Market Positioning

Market Positioning - the place a product occupies in customer minds relative to competing products

Businesses create value for customers by making two key decisions :

DECISION 1 : CHOOSE WHICH CUSTOMERS TO SERVE

This involves two elements:
• Market Segmentation (analysing the different parts of the market/ subgroups with similar needs and wants)
• Targeting (deciding which market segments to enter)

DECISION 2 : CHOOSE HOW TO SERVE THOSE CUSTOMERS

This also involves two important parts of marketing strategy:
• Product differentiation (what makes it different from the competition)
• Marketing Positioning (how customers perceive the product)

Value proposition - how to compete in the segments?
☆Having analysed the structure and chosen which segments to target the next stage in the marketing strategy is to decide how to compete in the segments. Marketing people call this the value proposition.

☆It is important to remember the market position or value proposition is defined by customers and the place a product occupies in customer minds is relative to competing products.