by Steve Fodor
A colleague of mine likes to say, “If you needed to have brain surgery done, you wouldn’t go to a general practice doctor.”
The same is true when it comes to positioning your business and how you go to market. If you don’t stand for something specific and own it, or, if you try to be too broad in your positioning, you end up standing for nothing in the minds of prospects and customers.
Positioning is the discipline of making trade-offs. And I say “discipline” because it is hard to focus your marketing message and positioning. But, as Bill Cosby once said, “The surest way to fail is to try to be all things to all people.”
Defining what you do best (or the two or three things you do best and can own) requires you to take a hard look at yourself and have insight into what the unmet needs are in your category. What makes you unique? Will this motivate customers? Will this render the competition helpless? Not only is this a critical business strategy, but think about how people find information today. In many cases, their first avenue is to enter some words into Google. If you’re not presenting your information in a specific, well-defined and positioned way, you’re probably not going to be high on the search page.
Today’s consumers and buyers have way, way more choices than they did just a decade ago. If you don’t stand for something specific, own a relevant position and stand out in a unique way, you’re just another commodity. And if you’re a commodity, you’ll always be forced to compete on price. That’s not the most enjoyable position to own.
Flickr Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mistressf/
A colleague of mine likes to say, “If you needed to have brain surgery done, you wouldn’t go to a general practice doctor.”
The same is true when it comes to positioning your business and how you go to market. If you don’t stand for something specific and own it, or, if you try to be too broad in your positioning, you end up standing for nothing in the minds of prospects and customers.
Positioning is the discipline of making trade-offs. And I say “discipline” because it is hard to focus your marketing message and positioning. But, as Bill Cosby once said, “The surest way to fail is to try to be all things to all people.”
Defining what you do best (or the two or three things you do best and can own) requires you to take a hard look at yourself and have insight into what the unmet needs are in your category. What makes you unique? Will this motivate customers? Will this render the competition helpless? Not only is this a critical business strategy, but think about how people find information today. In many cases, their first avenue is to enter some words into Google. If you’re not presenting your information in a specific, well-defined and positioned way, you’re probably not going to be high on the search page.
Today’s consumers and buyers have way, way more choices than they did just a decade ago. If you don’t stand for something specific, own a relevant position and stand out in a unique way, you’re just another commodity. And if you’re a commodity, you’ll always be forced to compete on price. That’s not the most enjoyable position to own.
Flickr Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mistressf/
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