Which book made positioning a marketing word?
Al Ries and Jack Trout made the word famous with their 1981 book, Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind. Their point was that positioning is not something you do to a product; it is what you do to the mind of the buyer, who already has a crowded shelf of alternatives in there.
April Dunford's Obviously Awesome (2019) turned the idea into a method that starts somewhere useful: with the competitive alternatives, meaning what customers would do if your business did not exist. That list often includes doing it themselves, or doing nothing at all.
How do you find a position you can hold?
Work through it in order. List what a customer weighs you against, including the do-it-yourself option. Write down what you have that those alternatives lack, whether a skill, a speed, a guarantee or a specialty. Ask which customers care most about that difference, and whether enough of them live within your service area.
Then name the category you want to be compared in, because "pool builder" and "plunge pool specialist" invite different comparisons. A position you cannot back with something a customer can check, such as photos, reviews or a guarantee in writing, will not hold for long.
What changed when a pool builder picked a position? (example figures)
A pool builder in Townsville with a crew of three competes with nine other builders for the same searches. It quotes about 60 jobs a year and wins 12, a strike rate of 20 percent, at an average of $55,000 a job. Its best work has been on small or sloping blocks that other builders turned down, so it repositions as the plunge pool builder for small and sloping blocks.
| Before | A year after | |
|---|---|---|
| Quote requests | 60 | 40 |
| Jobs won | 12 | 15 |
| Strike rate | 20 percent | 37.5 percent |
| Site visits saved, at 3 hours each | 60 hours | |
| Revenue at $55,000 a job | $660,000 | $825,000 |
Fewer people asked, because the builder stopped trying to appeal to everyone. More of the right ones said yes, because they had decided it was the builder for their block before anyone measured the yard.
How do you write a position down?
In one sentence, using the pattern Geoffrey Moore set out in Crossing the Chasm (1991): for a named customer with a named need, your business is a named category that gives a named benefit, and unlike the main alternative, it has a named difference. For the pool builder: "For Townsville families with small or sloping blocks who have been told a pool will not fit, we build plunge pools that do, designed and dug by the same crew; unlike builders who quote from a catalogue, we start with your block."
It is a note for you and anyone who writes for you. The line on the side of the ute comes later, and it comes from this.
Where does positioning sit in a CoraVision plan?
CoraVision builds your 12-month strategy in three layers (direction, plan and tactics), and positioning belongs in the first: it is decided before any ad or post. The strategy is built around one number you choose to chase, with weekly check-ins, and a clear position is often the cheapest way to move that number, as the pool builder's strike rate shows. Cora coaches you through each step, and you make the changes yourself.
Questions
What is the difference between positioning and branding?
Positioning is the decision about where you stand and who you are for. Branding is how that decision looks and sounds: the name, the logo, the colours, the tone. A brand built without a position looks good and says very little.
Should a small business niche down?
Usually further than feels comfortable. A narrow position still lets you take other work; your marketing simply speaks to one buyer clearly, and the others still ring. The test is whether there are enough of those buyers within reach of your business.