“What Position’s Your Positioning In?”

That thought came to me the other day when I heard the old Kenny Rogers and the First Edition song “Just Dropped in (To See What Condition My Condition Was In).”

I’ve been helping a lot of clients with positioning lately, and was thinking about one of them when the song came on. So the transfer from condition to position was pretty fast and I thought: “hey, great title for a blog.”

I think the reason positioning is becoming so important is that organizations do not have a lot of money to spend, and they want to make sure the money they are spending is being spent correctly. That means understanding what positioning will resonate with their target markets.

Your position in the marketplace is how you want your target audiences to perceive you (as opposed to your brand, which is how they actually do perceive you; and if your positioning and brand are not in alignment, your organization is not in alignment).

So here is what you need to do to correctly establish your position:

1. Know why people want your category. What is the pain that drives them to buy the type of product or service you offer? Sometimes it is easy; “I want to reduce costs.” “I’m having a baby and I need an ob/gyn.” Sometimes it is not. For example, why do people want that room addition?
2. Know the purchase decision drivers. What motivates them to buy from one source vs. the other? There are many possible attributes, ranging from quality to convenience to price to expertise, etc.
3. Know why they do or do not buy from you. This gets right at their perception of you and the competition, and is essential in competitive positioning. It also is essential in aligning your positioning with your brand.

The only way I know of to answer these questions is to go out and ask your customers, your referrers, and prospects. To assume you know the answer is an invitation to failure. But once you know the answers, you can do all sorts of great things:

1. Create your positioning statement. According to Reis and Trout, your positioning statement should build upon your present strengths, search for a niche, or reposition the competition.
2. Rebrand your organization. (We just did this for a client, and the cool thing was the name did not come from one of the names we tested, but from a comment made by one of the people we talked with)
3. Develop a new tagline and logo, even if you do not rename your organization.

So, what position’s your positioning in?