Learning Objectives

• Advantages of Strong Brands

• Brand Image
• Concept of brand positioning
• Identify the four components of brand positioning.
• POP & POD
• Describe the guidelines in developing a good brand
positioning.
Marketing Advantages of Strong
Brands
Brand Image
Identifying and Establishing
Brand Positioning
 Basic Concepts
Brand positioning
• Act of designing the company’s offer and image so that
it occupies a distinct and valued place in the target
customers’ minds.
• Finding the proper “location” in the minds of consumers
or market segment.
• Allows consumers to think about a product or service in
the “right” perspective.
 Consumer Business-to-Business
Segmentation Bases Segmentation Bases
 Target Market
Market segmentation: Divides the market into distinct
groups of homogeneous consumers who have similar
needs and consumer behavior.
Involves identifying segmentation bases and criteria
• Criteria
• Identifiability
• Size
• Accessibility
• Responsiveness
Funnel Stages and Transitions
 Nature of Competition
Competitive analysis
•Considers resources, capabilities and likely intentions of other
firms.
•Allows marketers to choose markets where consumers can
be profitably served.

Indirect competition
•Even if a brand does not face direct competition in its product
category, and thus does not share performance related
attributes with other brands, it can still share more abstract
associations and face indirect competition in a more broadly
defined product category.
 • ‘Shagun – Gift an Insurance”, a unique gift of
Personal Accident policy.
• Can be gifted to anyone you want
• Not necessary for the policy buyer to be related to the
insured. 
• The premium of the product - Rs. 501, 1001, 2001
• Premium amount has a touch of our Indian tradition

18th August 2020

Source: http://www.thetimesofbengal.com/sbi-general-insurance-launches-shagun-gift-an-insurance-policy/
 To Sum up…
To appropriately position a brand, marketers should:

• Identify their target customers.

• Analyze the type of competition they might face in the
identified market base.
• Identify product features and associations that are
different or similar to their competitors.
 Contents of Video (Reference)
https://www.campaignindia.in/video/dabur-red-paste-provi
des-the-immunity-for-chaubeyji/463158

http://www.thetimesofbengal.com/linc-pen-plastics-limite
d-launches-the-new-pentonic-covid-19-killer-a-finger-free
-touch-device/
 Developing a Brand Positioning
Positioning
• The act of designing a
company’s offering and
image to occupy a distinctive
place in the minds of the
target market
• Value proposition
 Points-of-Difference

Points-of-difference (PODs)

Attributes/benefits that consumers

strongly associate with a brand,
positively evaluate, and believe
they could not find to the same
extent with a competitive brand
Points-of-Difference

POD criteria
 Points-of-Parity
Points-of-parity (POPs)
• Attribute/benefit associations that are not necessarily
unique to the brand but may in fact be shared with other
brands
POP forms
 POP forms
Category - Essential to a legitimate and
credible offering within a certain product or
service category

Competitive - Designed to overcome

perceived weaknesses of the brand in light of
competitors’ points-of-difference.

Correlational - Negative associations that

arise from the existence of positive
associations for the brand
 Communicating
POPs and PODs
Negatively correlated attributes/benefits

 Low price vs. high quality

 Taste vs. low calories
 Powerful vs. safe
 Ubiquitous vs. exclusive
 Varied vs. simple
 Multiple frame of reference
When a brand identifies more than one actual or potential
competitive frame of reference it is has multiple frame of
reference.
•Cafe coffee Day as a cafe (frame of reference local cafe),
•as a quick-serve restaurant (frame of reference any fast food joint
like MCD)
•or as a retail coffee brand (frame of reference coffee brand like
Nescafe).
 Straddled Positioning - 2
• Occasionally a company will try to straddle two frames
of reference.
• Straddle positioning is a situation one a brands
POD in one segment becomes POP in other segment
and visa-versa.
Positioning Guidelines
 To Sum up ...
Brand positioning describes how a brand can effectively
compete against a specified set of competitors.

A good product positioning should:

• Have a “foot in the present” and a “foot in the future”.
• Identify all relevant points-of-parity.
• Reflect a consumer point of view in terms of the benefits
that consumers derive.
• Contain points-of-difference and points-of-parity that
appeal both to the “head” and the “heart”.