The 3 Ps of Brand Positioning

Brand Positioning

Brand positioning is not an essential element of a winning brand strategy—it is the only winning brand strategy. Positioning literally effects every strategic decision about a brand therefore it affects every marketing decision. The essence of every communication with the target audience should reinforce the brand position.

The term “branding” refers to how consumers perceive a specific company, institution, product, service or cause. Brand positioning is the process of shaping how you want target audiences to perceive your brand relative to direct competition and alternatives. How you position your brand in the minds of customers and prospects plays a key role in influencing their consideration process and final choice.

The 3 Ps of Brand Positioning

Every brand occupies a specific space in the consciousness of the consumer based on their own experiences and those of others—these perceptions may or may not be reality. The 3 Ps of positioning will help you determine which positioning strategy will promote your brand to its greatest advantage.

1. Premier
   Your brand has the premier position if it is #1 in a specific market category. The premier brand is the biggest, the first, and the most well-known—think Coke, Google and Harvard, to name a few. Sometimes the premier brand name is so popularized it becomes synonymous with the category itself—for instance, facial tissue giant Kleenex.Smart marketers use their brand’s tagline to communicate their market position to customers and prospects. For example, Hertz Rent-a-Car, the largest company in the car rental category, uses the tagline, “We’re #1.”On the surface, most brands would want to be marketed in the premier position. The challenge is there can only be one premier brand.
   
2. Preemptive
   The majority of brands can benefit from preemptive positioning by offering unique, credible and relevant value to a specific target audience—known as differentiation or niche marketing. A common mistake is to adopt the offerings and messaging of the premier brand , known as the “me-too” position. Ultimately “me-too” brands are forced to compete based on price and convenience because they seemingly offer no unique value to the target audience.The key to a preemptive position is to target the largest possible audience who share a similar set of needs and values in which your brand is the only or best choice—thus preempting the competition. For example, in the car rental category, Avis decided to target business travelers with services like express check-out for those seasoned car rental customers, using the tagline, “We try harder.”
   
3. Price
   Your brand is part of a commodity market category where competitive offerings are virtually interchangeable; this is common among personal computers, community colleges and local pizzerias. However, today the globalization of markets, rapid innovation and instantaneous communication via social media has resulted in an epidemic of “me too” offerings within nearly every marketing category. When consumers perceive little to no difference between your brand and the competition, you have two options: either develop a preemptive positioning strategy or compete on high-volume sales and transactions with low prices.In some cases, price positioning can be utilized proactively as a preemptive strategy with a target audience that is price sensitive. A great example of this in the car rental category is Budget Rent-a-Car. No need for a tagline—the name says it all.
   

In a world of constant change, it seems the perception of a brand is only as good as the last customer interaction on a social media channel. Many experts will tell you to do away with brand positioning altogether, since you cannot control it. Remember, it’s always been consumers who experience brands and develop their own perceptions—even before social media. Social media is here to stay and it is an essential platform for connecting with prospects and customers; use it to personalize your brand position.

Your brand positioning statement is the single most important sentence you will ever write. Therefore, your brand positioning statement must be different, believable and important to your audience while leaving the door open for evolving consumer needs and market changes. The brand positioning statement will guide every tactical decision in closing the gap between what your target audiences perceive and what you want them to believe. Brand positioning is nothing less than a battle for the mind of customers and their wallet. How is your brand positioned in the mind of your prospects and customers?

About Bergeron Creative Studios

Bergeron Creative Studios, a nationally recognized award-winning branding firm, integrates print, digital and social media with search marketing to engage prospects in dialog. We are innovative entrepreneurs who are passionate about ideas. For two decades, fresh ideas grounded in smart strategic thinking have invented and reignited brands to achieve measurable marketing results.