Product Positioning is a key element of a marketing strategy that marketers use to determine how best they can communicate their products attributes to their target customers depending on their unique needs.
What is Product Positioning?
Product positioning is the act of presenting a product to customers in a way that effectively captures their minds and communicates it’s value.
Importance of Product Positioning
- It ensures that marketing messages align with target consumers and compel them into taking action.
- Product positioning helps to create a perception of a product or service in the minds of the target audience.
- It presents products or services in a way that effectively communicates its values.
Factors that Influence Product Positioning
Some factors can affect your ability to positioning your product the way you deem fit. What are these factors?
- The current wants and needs of your customers.
- Your communication channels
- What industry influencers are saying about your products.
- How the rivals respond as well as what their positioning concepts are.
Steps to Product Positioning
There are some steps you have to take when it comes to product positioning. These steps are necessary if you want to get a positive result.
Identify Your Target Audience
These are the people who will be buying your products, as such, it is important that you, first of all, identify these target audiences and then understand their needs and preferences. Since no two individuals have the same interests, needs, and preferences and no two individuals can think on the same lines, it is important to identify those you need for your business and what works for them.
Know also what your customers expect of you, so you can provide for them the products that will fulfill their demands.
Identity the Product Features
You must know your product well enough to market it. You should know the features and benefits of the products to the end-users.
Unique Selling Propositions
Your product needs a USP, thus the organizations must create USPs of their brands and effectively communicate the same to the target audience.
The marketers must be well versed in what the product can do.
They must find out how the products can be useful to the end-users.
Then, communicate the USPs to the target audience via effective mediums of advertising, using banners, slogans, inserts, and hoardings.
Identify Your Competitors
- You must know your competitor’s offerings and let your customers know that your product is better than the competitor’s.
- Don’t downplay your competitors.
- Look for ways that you can have an edge over your competitors.
Promote Brands
- Select the right theme for your advertisement
- Make use of catchy and compelling taglines.
- Your audience must understand your advertisement.
- The marketer should highlight the benefits of the products.
Maintain the Position of the Brand
- The marketers must continue to live up to the expectations of the end-users, to ensure effective positioning.
- Do not compromise on quality.
- Do not drastically bring down the price of your products as this may portray your product as being sub-standard.
Product Positioning for Small Businesses
Small businesses can benefit from product positioning by asking their network for their opinions. After collecting information on customers and their purchases, future product positioning strategies can be done depending on actual sales data. Now, this is very effective since it is based on the real behavior of the customers rather than on speculation.