In This Episode You’ll Learn:
- What positioning is and how to implement it
- The benefit of understanding your real competitors
- How to identify your good customers
Positioned For Success
April Dunford has a career that spans over two decades working with technology start-ups. She knows what it takes to launch a product into the market successfully.
April says when your market positioning is fragile, your revenue will flounder. While most people will position one or two products within their entire career, April has successfully positioned more than a dozen.
“Positioning describes how your offering is the best in the world [and delivers] something that a well-defined set of customers cares a lot about.”
Positioning is an old concept, with some publications dating back to the 1970s. It consists of identifying these five components:
- Who is your real competitor
- What do you have that the alternatives do not have
- What is the value for customers
- Who is your target customer
- What is your market category
Understanding Your Good Customers
Weak positioning often comes as a result of trying to position for every customer you’ve ever sold to. You must understand the customers who love your product for your positioning to take hold.
When you think about doing positioning for your brand, the key is to aim for the customers who are an awesome fit for what your company does. Once you can pinpoint your ideal customer, you can weed out the others who may be hindering your business.
Benefit And Value
Regardless of whether you have a small or a larger team, April says having a positioning team can be incredibly beneficial.
“I do think there is value in having multiple voices at the table so that you don’t end up smoking your own marketing.”
Map the differentiating features of your brand and what they enable your customer to do. Through this, you can highlight the value you will bring to your customer as well as distinguish which customer will benefit from that value.
Customers need to be able to easily understand what your product is, why it’s unique and why it matters to them. Once you have completed these steps, you will see an increase in revenue and higher success rate in your marketing efforts.
Learn More:
Also Mentioned In This Episode:
Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind by Al Ries and Jack Trout
