Positioning is the way customers think about your company’s brand, explains Michael Goodman. It is their perceptions and emotions. Although you don’t own the positioning, understanding how customers think about your brand can help you influence potential customers.
Before you try to change perceptions, you need to be clear on what you want your positioning to be. Goodman outlines four steps for developing a good positioning statement:
Know your audience. Think in specifics, Goodman recommends. By defining your audience clearly you will find the sweet spot—attracting the people most likely to need or want your product or service.
Identify what your audience considers the most important benefit. This may not be the same benefit you envision, cautions Goodman, which is why you may want to conduct some market research to ensure that you understand what your target audience really wants and needs.
Determine the level of benefit you can promise. This could be simple or involve defining a higher-level emotional reason for the audience to purchase your product or service.
Test your statement. Once you've crafted your positioning statement, evaluate it against the elements of a good positioning statement, and continue to refine if you're not quite there.
The Po!nt: A good positioning statement can help you win the minds and hearts of customers. Spending some time on this will reap benefits.
To learn more about positioning statements, attend the MarketingProfs Small Business Seminar Positioning, Naming and Taglines this Friday at 3pm Eastern online, from your computer.
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