Now that you have completed your sales objectives and identified your main and secondary target markets it is time to put your product in the best possible position to succeed and fit in to the overall marketing strategy.
What Does Positioning Mean?
When you are trying to position your product, you are attempting to put the image of your product in the minds of consumers who you have targeted to purchase your product. If done correctly it will put your characterization of the product in the minds of the target market ahead of your competition. Putting your product in a good position will help consumers view your product differently than your competition.
Is Positioning Important?
When coming up with a marketing plan, positioning the product is important. Having good product positioning is the base for all of your activity with consumers. Without having good product positioning your communication, advertising, merchandising, and publicity will all suffer. When you are marketing your product, you are reinforcing your product positioning. All these areas of your business must work together to convey the common message of the position of your product.
When you are looking towards the long-term positioning of your product there are some factors that you must address. You must understand what your target group wants from your product and you should have a clear understanding of your competition. The research that you have already done will be a great help to you when it come to positioning your product. Having a good understanding of your products strengths and weaknesses in relation to your competition is good place to start when positioning your product. Having a good idea of what separates your product from your competition will help you position your product as well.
Along with the research that you have done on the strengths and weaknesses of your product that will help position your product, the research that you have done on your target market will be of equal help. The surveys and interviews that you conducted will be of use here because they were conducted directly with consumers. This is because no matter what you do, the target market must be put first, and any positioning must be focused on them.
Furthermore, in order to position your product in the best way by using your target market these are the questions you should have the answers to through your research. Why the target market is buying, is it that your product is the best or is your brand name associated with quality products? Where is most of the product purchased? Does in vary by geographic region or season? Is your product meant to be used with another product or is it a stand alone product? Is it a product that will be purchased frequently or infrequently? Knowing this information about your target market will go along way into putting your product in the best position to succeed.