If you can answer these 10 questions, your positioning will be "successful"

Editor's note: How should a brand find its own unique positioning? You need to understand your brand's target consumers, competitors, and the overall market environment. In this article, the author summarizes several questions about brand positioning, which may help you find your own unique positioning. Let's take a look.

Positioning is a classic theory that has influenced brand management for 50 years.

IBM suffered a loss of $8.1 billion that year, but with the help of positioning theory, it positioned itself as an "integrated computer service provider" and eventually made a comeback.

7UP was born at the height of its popularity with Coca-Cola and Pepsi. By positioning itself as a "caffeine-free soda", it also became a global best-selling beverage brand.

There are many cases where positioning theory has helped Chinese companies build strong brands, including Wanglaoji, Jiangzhong Jianwei Xiaoshi Tablets, Wujiang Zhacai, Xiangpiaopiao Milk Tea, Great Wall Motors, Dong'e Ejiao, Zhen Gongfu Fast Food, Joyoung Soymilk Machine, KingBoss Men's Clothing...

How to position your brand? There are different answers in marketing positioning, brand positioning, category positioning, and strategic positioning. Based on my understanding of the general retail market, I will mainly sort out several issues.

01

What exactly does positioning mean when retail brands talk about it?

First of all , we should be clear that positioning is actually a very competitive concept. The premise is that in order to make our brand gain a greater competitive advantage, the positioning is that you have what your competitors do not have, or your competitors have what yours has but is better.

Secondly , this is also the key to consumer communication, because positioning means confirming your unique existence in the minds of consumers, and your positioning has a huge appeal to them.

Finally , this is an organic combination of an enterprise management system. The so-called positioning is actually product positioning, crowd positioning, price positioning, regional positioning, business format positioning, scale positioning, and even promotion positioning.

02

Everyone knows that positioning is important, so what is the fundamental reason why it is important?

The origin is still the consumer.

Due to the inherent differences and the increasingly personalized values ​​of consumers, the differences determine that retail enterprises implement market positioning and distinctive operations.

However, in the face of the differentiated demands of consumers from multiple circles, it is impossible for our brand to be the best in all aspects - this requires us to excel in one aspect or even achieve unique results.

In 1995, Treacy and Wiersema, consultants from CSC Index Systems, proposed the Value Discipline Model in their book Market Leadership Practice.

The model indicates that to become a market leader in one of the three aspects of product leadership, operational excellence and service affinity, it only needs to perform appropriately in the other two aspects.

Later, scholars successively proposed more specific factors in this regard.

For example, Crawfod and Mathwes concluded through a study of more than 100 successful companies in the world that successful companies provide customers with a corresponding combination of benefits in five aspects, including price honesty, product stability, accessibility, unique experience and service commitment.

But they don't need to be better than their competitors in all five aspects of the benefits, just excellent in one aspect, excellent in another, and reach the industry average in the others.

For example, after studying the retail industry specifically, Ander and Stern believed that among the five elements of rich variety, low price, fashionable style, convenient service and fast speed, one element is the best, and the other four elements only need to reach the average or passing level.

Although these factors are more about combining the pricing of retail stores, the entity that ultimately receives feedback is still the retail brand.

03

The first step in positioning: how to segment the market?

If a brand tries to satisfy everyone, it will inevitably get into trouble.

Even a small Internet giant like Meituan only provides taxi services to gourmet restaurants based on group purchases of gourmet food. But they still want to buy bags, clothes and shoes, so why doesn't Meituan create a Taobao?

Wang Xing’s answer was that our choice of business is related to customer needs and business capabilities.

In fact, this is a market segmentation based on one's own business capabilities.

Among the common market segmentations, there are mainly geographic segmentation, demographic segmentation, and behavioral characteristic segmentation.

Geographic segmentation is very simple: there are regional giants in retail malls, such as Hongqi Chain Store, Chongqing Commercial Society, etc.; there are also regional trump cards in retail brands, the most obvious of which are local liquor brands.

Population segmentation is the most common type of segmentation at present, which includes segmentation by age, income, education level, family cycle, and social class.

The segmentation method of behavioral characteristics is more related to consumers' lifestyles. The advanced consumption attitude of the new generation of young people is actually a behavioral characteristic.

In addition, there is also a classification based on the consumer's interest needs in the consumption scenario. This is particularly evident in personal care products such as shampoo and toothpaste.

Colgate discovered that consumers have four main interests in toothpaste consumption: low price, good taste, anti-caries, and whiteness - so the toothpaste market has basically formed these four market segments.

04

Is your segmentation really reliable?

This is a problem that many brands tend to overlook. In many cases, when the founding team is crowded in a small office brainstorming and formulating strategies, they suddenly choose a blank market segment and are extremely excited.

But in the end, after they put all the materials into the first-tier markets, they found that this market segment did not make as much money as they had imagined.

There were start-up brands of soy sauce liquor that focused on the community, start-up brands of car maintenance that linked up with properties, and health care product brands that placed their main base in the first-tier markets from the beginning... some of them seemed to be reasonable, but in the end they still ended up going bankrupt in batches.

How do you verify that your market segment is valid?

1. Measurable

The purchasing power and size of market segments can be identified and measured.

In the field of meal replacement, why are emerging brands such as protein bars, meal replacement powders, and meal replacement shakes emerging?

First, the younger generation has a strong demand for weight management, and their purchasing power far exceeds that of previous decades. Second, there are precedents for the development of overseas markets, and the size of the domestic market can be estimated through data such as per capita income levels.

2. Profitable

The capacity of the market segment can ensure that the enterprise obtains sufficient economic benefits.

Making liquor for young people to drink was once seen as a business of squeezing milk from a stone, which meant that the company could not obtain sufficient economic benefits.

But what if it is a reef in the ocean of liquor? In fact, the ceiling of this business is high enough that the remaining business of traditional giants can still support several startups.

3. Accessibility

This is what Wang Xing said, you must have enough resources and capabilities to approach this market segment.

People who buy in groups have the need to take a taxi, but don’t they have the need to buy clothes? From the perspective of the business capabilities of the company at that time, it was actually impossible to approach such a market segment.

But if you go to Meituan now, you will see that Meituan e-commerce has already appeared.

4. Responsive

It mainly refers to the reaction of consumers to the market segments. When pure milk and plant milk are placed in front of users, there is a reaction; when the ranch milks the cows collectively, and when the cows are adopted by themselves, there is also a reaction.

When I was shopping at Kidsland yesterday, I saw a pair of diapers marked “for both boys and girls”, which immediately got me thinking - but from the perspective of consumer cognition, boys and girls have basically the same reaction to diapers.

This is like the reaction of men before and after marriage to basketball shoes, except that the latter's private money has been confiscated by his wife.

05

How many segments will you serve?

Once we have identified market segmentation opportunities, we should quickly evaluate the effectiveness of the segments and ultimately decide how many segments to serve.

There are four types of toothpaste: low price, anti-cavity, whitening teeth, and good taste. Which of them can you get?

Several factors need to be considered during this evaluation process:

1. Market Potential

Compare the growth potential between market segments to understand where the greater opportunities lie.

In terms of potential, low price actually means gross profit margin, tooth decay prevention means being linked to health, whitening is more of an appearance economy, and after the arrival of the big health trend, consumers are even willing to accept less delicious food for the sake of health.

For example, the most discussed 100% whole wheat bread on Xiaohongshu - German Jessen. I bought two 500g packages to try. As soon as I opened them, the whole room was filled with a sour and smelly smell, which was no better than snail noodles.

2. Company Resources

Your own resources can handle this niche service. Anti-cavity toothpaste obviously requires research and development. Can your R&D team produce it? This is the threshold.

3. Understand your competitors

We only look at the users who give me a job, and we don't see any competitors - a young wine company once said this. This is actually a bit too much to say. The business world is like a battlefield. Knowing yourself and the enemy will ensure victory in every battle.

Would it have entered the market if it had not seen that Moutai, Wuliangye and Yanghe had not yet laid out this market segment? Whether to bet on a target market or not also depends on whether it is necessary to confront competitors head-on.

4. Target strategy

At present, it is basically capital resources. At present, some cosmetics, including Perfect Diary, have a fixed multiple of about 2 times, compared with the 10 times fixed multiple of the traditional industry. This is almost entering the market at a dumping price in order to quickly gain market share.

This is actually related to the brand's initial strategy. Look at Cha Yan Yue Se and Pop Mart, they all became famous after working quietly for many years - this is the strategy of maintaining the advantageous market and waiting for opportunities to expand.

5. Market Position

Needless to say, start-ups can only break through in a single category and then expand step by step: some self-heating hot pot brands relied on the hot pot category at the beginning, and later began to make rice noodles, instant noodles, self-heating rice, etc. This is called anchoring a niche market.

The giants are all relying on their existing market penetration rates to expand outward rapidly. Brands with deep channels, such as Dali Foods and Taoli Bread, can quickly deploy terminals once they launch new sub-brands and new products.

06

After selecting the target market, how to enter it?

The most difficult problem for startups is that there are several market segments in front of them, but should they go all in or conquer them one by one? Here are five models to adopt:

1) Concentrate on a single market segment, that is, select a market segment and focus on serving it.

There are several prerequisites here: for example, you have limited funds and can only choose one; for example, you have the necessary conditions for this market segment; for example, this market segment is so blank that there are no competitors...

2) Product specialization

Focus on providing one product and selling it to all types of consumers.

I came across a brand in Jiaxing, Zhejiang, which specializes in health beds with intelligent electric functions. They provide health beds of different levels and functions according to consumer needs. It can detect, analyze and record physiological parameters such as heart rate, respiratory rate, snoring, etc. during sleep. Once an abnormal trend is found, the artificial intelligence system will intervene in time or issue an early warning to the user and his family, helping the user to get help from medical institutions and family members as soon as possible.

Currently, the brand's parent company is already listed on the A-share market.

3) Market specialization: Focus on serving a group of consumers and provide them with different services.

Case, Meituan, the details can be omitted by 10,000 words.

4) Selective specialization and complete market coverage.

This is basically the measure taken by large enterprises.

07

Okay, now comes the key point. How do you position yourself in your target market?

As mentioned before, the concept of positioning is an organic combination. We have several directions:

1. Target customer positioning

Determining target customers is the basis of the premise of positioning. Only when this factor is clear can the subsequent product positioning, price positioning, and promotion positioning be determined.

Among all the crowd positioning, the final result is income positioning. This is called a price gap in "Positioning", high-end, mid-end, low-end, whichever you choose will shape your product, service, marketing and brand tone.

2. Product positioning

First of all, the grade positioning is achieved based on income level. Feitian Moutai is definitely not positioned for middle- and low-income customer groups.

The second is product mix positioning, which tests the brand's operational capabilities.

① Product combination can improve sales.

Gillette razors are a classic combination. They give away razors at a loss, and make money from the blades because you keep buying them.

At that time, he gave razors to the government, and the government gave them to soldiers in the war. These soldiers were equivalent to his salesmen, and he gained such a large number of salesmen without spending a dime. It was because of this move that he created the legend of 130 million pieces.

② Product combination can increase customer orders.

Everyone has heard the story about Walmart selling diapers and beer together on weekends.

3. Price positioning

Price positioning is actually the best expression of your relationship with competition.

① High-price positioning, not lower than competitors’ prices, which is generally based on good brand, quality and after-sales service. Bebebus, a baby stroller costs 4,980 yuan, 2-3 times higher than its peers, but it still sells well.

② Low price positioning, lower than competitors’ prices.

This requires the brand to have an absolute low-cost advantage. For example, Xiaomi's mobile phone only earns 5% gross profit from hardware. Its price is lower than that of competitors, but the quality is not worse than that of peers. This can actually inhibit the development of competitors and establish the brand image.

4. Promotional positioning

This concept is very unfamiliar, but later advertisers gave it a new name "marketing positioning" - this is actually the most commonly communicated positioning concept among the public.

There are several main methods for these positioning:

① Preemptive positioning: Be the first in the category, let your brand be the first to enter the minds of consumers and occupy the first position.

② Strengthen positioning: In daily marketing, the positioning mindset has been infiltrated. This is the case for example, a certain down jacket is a global leader, and a certain pair of pants emphasizes professionalism.

③ Analogy positioning: Make your own position and that of your competitors clear to consumers, and make it clear the position you want to occupy and the position occupied by your competitors.

In a word, there are two major brands of Maotai liquor in China, one of which is...

④ Reverse positioning: If the competitor is too strong, your own positioning should be "different from the same category" away from the competitor. The following is from Baidu Encyclopedia——

From the product perspective, the dilemma faced by "Tyningnuo" painkiller at the time was that aspirin dominated the market. If it faced head-on competition, it would surely be doomed. So "Tyningnuo" used a clever trick and positioned itself as a "non-aspirin painkiller", showing that the drug ingredients were fundamentally different from previous painkillers. As a result, it achieved great success with little effort and emerged as a dark horse.

From a conceptual perspective, when purified water had an absolute advantage, Nongfu Spring raised the banner of "Since purified water is harmful to the human body, we will no longer produce purified water", and raised the concept of "natural water", staging a Romance of the Three Kingdoms with Wahaha and Robust.

Starting from the target users, "riding in a Mercedes-Benz and driving a BMW" is actually a typical example of reverse positioning of the target groups. Mercedes-Benz is positioned for the wealthy who pursue respectability and pay attention to pomp, while BMW is positioned for the "BOB0" who have financial strength but are free and unrestrained.

⑤ Gap filling positioning

Find the blank segments and look for the gaps in consumers’ minds.

The Volkswagen Beetle is short and ugly. If the Beetle is marketed in the traditional way, its weaknesses will be minimized and its other strengths will be magnified.

However, advertisers discovered that there was no model that occupied the small car market at that time. There was just such a gap in the minds of potential consumers, so they positioned the gap based on the small size.

They positioned the advertisement in the gap, and the design of the advertisement was as follows: there was a small car in the upper left corner, a large blank space in the middle, and a small explanatory text below, with the title "On second thought, small is better."

08

How to choose the positioning strategy of combined organisms?

As an organic combination of multiple positioning contents, different combinations present different business attitudes of enterprises. What are the most suitable positioning strategies for you?

1. Competitive positioning that directly competes with competitors

In order to occupy a better market position, some brands do not hesitate to confront dominant competitors in the industry head-on when they are first established.

Nayuki Tea first started out in Shenzhen and opened stores next to Starbucks; when Luckin Coffee entered the shopping mall stage, it directly reported Starbucks’ exclusive behavior. These are all competitive positioning.

2. Avoidance positioning

Competitive positioning is supported by capital and resources. If the momentum is not strong enough, competitors are generally avoided.

3. Highlight the distinctive positioning

IKEA is positioned as a self-service furniture service provider. This feature stood out because it did not exist in the market at that time, and once it occupied people's minds, it was difficult for competitors to imitate it.

09

Have you ever thought about repositioning?

Positioning is difficult to achieve once and for all, and repositioning is more common than initial positioning in reality.

Retail brands generally have three stages:

• Phase 1 Model Validation;
• The second phase is market breakthrough;
• The third phase is about to take off.

The model verification phase is to verify whether the positioning is appropriate. In 2009, New World Department Store positioned itself as a market and lifestyle store instead of a grade store.

But after operating for a period of time, New World found that homogeneity was still serious, so it repositioned itself towards white-collar women, introduced designer brands, and opened book bars, pet shops and other leisure venues.

Author: Huang Xiaojun; Official Account: Jingyan Brand Lab (ID: JingyanLab)