Reviewed by Suzanne Abate

http://www.bodisonb2bmarketing.com

Would I recommend Positioning: The Battle for your Mind?

First, some context.  I would recommend red wine over white (which is for cooking).  And that you watch all of Werner Herzog’s documentaries, especially Encounters at the End of the World.  I would recommend that you pay more to fly Emirates and that you don’t pass up the chance to dine at Bhukara, if you should find yourself in Cape Town.
I would not recommend this book if you like your information delivered with diplomacy and delicacy. But if what you like is unabashed conviction and history as persuasion, then this marketing classic is your compulsory reading.

Overall Stickiness:

Five.

Application:

Industry veterans (which I am not) will all tell you that in the nineteen seventies Al Ries and Jack Trout forever changed the way people think about marketing.  And the proof is in the circulation pudding – with millions of copies in print more than thirty years since its original release.
But the dedication (to the second best advertising agency in the world, whoever they might be) is somewhat restrictive.  This book belongs to every small entrepreneur and C-level executive.  To genius inventors and the world’s investors.  To all the ad agencies big and small, and, of course, to all of us marketers whose job it is to create compelling stories.

Ideas:

The idea is this: in today’s over-communicated society how do you create messages that get heard? By linking products (people, ideas, and services) to meaning in the mind of the consumer.  That’s positioning.
What follows are some monoliths: in the battle between “first” and “better,” first always wins.  Strategies for being a leader are fundamentally and always different from strategies for followers.  If you can’t find a hole in the market (to be first in) you must re-position how people perceive the competition. And, what’s in a name? Everything.

Style:

Each chapter of this book is like a shot of espresso: goes down fast and spins your wheels.  The core ideas are repeated like mantras and endlessly supported by historical case studies and comparisons.  When tallied, what results is a bible of common sense.  We are the disciples; and taking up these ideas is not only easy to do, it feels like a professional obligation.
But if you don’t want to take my word for it you can simply open up the table of contents.  Each chapter is named by its thesis and the summary overviews – written with the same candor and cut-to-it approach that governs the entire book – say it all.

Chapter 10. The No-Name Trap. Companies with long, complex names have tried to shorten them by using initials.  This strategy seldom works.

Chapter 11. The Free-Ride Trap. Can a second product get a free ride on the advertising coattails of a well-known brand? In the case of products like LifeSavers gum, the answer is no.

Chapter 20. Positioning a New Jersey Bank. One of the best ways to establish a position is to find a weakness in your competitor’s.

My Biggest Insight:

Bright minds repeat common and painful mistakes.  This continues at an alarming rate and on enormous financial scales.  The mistakes themselves are evidence that positioning works.  Old beliefs are seductive misleadings – we have to change the way we think about marketing.
My second biggest insight: Platforms evolve; principles endure.

Some of the powerful concepts in this book (and how you start applying them today):

-To be heard you have to find a new path into peoples’ minds.

-Marketing must be part of the plan from the outset; by the time you’ve named your product it may already be too late.

-When you’re leading never stop looking behind you and always be ready to defend your position.

-Creativity is alive in well in the concept of positioning; to apply it successfully you must learn to think from every angle.

Introductory concepts:

1) Positioning: the fifth “P” that intersects Product, Price, Place, Promotion.
2) Anyone can use positioning strategy to get ahead in the game of life.
3) Advertising cannot save a product that is improperly positioned.
4) The easiest way into the mind is being first.

Thanks to Suzanne Abate

Bodis On B2B Marketing http://www.bodisonb2bmarketing.com