Non-Marketers Guide to Effective Positioning

You have a product. . .

You think it is cool, it has some traction among friends and family and now you wish to launch to the greater world. . .

You are convinced that this will be a revolutionary brand, that will make all others buckle under your awesomeness.

The unfortunate reality is that this may be too far fetched to ever be realised. 

Sure, there are great examples of companies, and brands that have launched to become world leaders in their segment. 

Brands that become almost instant global icons and attain massive amounts of sales. 

But those brands a few and far between, for the rest of us, we need to contend with playing effectively in a niche environment, gaining traction, notoriety and trust from the consumer, to be able to get the sneezers to speak about our brand and let the early adopters in on the action.

The  innovators the people at the edge, will go out and find your product, that is what they do. Seek out new and interesting experiences, products and brands. And if you serve these well, they will make you viral, sneezing on everyone, telling your wonderful story and increasing your brand equity.

Theoretically all this sounds easy and step-by-step models exist, which suggests that all brands should breakout and attain success over time. The inhibiting challenge to that not being the case lies in the human psyche. Our ingrained lack of patience. 

Patience to painstakingly curate, manage and grow a brand in a small market. A situation that might not be financially sustainable in the short-run, but is key to forming a solid foundation. A brand much like a stranger, needs to be introduced to us, interact with us and develop report with us, before we can be comfortable.

We apex creatures (humans for short) - need interaction, relationship building and engagement before we are comfortable to transact. 

That is why when so called influencers, punt a brand or product, it gains initial traction.

However, if the brand or product does not live up to the punting, embodying the efficacy, denoted by the said influencer, both parties will lose. The brand will gain great negative appeal and the influencer lose any and all credibility.

Honesty lies at the heart of effective marketing and positioning.

Now, on the other side of the coin, if you have deep pockets and a massive corporate budget that will smack the consumer to submission with subliminal, overt placement and direct marketing in all media channels. 

You are free to push the agenda of mass market, trying to garner the following of the mainstream market.

But, how many of us are that well resourced, even the greatest FMCG companies in the world are at pains to find financially efficient and effective strategies that can capture the target market and keep it coming back. 

Where they can effectively quantify the real rate of return on their advertising spend. Money spent equating to a reasonable percentage of money made on the sale.

Nothing beats honesty. . . a brand needs to build notoriety within its target audience, gain trust, before it will be fully engaged upon by the consumer.