Introduction
Positioning strategy defines how the company products differ from competitors’ products. Therefore, Positioning is the process of designing the company’s image and value offer so that the customers understand and appreciate what the company stands for in relation to its competitors. A Positioning strategy adopted puts a company in a segment that intends to attract and retain customers in. For example if a firm goes after the high- quality position will attract the high quality customer segment within the market. Therefore positioning goes to the branding of the company products. What it means is that the consumers’ products choice will fall on that product which in his opinion will at that point in time and under specific conditions best satisfy his need. Self-interest will dictate a choice of the commodity that will have maximum utility. It follows that the determinants of utility will be the same as the determinants of choice. Thus, if the marketer knows the nature of the factors influencing the consumer’s opinion of the goods concerned, he will probably be able to predict consumer choice.
Main body
This means that positioning is dependent on the branding and advertising of the company’s products. Branding and advertising give arise to brand image, brand attitude, brand loyalty, sustainable services, embracing of technology, and differentiation, this is new concepts or ways of positioning. Customers usually have relationships with the brand because the specific brand can develop associations with a type of person or even another product of a specific segment. A brand can be designed to appeal to some group of people like the Verizon cell phone has been designed to fit the elite group of people. And likewise, the 20th-century movie appeals to the young generations, this positioning using the brand image. At the same time, customers have relationships with brands because of the like-dislike feeling towards a brand. A customer might like a product or dislike it due to the positioning of the product or product image. Brand image will also have some customers become extremely loyal, buying from a competitor only rarely if at all. While some customers may recommend a product to a person because of the image of the product and branding followed by the producer. For these customers, the goal is to maintain their loyalty and reduces the likelihood that they are to share their purchases with other brands. This follows the positioning of the brand name by the company that produced it.
Differentiation is what branding is all about is a good positioning strategy. A brand is the product or service of a particular supplier which is differentiated by its name and presentation. Hence customers have relationships with specific brands. A brand is the product or service of a particular supplier which is differentiated by its name and presentation.
The use of new technology is another positioning strategy exploited by companies. Customers have relationships’ to brands especially those exploiting modern technology. Customers won’t benefit from what is looking new, current, and up to date hence they have relationships with some brands. For example young people like movies of the 20th century.
Therefore it is easy for firms to choose their positioning strategy after identify the target market segment. Thus a firm that is well known for quality in other segments will go for this position in a new segment as long as there is a sufficient number of quality–oriented customers. however, if there are firms with similar quality products then, they will need to seek further differentiation of their brand, which may include high quality for low cost or high quality with more technical service. Another way of saying this is that each firm must build a unique bundle of competitive advantages that appeal to a substantial group within the segment.
Brand positioning involves; identifying a set of possible competitive advantages to exploit, selecting the right competitive advantage, and effectively signaling to the market the firm positioning concept. Identifying potential competitive advantages a company differentiates itself from competitors by bundling competitive advantages.
Competitive advantage grows out of value a firm is able to create for their buyer that exceeds the firm’s cost of creating it. Value is what buyers are willing to pay, and superior value steeps from offering lower prices than competitors for equivalent benefits or providing unique benefits that more than offset a higher price. There are two types of competitive advantage: cost leadership and differentiation. The advantage of solving the positioning problem is that it enables the company to solve the marketing – mix problems. The marketing- mix products, price, place, and promotion –is essentially the working out of the tactical details of the positioning strategy. Thus a firm that seizes upon the “high-quality position” knows that it must put out high-quality products, charge a high price. Distribute through high-class dealers, and advertise in high-quality magazines. This is the only way to project a consistent and believable high-quality image.
Each brand has various activities that are performed before the product is consumed or reaches the market this designing, producing, marketing, delivering, and after-sale services. The value chain disaggregates a firm into nine strategically relevant activities in order to understand the behavior of costs in the specific business and industry and the existing and potential sources of differentiation. The nine value activities consist of five primary activities and five support activities.
Thus not every company will face a plethora of cost or performance opportunities for gaining a competitive advantage. Some companies will find many minor advantages available, but all are highly imitable and therefore perishable. The solution for these companies is to identify new potential advantages continually and move them out one by one to keep the competitors off-balance. That is, these companies need to routines the innovation process, expecting not so much to achieve a major permanent advantage but rather to discover many little ones that can be introduced sequentially to win market share.
Choosing competitive advantages to suppose a company has been fortunate enough to discover several potential competitive advantages through its value chain analysis. Some could be ruled out because they are too slight, too costly to develop, or too inconsistent with the companies profile. Suppose four advantages remain and the company needs a framework for selecting the one that makes the most sense to develop.
Conclusion
Companies must take specific steps to build and advertise their competitive advantage and not assume that it will automatically be apparent to the market. Thus a company that decided to build service superiority should go about quietly hiring and training more service people, and broadcasting its services capabilities and its superiority in this attribute.
References
Aaker, D.A. (2001), Managing Brand Equity, Free Press, New York, NY.
Aaker, D.A. (2003), “Are brand equity investments really worthwhile?”, in Aaker, D.A., Biel, A. (Eds),Brand Equity & Advertising: Advertising’s Role in Building Strong Brands, Erlbaum, Hillsdale, NJ, pp.333-41.
Park, C.W., Jaworski, B.J., MacInnis, D.J. (2006), “Strategic brand concept – image management”, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 50 pp.135-45.
Ries, A., Trout, J. (2006), Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind, McGraw-Hill Inc., New York, NY.,.