I recently spoke to group of small business executives on marketing at an event with the Monrovia Chamber of Commerce. (Thanks much to my co-presenter Jacen from Century 21.) As I was planning my portion of the outline, I had an “ah ha!” moment when I came to the slide on “positioning.”

What is positioning?

What I mean by positioning is how one seeks to be compared in relation to others of perceived like characteristics. For example, when evaluating vehicles, how is the Mazda model seeking to position itself against its competitors in the same class? How does Mazda frame the argument and what are the specific buyer “hot buttons” — issues of vital importance — it is looking to push.

My take on positioning uses qualitative research of customer and prospect “hot buttons” to determine how one frames a product or service. Branding is the introspective process of determining values and identity apart from the customer. Positioning is the extrospective process of evaluating how that brand will be conveyed to prospects and clients in light of the market landscape.

Following the buzz

In my experience, I hear a lot more about “branding” than I do positioning. It is a big process but is it vital for a small business? Research shows that 90% of small business customers are within 50 miles of their office. Therefore rather than communicating the larger aspects of their “brand” to prospects, it might be more advantageous just to call up 10-20 customers and even some lost opportunities and ask why they made their buying decision.

Step 1

At Enthusiast, one of our core values is Innovation. This forms the backbone of our brand along with others like Excellence, Accessibility, Responsive, etc. Since this is my brand, it is tempting to start putting this on all of my ads. “Excellence is job #1″, “Innovation is key”, and other platitudes emerge as only half the work has been done. All of my competitors would probably say the same thing.

Step 2

However, if I examine my brand in light of frequent client feedback such as “We bought due to the prompt response of the salesperson to our questions” or “We appreciated the attention to detail on our project,” I can now begin to translate my brand into practical value for my prospects. They showed me how they define “excellence” and “responsive” and I can now focus my communications on using this perspective on my values.

What’s the goal?

The goal is true differentiation. The ability for the buyer to clearly understand why you are different in terms she understands and values. This is a challenge, especially in our business as we are helping organizations grow revenues using a quickly evolving medium. However, I believe this two step process will help keep us focused on what really matters and help a lot of others use their web site to do the same.

What do you think? There are many perspectives on these subjects and I would love to hear yours.

–jc

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 12th, 2007 at 3:04 pm and is filed under general, jon cline. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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