Brand positioning
The famous ‘5 p’s’ of marketing folklore (product, place, price, promotion & packaging) were fine tools for implementing packaged goods brand positionings - and the basic formula still has its role in FMCG assignments. But today we are entering the era of customer brands where ‘company’ and ‘brand’ are one and the same. In this scenario the company culture & values become a crucial factor in the solution: finding and harnessing what’s there already or setting out to create values and practices which support and manifest the positioning.
Why is Defining the Positioning So Important?
Running a brand is like conducting an orchestra. Positioning is the heart of competitive strategy. The messages transmitted by everything from the advertising to phone calls with your customer care department all need to be kept in harmony and on-brief. Without a clear, single-minded definition of what the brand is about the messages rapidly become discordant and confusing. The positioning statement is therefore a focusing device which helps brand management to keep everything sharp and relevant. Identifying where a specific brand is placed within the marketplace and its relationship to competitive brands, brand positioning is determined by defining the brand’s benefits to the consumer, opportunities for which the brand is best suited, the brand’s target audience, and who its main competitors are. or us to achieve the benefits of brand positioning, it is necessary to research in-depth the market position (or lack thereof) of the brand. Brand maps and forms are created to profile the brand positioning, comparing the results with competitive brands. In realizing the benefits of brand positioning, it is important to understand that not all brands are competitors. A consumer may be presented with six brands of one product and only consider three out of the six as a purchasing choice. The consumer may have encountered a negative experience with a specific brand and may never consider purchasing it again, or there may be a brand that simply does not stand out to the
consumer and it is passed up.
Position Or Perish!!!
Have you ever thought what makes Kelloggs different from Maggi. The difference lies in positioning. Let us see how this magical concept plays a major role in making any brand a success or God forbid a failure!!! The concept of positioning was introduced by Al Ries and Jack Trout in 1969 and was elaborated in 1972. To understand the concept of positioning we can consider the human mind as consisting of a perceptual map with various brands occupying different positions in it. This concept of perceptual space forms the theoretical basis for brand positioning. What this leads to is the perception of the consumer, which decides the positioning of any brand. It is important to note that what a marketer does is to find a position for its brand in the perceptual space of the consumer and place it at the most lucrative point.
Hence, Positioning is not what you do to the product, it is what you do to the mind of the prospect. It is a new approach to communication and has changed the nature of advertising. It can be of a product, service, company or oneself. The perception of a consumer is a function of consumer’s values, beliefs, needs, experience and environment. Thus as per Subroto Sengupta “the core thought behind brand positioning -the idea that each brand (if at all noticed) occupies a particular point or space in the individual’s mind, a point which is determined by that consumer’s perception of the brand in question and in its relation to other brands”. Thus, in the perceptual map, the spatial distance between the points on which brands are located reflects the subject’s perception of similarity or dissimilarity between products or brands.
The basic approach of positioning is not to create something new and different but to manipulate what’s already up there in the mind, to retie the connections that already exist. In communication, as in architecture, less is more. The only answer to the problems of an over communicated society is positioning. Positioning is an organized system for finding a window in the mind. The easy way to get into a person’s mind is to be first in a particular category. If you are not the first then you have a positioning problem.
The origin of positioning comes from two preceding phases:
The product era: - The product features and customer benefits were of importance. With technology being easily available, the product was no longer the Unique Selling Proposition.
The image era: - In this phase the reputation and image of the company became more important than the product. But the similar companies sprung up and this advantage was no longer a distinct one.
The positioning era: - To succeed in today’s over communicated society a company must create a position in the prospect’s mind, a position takes into consideration not only the companies own strengths and weakness, but those of competitors as well. In the positioning era as stated earlier, you must be the first to get into the prospect’s mind.
The ladders in the mind: - In a particular category, people have learned to rank the products and brands in the minds e.g. In soft drinks, we generally have Coke followed by Pepsi followed by Thumsup. Thus if a new soft drink is to be introduced, the company must decide upon the way it will position itself viz. the product ladder position.
Positioning a company:- You can also apply Positioning to an organisation in general. The companies who have a high position in the minds of the prospect i.e. the students mind absorb the cream of the crop from institutes. Similarly companies visit only those campus who have a high position in the mind of the company (the company becomes the prospect in this case.) The whole concept now boils down to creating a perception for your brand in the prospect’s mind so that your brand stands apart from the competing brands and provides the consumer with what he wants.
Thus speaking comprehensively, positioning is a function of
1. Perception it brings about in the mind of target consumer.
2. Functional and non-functional benefits associated with the product.
3. Perception of the competing brands held by the target consumer.
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Brand Repositioning
Many marketers are rethinking their brand’s positioning because competitive pressures, new channels, and changing customer needs have eroded their brands’ positions of strength. However, increased marketing expenditures to reposition brands often fail to produce any improvements in either overall image or market share. Our experience has shown that companies should focus on achievable rather than aspirational positioning, and that three steps can help ensure success:
1. Ensure relevance to a customer’s frame of reference.
· Be fully aware of the brand’s “frame of reference” so that a repositioning strategy will resonate with customers.
· Look at a combination of customers’ attitudes and the situations in which the brand is used to obtain the most powerful customer insights.
2. Secure the customer’s “permission” for the positioning.
· Recognize that permission amounts to a reasonable and logical extension of the brand in the customer’s eyes.
· Leverage a brand’s unique emotional benets to carry customers from their current brand perception to the intended one.
3. Deliver on the brand’s new promise.
· Identify the pathway of performance “signals” that will convince customers of the new brand positioning.
· Develop product/service programs to ensure consistent performance on these signals.
· Track and assess performance against customer signals prior to launching the new positioning.
· Adopt an “interim positioning” to establish brand credibility and performance.
An array of factors is requiring marketers today to rethink their brand positioning. Changing customer needs are often eroding the brand’s established position. At the same time, increasing competitive pressures created by new entrants and product innovations, and the proliferation of new channels and promotional campaigns, are driving marketers back to the drawing board. Many CEOs and CMOs, however, nd themselves displeased with the results of their repositioning efforts. Increased marketing expenditures devoted to repositioning brands in the minds of consumers often fail to produce any improvements in either overall image or market share. Why do these well-intentioned efforts turn into marketing
failures? While there are many causes, companies often fail to focus on achievable brand positioning rather than aspirational brand positioning. Too often, their efforts target an ambitious goal that outstrips the actual ability of the brand to deliver on what it has promised to customers.
Celebrity endorsement
of products can fulfill either a strategic or a tactical purpose. In the case of Taj Mahal Tea, Zakir Hussain fulfills a strategic role. He is a brand ambassador. An intrinsic part of the brand itself in many ways. Distancing such celebrities from the brand at hand is a tough task. At times, the celebrity in question assumes a larger than life image that overshadows the brand and its delivery appeal. In the case of a Coke or a Pepsi, the celebrity is pretty much a tactical initiative t hat is run for a period of time to plug a particular proposition. In tactical initiatives that embrace celebrities, the name of an individual who is the flavor of the month is pretty much of an incidental issue. It is pretty easy to divorce celebrity from brand, and yet retain brand sanity. It has become a fashionable thing to use celebrities when you want your brand to jump
into a point of contemporaneity that would otherwise take a great deal of effort to build in the good old way. The celebrity is an easy route! It hits back at you at times. Look at all the money that went with Hansie Cronje and our very own Salman Khan! In the case of our very own Mr Khan, shooting a Chinkara worried many a wildlife enthusiast. A later violent image on the sets dampened it more. A much later accident in a drunken state drove in the nail further!
I am sure now we have got a hold on the subject matter. To go on with more examples, there’s young Chandrachur Rocky Singh flaunting his choice of suitings and there is Raveena singing of love and a ballpoint pen. Akshay in Ruf and Tuf jeans. The other Akshaye on a speedboat surfing in his father’s footsteps, on lime freshness. Amitabh Bachchan hamming it as himself and his screen characters in a corporate film for a consumer electronics giant. This is advertising’s very own star track. And the star system is working out of the film star circuit as well. Cricket has created its own ad stars... Sachin Tendulkar, Azhar, Rahul Dravid... as their rating points go up so does their advertising appeal. Internationally tennis, baseball, basketball and soccer stars co mmand millions in endorsement money while film stars have always plugged their choice of brands, all for a neat sum of money. Andre Agassi in Nike ads, Shaquille O’ Neill in the Pepsi commercials, Michael Jordan recommending his signature line from Nike, Air Jordan and players coming together to claim, “this is my planet” for Reebok.
In Indian advertising the celebrity is hot property. The film star celebrity is naturally first choice. There are clients who come in from small towns with wads of cash looking for an ad film script and with a clear agenda... to make a film with their favourite star. But the film star route is not restricted to small towners alone flip through the ads and you will notice as many multinationals using star power, to sell their products. Why do we choose celebrities to endorse products when it costs an arm and a leg to put a celebrity under contract? Why do we deal with celebrity managers and the whole gamut of celebrity management to get the star of our choice, whose choice does the star finally represent, a star-struck client’s or the consumer’s? What happens to a brand if it becomes indistinguishable from the celebrity endorsing it, like the Nawab of Pataudi and Gwalior suitings? What happens when in an ironic twist a spokesperson becomes a celebrity because of brand advertising and then becomes larger than the brand like Lalitaji in the old Surf commercials? What happens when you run out of celebrity testimonials or endorsements can actually work two ways. One to bring quick memorability, recall and recognition for your brand which helps when your brand is fairly new so you can cash in on the linkage.
If you are a multinational it helps you project an Indian face and o ften a popular Indian face. Celebrity testimonials work when your product makes logical sense in the celebrity’s life... like a beauty cream for film stars, a range of tough wear for a tough guy, a memory supplement for an aging prime minister, a pair of shoes for a famous player, and by logical transference of this peek into the celebrities behind-thescenes life, make it relevant to our own. But celebrity testimonials can never be an easy way out if you are looking at some long-term brand building. For that you need a creative idea and a celebrity is no substitute for an idea. A film with an all-starcast can still flop if the script and story don’t deliver. The consumer like the public is discerning. What makes a celebrity testimonial work at a point of time when words like brandbuilding and realism and real people are the current buzz. Strangely the same climax that has thrown up a host of real commercials, featuring real people with real emotions, really using the brand in question and subscribing wholly to brand values. The same consumer who is exposed to Surf Excel advertising is also exposed to Govinda in the doodh-ganga ad and Madhuri in the Lux commercial. But the consumer is willing to see category differentiation. A film star in a beauty soap ad is acceptable, but a film star endorsing a dish washing powder may require an unimaginable suspension of belief. In India today, the use of celebrity advertising for companies has become a trend and a perceived winning formula of corporate image-building and product marketing Associating a brand with a top-notch celebrity can do more than perk up brand recall. It can create linkages with the star’s appeal, thereby adding refreshing and new dimensions to the brand image.
So what exactly is the right personality?
It’s one that can personalise your brand, is in sync with the product/service and is the perfect match for it. The one that puts buzz into your brand. Creates opp urtunities for advertising promotions and events. And forms the fertile ground for clutter-bursting ideas. Celebrity endorsement is a serious business, and if used effectively could have a lasting impression on the brand, its activities and its image. Right from Kapil Dev’s ‘Palmolive ka jawaab nahin’ to the most recent sensational association of Hrithik Roshan with Tamariind, celebrities have done wonders for brand recall.
The rewards of using celebrities for your brands
Associating a brand with a top-notch celebrity can do more than perk up brand recall. It can create linkages with the star’s appeal, thereby adding refreshing and new dimensions to the brand image. It can also create media and promotion opportunities that sweep the consumer off her feet. Research conducted by Katherine Eckel, professor of economics at U.S. Virginia Tech, has revealed that celebrities or ‘higher status agents’ can get people to make a better choice but cannot influence ‘people to make a foolish choice’.
In India today, the use of celebrity advertising for companies has become a trend and a perceived winning formula of corporate image building and product marketing. This phenomenon is reflected in the recent market research finding that 8 out of 10 TV commercials scoring the highest recall were those with celebrity appearances. A few examples: Sachin Tendulkar-Adidas, Sourav Ganguly-Britannia, Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupati-J. Hampstead, Shah Rukh Khan-Pepsi, Sushmita Sen-Epson and Aishwarya Rai-Coke. The effectiveness of the endorser depends upon the meaning he or she brings to the endorsement process. There is a three-stage process of meaning transfer which involves the formation of the celebrity image, transfer of meaning from celebrity to brand and finally from brand to consumer. This is what leads to effective celebrity advertising.
Online Branding
Successful online branding means drawing in customers through value-added features, such as recipes on an online grocery site, Farah says. Instead of just listing grocery items, the site could allow customers to order all the items necessary on the recipe once they print it out. The aim is convenience, bolstering brand equity, and earning customer loyalty. Farah also stresses the need for a consolidated branding strategy that crosses all media channels. A transportation company whose message is speed of delivery should not have a pokey Web site,
for example. “Have a single brand guardian who reviews all channels against
a corporate brand strategy. Ensure these channels and their associated technologies can deliver your brand strategy,” he says. Businesses should focus on their Web site design and implementation, and ensure able to meet every visitor’s needs, whether it be accessing specific product information, learning about the company, or processing a transaction. “Once users’ interaction with your site is quick, effective, and satisfying, they will be able to appreciate brand messages being presented,” Farah noted. A common mistake is to separate traditional marketing departments from the design and execution of a Web site, or to focus on visual appeal, rather than ensuring fluid transactions and Web functions.
Is Online Branding Effective?
Results of brand effectiveness studies illustrate how online media can effectively embed a product’s message into the minds of consumers. Following is a small sample of the many available studies proving that the online medium can produce positive shifts in consumers’ brand perceptions and purchase intent.
· IRI and Procter and Gamble generated a study-based on surveys and actual buying patterns of consumers-showing that banner advertising bolstered sales for a Procter and Gamble snack food brand by 19 percent.
Online Branding Tactics
Besides presenting an engaging consumer offer, what tactical steps can marketers take to increase the effectiveness of online branding campaigns?
1. Leverage large, interactive ad formats. Several studies sponsored by various organizations (including the IAB, Dynamic Logic, and DoubleClick) all conclude that larger ad sizes can significantly enhance online branding effectiveness.
2. Develop clean, uncluttered creative with large logos.
3. Ensure sufficient ad frequency. Several studies also show that increased ad exposure generates a higher impact on key brand metrics. While the optimal number of exposures for any given campaign vary with the creative, ad format, and type of product offered, it’s clear that more than one exposure is beneficial.
4. Incorporate consumer behavior trends into marketing strategy.
