We all understand the concept of ‘positioning’ finding and defining a clear and distinctive place for your company product, service, or brand in the mind of customers and prospects. The best positioning strategies deliver a clear understanding of what makes you different, but in a way that is relevant to the market; for example, saying that you are the only marketing communication agency in Teddington may make you unique, but is of no interest.
Positioning, of course, must therefore be customer centric, believable, easily communicable and give you a competitive advantage.
We also know that positioning is a way of identifying with either a niche in the market that you can occupy, or of appealing to a particular market segment. These exclusion strategies can of course be self-limiting and restrict your market potential, proving that finding real points of differentiation without imposing market restrictions is just one of the reasons that positioning is so difficult.
Most of the positioning that we are familiar with is business-to-consumer oriented, and most studies and research has been around the way that consumer brands are defined and positioned. Nevertheless, positioning does have an important part to play in business-to-business markets. It is even more difficult than in B2C to arrive at a good workable position strategy for your brand, but is just as important.
Firstly, positioning in FMCG is usually aimed at a single point of reference. In B2B, the complex buying process and the different roles of decision-makers means that there are multiple targets for our communications.
However, positioning is positioning is positioning, and as a universal indicator of what your brand is about, it cannot be changed simply because it is aimed at a different people. You cannot, for example, claim to be the only quality-driven facilities management company to the CEO and at the same time position yourself as the cheapest to the CFO. Your positioning needs to take into account multiple decision-makers without diluting the brand. Easier said than done.
A second point of difference is that in FMCG and B2C, it is frequently (though not always) the product that is ‘positioned’, not the company or organisation offering it. As we move up the considered purchase scale, we tend to find that it is increasingly the company that ‘owns’ its brand positioning, not the individual products they offer.
For example, neither Unilever or Proctor & Gamble make any serious attempts to position themselves as companies, but car manufacturers have a definite brand position regardless of whether you are looking at the BMW 3 or the BMW 7 series. This process becomes even more defined in B2B markets.
Most B2B companies end up branding themselves, and even if they use sub-brands they rarely attempt separate positioning. While this is undoubtedly more cost-effective, it becomes harder to think of all encompassing points of departure at the company rather than the product level.
Product convergence and the lack of service differentiation make it even more necessary to find and focus on those things that make you unique. This is difficult in B2B markets particularly in service companies where an individual relationship often marks the major point of contact with the brand. A quick glance at many B2B websites shows how similar each of them is within their sector.
Take a quick look at the ‘big four’ accountancy practice sites. This is what each one of them says about themselves:
Deloitte & Touche the company values integrity, outstanding value to markets and clients, commitment to each other and strength from cultural diversity.
KPMG (its) approach to relationships and service delivery helps clients across the globe exploit new opportunities, improve performance, manage risk and enhance value for both shareholders and stakeholders alike.
PricewaterhouseCoopers We provide quality integrity and industry expertise, to build trust and enhance value whatever the size of your organisation.
Ernst & Young Helping clients to deal with the rigours of modern business means showing them ways to improve their operating effectiveness and achieve their economic objectives no matter where in the world their businesses take them.
I would not criticise any of these four statements, and you can see the germs of differentiation within them (values, relationships, size, global, etc.), but it demonstrates how hard it is for firms occupying the same territory to find anything different to say about what they offer and the way they offer it. The perception within the target audience of the accountancy market is that the ‘big four’ are all high quality firms whose service is usually of the highest level, but that they are much the same.
The fact that B2B poses particular problems for companies in B2B doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t attempt it. In the February issue of B2B Marketing magazine pages 26-28, the list of the nominated 11 brands for the Best B2B Brand of 2005 showed just what great work can go into brand positioning.
The two banks (Alliance & Leicester and Bank of Scotland) are in competition and yet have carved out separate positions for their brands. They have done this by focussing on where they can claim a unique sector benefit and one that is relevant to their marketplace and, as a result, both of them are demonstrating growth in business banking. Finding the right, relevant differentiators is the hard part. Once you have done that, communicating it with impact should be easy.
