POSITIONING REPORT June 13, 2009 Advertising is, for the most part, unwanted and unlike. Positioning is a concept that has changed the nature of advertising. It starts with a product but is not what you do to a product, is what you do to the mind of the prospect. Is not product positioning as nothing really has been done to the product itself. 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 be successful today is necessary to touch base with reality. And the only reality that counts is what´s already in the prospect’s mind. In general the mind accepts only that which matches prior knowledge or experience. It is important to concentrate on the perceptions of the prospect, not the reality of the product. By focusing on the prospect rather than the product the selection process is simplified. An oversimplified mind is the only defense a person has in our over communicated society. An oversimplified message is the best approach to take in our over communicated society. Scientifics have discovered that that a person is capable of receiving only a limited amount of sensations. Beyond a certain point the brain goes blank and refuses to function normally. Successful communication is saying the right things to the right person at the right time. This is call “window in space”. Positioning is an organized system for finding that window in the mind. It is based on the concept that communications con only take place at the right time and under the right circumstances. The easy way to get into a person’s mind is to be first. To place a message indelibly in the mind is not the message itself, is to get an innocent mind that has not been burnished by someone else’s brand. The hard way into the mind is second. Second is nowhere. There are positioning strategies to deal with the problem of being number 2 or number 3 or even number 203. The product era: In the 50’s, advertising was in the product era. It was the time when people focused their attention on product features and customer benefits. People looked for the “unique selling proposition”. The end of the product era came with an avalanche of “me‐too products”. The image era: Successfully companies found that their reputation or image was more important in selling a product than any specific product feature. But just as the me‐too companies killed the product era, “me‐too companies” killed the image era. The positioning era: Advertising is now entering an era where strategy is kind and where creativity is no longer the key to success. For a company today one road to success is to look at what the competitors are doing and then subtract the poetry or creativity (the barrier to getting the message into the mind) and sending out a purified and simplified message to penetrate the prospect’s mind. The mind accepts only that new information which matches its current state of mind, filtering out everything else. One prime objective of all advertising is to create the illusion that the product or service will perform those miracles that are expected. People often think that the answer to the problem is trying harder. A company stuck with a losing position is not going to benefit much from hard work. The extra effort, if it is going to be of much help, should be applied early to establish the precious posture of product leadership.
Leadership: When a company owns the position there is no point in running advertisement that repeat the obvious. Much better is to enhance the product category in the prospect’s mind. The essential ingredient to secure leadership position is getting into the mind first by reinforcing the original concept. When a new product is introduced by a competitor, leader ...
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