Positioning is everything in business
Remember the famous Apple slogan from the turn of the century – “Think different”?
The slogan wasn't created just to look nice or win advertising awards. Its purpose was to appeal to a specific target audience.
It was the cornerstone of Apple's entire marketing, and made them a boatload of money.
The campaign worked so brilliantly because…..who doesn't think of themselves as different or special?
The ad basically said “if you wanna be like Albert Einstein, Richard Branson, Amelia Earhart and other world-famous figures, buy our products”.
After watching that ad, you just want to become a part of the movement, right? (Here's that 1-minute ad btw.)
Onward.
Does this mean you need a brilliant slogan to have a successful business?
Not at all. In fact, I'd have to google Apple's current one.
Having a clever slogan can be a nice bonus. But what this is really about is having a clear target audience in mind.
Apple had a clear target audience back then and they have one now, even though it didn't stay the same. But let's be honest, everyone still thinks of Mac users as “different” or “better”. (The iPhone is a totally different story though.)
Whether you call it target audience, target market or buyer persona doesn't really matter. What matters is that every successful company has one, and you need it too.
This may be the hardest thing you'll have to do in your business, but it's the most important one. Because you're doomed if you try to market to everyone, it's the recipe for disaster.
The bottom line? That's all nice to know but the real question is...
How can you define your target audience for your business?
You tell me -- here's a simple exercise.
Let's say you got an assignment, as head of marketing, to sell an electric shaver -- not any better or more 'special' than thousands of others out there. How would you do it?
Use whatever categorization you want -- country, city, age, gender, interests, problems, needs, wants, anything.
How would you do it? How would you sell it?
Take a couple minutes and think about the best ways to sell a shaver.
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Did the exercise? Great!
But I can’t read your mind so we’ll take a look at real-world examples I have prepared.
There are 2 brands named Meridian Grooming and BALLS (not kidding).
Both of them are selling an almost identical product, which they use different labels for – “below-the-belt trimmer”, “body shaver”, “intimate trimmer” – but it’s all the same thing.
They are, to the best of my knowledge, not any better nor particularly different than other body shavers on the market.
With a name like that, the BALLS brand only needs a picture of the product and that's it. It's obvious who it is for and it's obvious what it does.
Have you seen their ads recently? If not, maybe you're not in their target demographic.
Here's my best guess on who they're targeting:
-- Gender: Men
-- Age: 20s & 30s
-- Location: Probably developed countries
They don't need to get any more specific, because many young men will be interested in their product. All they need is to create decent ads that will generate traffic to the store.
So what's the secret sauce to their success?
The secret is in going ultra specific. Not just a shaver, not even a body shaver, but a shaver for “down there”. That narrow specificity is what distinguishes them from other body shavers.
Exceptional marketing and positioning, well done!
I came across these brands years ago and even bought one to try it out.
-- Quality? Below average.
-- Price? Expensive.
-- Positioning? Perfect.
The entire business model hinges on that positioning and they have executed very well.
What they did was take a random, average at best, product and position it in a very specific way, where the brand name played a big part as well.
If their product was any good, I’d give them a perfect 10/10 score for execution.
Hasta la vista,
Filip Stanojevic - The positioning guy