Why is marketing positioning important?

Positioning: what is it?

Marketing positioning allows you to give your product or service a credible and coherent position within a market. The strategy you define and implement allows you to recognize your brand in the eyes of your consumers.

The aim is to highlight your brand, products or services so that they are seen as a valuable asset by the public. stand out from the competition to your customers. A well thought-out positioning strategy ensures that you add value to the existing market. 

With a lot of competition, it is necessary to determine the positioning of your company to impose your difference and to make an impression consumers. This makes it easier for you to win market share.

In summary, marketing positioning is a simple and useful tool, a necessary reflection that you should have before you take action.

Only after you have defined your marketing positioning can you define a communication strategy. The latter will tell you which actions to prioritise and which means of communication to use to communicate with your target.

The benefits of good marketing positioning

There are many benefits to defining a good marketing position; both for your company and for your future customers.

The benefits of marketing positioning for your company:

• Clearly establish your place in the market and identify the target audience that is most likely to buy your services or products
• Maintain a consistent and transparent approach to marketing and related business issues
• Define a suitable price that takes into account your audience and your brand image
• Increase conversions and loyalty by resonating with existing and potential customers
• Focus your efforts on the right audiences and the most effective marketing tactics
• Create a better environment for analysing the success of existing strategies

For the customer, this allows them to quickly identify whether the product or service is made for them and corresponds to them. In the long term, they more easily establish solid relationships with a brand whose positioning and communication directly affects the buyer.

How to develop a marketing positioning strategy?

The basics of marketing positioning

Start by researching and segmenting your market before defining your company's positioning. Targeting your market allows you to define a good strategy and to have a credible position within it.

Good positioning is defined by your ability to make it simple, readable and relevant in the minds of consumers.

Your value proposition must add a dimension to the existing market, while being distinctive, attractive and relevant. We talk about :

• Product identification
• Differentiation of your offer
  

The better you respect these two elements, the better consumers will quickly identify and understand the offer you are making. If your positioning is clearly identifiable, they can start to think about whether or not you are relevant to them.

Then there is your ability to offer a different approach to the large competition that manages to attract consumers.

Representing one's position using a perceptual map

Who are your competitors? This is the question you must ask yourself. To implement a differentiation strategy, you must first identify and analyse your competitors. 

Next, place your company, its products and services, and your competitors on a positioning mapping. This will allow you to find a unique positioning and thus define your competitive advantage.

Here are the right questions to ask for a effective marketing positioning :

• What position do you want to occupy in your market?
• How to reach your goal? What is the deadline?
• Do you have the means to achieve your goal?
• What marketing and sales strategy should be implemented?
• Is your objective consistent with your company's overall strategy?

You can also position yourself on the values you want to defend. This is a positioning choice that is less focused on a product or service promise, but which can nevertheless be a real means of differentiation.

In summary, the perceptual map enables :

• Visualise the different positions of competitors
• Determine your company's current positioning
• Identify opportunities in the market
• Define or redefine the company's desired positioning

Understanding your brand positioning

Understanding your market

You need to analyse the strengths of direct competitors, i.e. companies that offer a product or service identical to yours. The same exercise should be carried out with indirect competitors, i.e. companies that offer a different product or service but meet the same need: reputation, accessibility, sales area, range of products, prices offered, etc. ....

To know your market, you also need to understand how it works. These elements can influence your sales but also important strategic choices. Here is a series of questions to help you understand your market

• What are the best times to buy the product or service?
• Is the activity of the target clientele defined by a calendar, a schedule, or particular hours?
• Is the demand one-off, accidental, periodic, seasonal, continuous?
• Are purchases scheduled, random, emergency?
• Where to locate the business?
• Is it better to locate near sources of supply or near customers?
• Is the physical location (if necessary) well placed? How do other businesses in the street function?

Understanding your target

Knowing your target customers is extremely important. After all, it is their market perception which is at the centre of the reflection on positioning.

Don't try to please everyone, you will become a popular supplier. This vision is only interesting if you offer a product or service that is a necessity. If this is not the case, we strongly recommend that you do not use this strategy.

This is why, since the beginning of this article, we have insisted on identifying a specific segment of the market in order to become the best seller or provider in that market.

Do you want to target teenagers, adults or seniors? Should this audience be connected, connected, active, travellers, families, party-goers, etc.? Once you have identified the profile of your prospectsyou must understand their behaviour and the best way to attract them.

Types of marketing positioning

Marketing positioning on product quality

Your brand focuses on its style and luxury and therefore a more exclusive positioning. With this marketing positioning strategy, the consumer will pay a higher price for the exclusivity and emotional response that an association with your brand can bring. Your offer proposes very high end products with high quality materials (ex: Louis Vuitton, Porsche,...).

Marketing positioning on the price of products

In this example of positioning, your brand stands out by offering products that provide the same benefits as competing products, but with a reduced price. The positioning and communication that follow are therefore strongly focused on this. The use of the terms "cheap", "best price", "unbeatable" are frequently used.

Marketing positioning on product applications

With this positioning, you focus on marketing a specific function or use of the product. This could be for use in a certain situation or scenario.

Marketing positioning on the benefits of the product

Your brand emphasises specific features of your products. These may offer a higher level of value than your competitors. You associate your brand or service with certain specific benefits that provide a real advantage to your customers and meets a (potential) market need.

Marketing positioning on product superiority

This strategy is more aggressive than others. The principle is to compare directly your brand to your competitors, highlighting the reasons why you are better than the others. This is not a positioning we recommend using, although in some cases it could be useful and beneficial to you. Consider first trying to position yourself on the types listed above.

Examples of marketing positioning

Stella McCartney, a unique and strong positioning

When we talk about responsible luxuryStella McCartney is usually the first brand to come back to the table. To be fair, the brand practically invented the concept and pushes its commitment more and more far as it evolves.
Stella McCartney has moved away from the use of leather, fur and PVC in its collections and is constantly looking for new ways to make luxury fashion more sustainable and environmentally friendly.

It is this commitment and values that give Stella McCartney a unique position in its market. Consumers who share its values are attracted to the brand far beyond its aesthetics. This in turn generates sales but they also manage to strongly build loyalty their customers.

The success of the Stella McCartney brand tells us one way to boost your brand positioning: establish and maintain core values that your target audience embraces and values.