). Each new concept that the mind gathers, gets a file folder and eventually a descriptive label (positioning attribute) which is correctly placed in the file directory. Each person's file directory is slightly different; however within a certain market segmentation (i.e. boomers) the data files are surprisingly similar.

The mind's librarian checks each new concept against its current file directory to see if it is needed. If the mind already has it, there is no need to buy the concept. Imagine trying to position any drug against Tylenol for headache relief.

If a competitor has already his product to a concept file label you were seeking, there is not much choice but to search for another concept to claim. Not surprisingly the best attributes in a new category are taken quickly. The easiest way to capture a good concept is to be first into the mind and then defend it with constant reinforcement. Do you think Pepsi will ever replace Coke?

Once you know the concepts the competition has taken, it is easy to spot an unused space. The rank of the concept will determine if you want to take it.

People buy perception, not reality. There is only one reality but many possible perceptions of a product. People's perception usually boils down to one key attribute which they associate with a product. So did you guess the product? Yes, you're right it was Absolut Vodka. Consumers identified high quality as an attribute of "imported" and "pure", a position available and supported by the high price. Its ad campaign positioned Absolut as the "absolute highest quality". If you remember the first commercial pictured an Absolut bottle with a halo against a black background with the title "Absolut Perfection". Today Absolut has a 60% share of the USA vodka market. The concept of purest and highest quality has now been taken.

The information discovery process and analysis of the motivating power of product attributes and images within a market segment or category is the heart of our positioning strategy and key to our deliverables.

We deliver clear recommended actions in 5 areas.

1. Clear Positioning Strengths - highly motivating attributes for which your products/services are perceived to have a significant competitive advantage-will make up immediate areas to focus marketing/promotional/sales resources.
2. Key Weaknesses- - attributes and benefits which are highly motivating to target consumers and which your product/service is perceived inferior to the competition-must be fixed if at all possible.
3. Areas to Deemphasize - attributes and benefits on which your product or service is perceived superior but which are o insignificant motivation power to the consumer-these areas can be eliminated and resources refocused
4. Open Opportunities - attributes which are highly motivating and where you are perceived as being capable delivering well, despite the fact you do not currently offer the product/service
5. Unused Opportunities - attributes which are highly motivating yet no one has claimed the concept or currently not delivering against-this is an new growth or repositioning area