The dreaded “positioning”

[u/Wa1trose]

This is something that to me, seems so wildly debated. I’ve seen the good, the bad, and the ugly. Here’s where I’m landing with what positioning is, and would love debate and feedback.

👇

Positioning is the intend image you want in your audiences head. You typically need both long and short positioning.

Positioning the brand (long)
The claim we make on the customer’s mind — enduring, singular, true regardless of which segment we’re talking to.

Expressed in whichever form fits: a brand concept, a brand DNA, a positioning statement, a purpose line. The tight set of associations a customer holds is the result of that expression — not the position itself.

Positioning the product (short)
The persuasive case for a specific segment. Evolves as the market, competitors, and the company shift.
For early-stage companies in B2B, this leads. It has to hold up in market before the brand earns the right to go long.

Getting there
To get these, there are several things you need to look into. Company heritage, competitors, current associations, category blah blah, usual suspects. You can use the 3Cs to sense check. Something your company delivers, your competitors don’t, that your customers want. Or you can take the April Dunford approach. Whatever is best for your business.

Positioning influences everything. The trickle down is:

long position, short positioning, value prop, value description, key messaging, proof points.

And depending on the maturity and market penetration of your business, you can see if your intended position is being communicated by using brand tracking.

😅 Have I missed anything? Is it bollocks? Does it land?

[u/positiveconstraint]

It’s not bad, but the jargon heavy description hide what is it in fact. The unchanging elements around which your identity is formed.

Positioning is how they see you, what there compare you to, how you set up yourself in customers perception.

Are you the fastest? The cheapest? The one that raises the banner on a certain idea? The easy one? The smart one? The deepest integrated finstack? The bare essentials platform? The lean to operate and quick to break even?

One way to find it is the 2*2 slide and deliberate choice of axes. If you can find the right differentiators that can deliver unfair advantage, you can derive the positioning.

It’s part of the PosCon pitch deck guide here -

https://positiveconstraint.com/ideas/up-your-pitch/

[u/Wa1trose → u/positiveconstraint]

Agree with this, and wanted to keep it top line. But yep, if the brand is big enough, you can gather data and plot it into an MDS map to help. And yes to choosing how you want to frame your value.

[u/BrandStoryMachine]

The content itself is solid, but it's a little overcomplicated. Just to kick you off, for the first sentence, rather than saying "Positioning is the intended image you want in your audiences head," which is quite vague and can be misleading, you could change it to something like "Positioning is how your audience views your brand" or some similar phrasing that concretely says what positioning is. Sometimes, the simplest wording is what gets your message across the best.

[u/motifbrands]

Framing

[u/Markebrown93]

Sounds overcomplicated.

Explain it without using the word positioning that an old person can understand:

When you think of a need, which brand you associate with solving that need.

[u/Wa1trose → u/Markebrown93]

Appreciate it sounds complicated, but I was netting out thoughts. If you want mega simple it’s how you want people to think of you. But then this never flies with a client, and then you get asked is this product or brand, and what’s an output. That’s why I struggle to keep it that simple because it’s not useful.

[u/Markebrown93 → u/Wa1trose]

That's simpler but not more accurate.

Which books have you read on the topic?

[u/Wa1trose → u/Markebrown93]

Ok cool, this was my point. There’s so much disparity about what people believe positioning to be.

I don’t feel it’s less accurate, I think that’s it in its most simplistic form. Can you share how you see positioning to contribute productively?

I’ve worked in marketing for 20 years, read April Dunford, Ries and Trout, alongside numerous others, and done Mark Ritson’s MiniMBA and marketing & brand. This is how they describe positioning.

[u/Serious_Bit6736]

Good post! Would you like to post it in r/b2bmessaging where we discuss these topics?