Book ReviewBook Review

POSITIONING :POSITIONING :The Battle for Your MindThe Battle for Your Mind

Al RiesAl RiesJack TroutJack Trout

Group Information

Abhishek Srivastava (S-2)Amit Sahni (S-5)

Shreya Das (S-58)Mahmood Akhtar (S-37)

Sunal Kumar (S-62)Umesh Parashar (S-64)Vikram Razdan (S-68)

About the Authors

Al Ries is a legendary marketing strategist and the bestselling author (or co-author) of 11 books on marketing including Positioning, Focus, The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding, The Fall of Advertising & the Rise of PR and his latest ‘The Origin of Brands’.

After graduating from DePauw University, Al worked in the advertising department of General Electric before founding his own advertising agency in New York City, Ries Cappiello Colwell in 1963. The agency later changed to a marketing strategy firm, Trout & Ries.

About the Authors

Jack Trout is recognized as one of the world’s foremost marketing strategists. Instrumental in developing the vital approach to marketing known as “Positioning,” Jack Trout is responsible for some of the freshest ideas to be introduced into marketing thinking in the last decade.

Jack Trout started his business career in the advertising department of General Electric. From there, he went on to become a divisional advertising manager at Uniroyal.

He has over 40 years of experience in advertising and marketing, and became a boardroom advisor to some of the world’s largest corporations. Jack Trout has gained an international reputation as a consultant, writer, speaker, and proponent of leading-edge marketing strategies.

Wrote books on

Differentiate or Die, Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind, The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing, The Power of Simplicity, Marketing Warfare and many more…..

A concept so simple,A concept so simple,people have difficulty understandingpeople have difficulty understanding

how powerful it is!how powerful it is!

What is Positioning ?What is Positioning ?• Positioning is owning a piece of consumer’s mind

• Positioning is not what you do to a product– It’s what you do to the mind of the prospect

• You position the product in the prospect’s mind– ‘It’s incorrect to call it Product Positioning’ – Ries & Trout

Positioning

ColgateIs

Protection

GilletteIs

QualityLUXIs

Glamour

AXEIs

Sexual Attraction

Pond’s DFTIs

Confidence

ExamplesExamples

Why is Positioning Required ?Why is Positioning Required ?

The assault on our mind…• The media explosion• The product explosion• The advertising explosion

• So little message gets through that you ignore the sender and concentrate on the receiver

• Consumers only accept what is consistent with prior knowledge or experience

• Very difficult to change the perception once formed

How it is done…How it is done…• The easy way to get into a person’s mind is to be first

– Xerox, Kodak, Polaroid, Sun TV, The Hindu

• If you didn’t get into the mind of your prospect first, then you have a positioning problem– Better to be first than be best

• Even if you are not first, be the first to claim a unique position in the mind of the consumer– Miller Lite – first lite beer and Beck’s Beer – first beer popular in

Germany

• In the positioning era, you must, however, be first to get into the prospect’s mind

• The basic approach is not to create something new or different, but manipulate what’s already in the mind

• To find a unique position, you must ignore conventional logic

• Conventional logic says you find concept inside product– Not true; look inside prospect’s mind

• You won’t find an uncola idea inside 7-up; you find it inside cola drinker’s head

How it is done…How it is done…

Positioning of a leaderPositioning of a leader• Do not boast of being number 1, implies insecurity

about leadership (Coke – “the real thing”) • Single Position Strategy – Each brand occupying a

single unchanging position in the mind of the customer– Cheaper to introduce new brands– Introduce new brands instead of changing existing – Safari

and Sumo• Change is inevitable and leader must be willing to

embrace change.

Positioning of a followerPositioning of a follower

• It is always better to be first and establish leadership

• If the product is not first, then it must find an unoccupied position– “Munch ka crunch Mahaan” – Chocolate with a crunch– “Avis is only No. 2 in rent-a-car, so why go with us? We try

harder.”

• A product that seeks to be everything to everyone will end being nothing to everyone

‘‘You concentrateYou concentrateon the perceptions of the prospect, on the perceptions of the prospect,

not the reality of the product’not the reality of the product’- Al Ries & Jack Trout- Al Ries & Jack Trout

‘‘It’s difficult to change behaviour, but It’s difficult to change behaviour, but easy to work with it’easy to work with it’

- Paco Underhill- Paco Underhill

• Understand the role of words and how they affect people– Turtle vs. Lexus

• Be careful of change– Disney

• Need vision– Long term / Not on technology or fad

What you need…What you need…

What you need…What you need…

• Courage– To slug it out when others watch and wait

• Objectivity– You need a backboard / a springboard

• Simplicity– Not complicated or convoluted

What you need…What you need…

• Subtlety– Unique position and appeal that’s not narrow

• Willingness to sacrifice– The case of Nyquil– Rexona wooing male and female

• Patience– Geographical roll out / Demographic /

Chronological

• Global outlook– Taj Mahal Tea

GuidelinesGuidelines• Start by looking not at the product but at the

position in the market that you wish to occupy, in relation to competition

• Think about how the brand will answer the main consumer questions– What will it do for me that others will not? – Why should I believe you?

• Try to keep it short and make every word count and be as specific as possible– Vagueness opens the way to confused executions

GuidelinesGuidelines

• Keep the positioning up-do-date– Give as careful consideration to change as you did to the

original statement

• Look for a Key InsightKey Insight!– An ‘Accepted Consumer Belief‘Accepted Consumer Belief’’

What is Key Insight?What is Key Insight?• Key Insight is ‘seeing below the surface’ / ‘seeing

inside the consumer’

• Insight expresses the totality of all that we know from seeing inside the consumer

• An insight is a single aspect of this that we use to gain competitive advantage

• By identifying a specific way…– That the brand can either solve a problem or– Create an opportunity for the consumer

Key InsightKey Insight

‘‘I wish to get married I wish to get married to a handsome prince’to a handsome prince’

Key InsightKey Insight‘‘Fragrance of my current talc does not last long Fragrance of my current talc does not last long and I miss opportunities to enjoy life’and I miss opportunities to enjoy life’

Key InsightKey Insight‘‘Soap leaves my skin Soap leaves my skin feeling dry and tight’feeling dry and tight’

More on Key Insight…More on Key Insight…

• It will require two separate thoughts to be related to each other in a new and fresh way

• Insight will generally be enduring

• Often the process will lead to several insights

• The one to use is the one that offers to be the source of greatest competitive advantage

More on Key Insight…More on Key Insight…

• No need for insight to change if you have identified the higher-order needs of consumers

• Keep asking ‘why’ to find the real need behind the obvious insight

• Remember, the insight is always the basis for a brand’s positioning

How to find one?How to find one?• What are the ways in which the category / brand can improve

someone’s life?

• What are the conflicting needs that people face and that the brand can solve?

• How important is it that the product delivers? Who will notice?

• What is standard of excellence in the category?

• With every answer you get, you need to probe deeper:– ‘Why is that?’

The 3C’s of PositioningThe 3C’s of Positioning

• Be Crystal clear

• Be Consumer-based– Be relevant and credible to the consumer– Write in consumer language and from consumer’s view point

• Be Competitive– Be distinctive– Focus on building brand elements into powerful discriminator– Be persuasive– Be sustainable

And then…And then…

• The brand name!

• The name is the first point of contact between the message and the mind

• ‘‘The brand name is a knife that cuts the mind to let The brand name is a knife that cuts the mind to let the brand message inside’the brand message inside’

– Ries & TroutRies & Trout

GuidelinesGuidelines

• It’s not the goodness or badness of the name in an aesthetic sense that determines effectiveness– It’s the appropriateness of the same

• Name begins the positioning process, tells the prospect what the product’s major benefit is– Fair & Lovely– Close Up– Krack– Head & Shoulders– Vaseline Intensive Care Body Lotion

Checklist: Brand nameChecklist: Brand name

• Should be simple

• Should be acceptable in all key languages

• Should be appropriate when geographically spread

• Should be amenable for easy registration

Thank You