The Art of Brand Positioning: 6 Steps to Stand Out in a Crowded Market

6 Brand Positioning Strategies to Stand Out in a Crowded Market | CIO Women Magazine

Whether you’re selling premium coffee machines to the best serviced offices in your city, or selling the best serviced offices in your city to up-and-coming entrepreneurs, a packed marketplace is a bit like a popular restaurant during the lunch rush. Everyone’s demanding attention, but only a few will actually get served. Oddly enough, it’s not always those who shout loudest who get the attention. Instead, it’s those who make the waiter remember them for the right reasons. Here are six ways to position your brand distinctively without resorting to “the loudest one wins” theatrics:

Six brand positioning strategies:

1. Find what makes you weird

The most memorable brands we know and love embrace what makes them different. While many companies play it safe by smoothing their edges, others have done the opposite and found tremendous success. 

Take Dr. Bronner’s soap, for example. Their rambling, philosophy-covered labels shouldn’t work, yet they do. They’re iconic. The company successfully turned what should have been a liability into their signature brand of weird. To better stand out, consider what your equivalent of eccentric soap labels is.

2. Solve problems others don’t see 

Businesses that follow the conventional market wisdom tend to focus on addressing obvious customer pain points. The real opportunity, however, lies in solving problems customers don’t even realize they have. 

6 Brand Positioning Strategies to Stand Out in a Crowded Market | CIO Women Magazine
Source – blog.thecenterforsalesstrategy.com

Dollar Shave Club, for example, didn’t focus solely on selling the common pain point of needing a razor. They looked further afield, solving the pain point of remembering to buy razors. Questioning an assumption everyone else took for granted helped them carve out a unique position in the grooming and packaged goods space. This is a great example of using brand positioning strategies to gain a competitive edge.

3. Own a specific emotion

Rather than claiming broad (and often vague) territory by trumpeting values like “quality” or “innovation,” stake your claim on a specific feeling. Volvo, for example, is all about “safety,” but that sense of safety is really about the feeling of confidence that comes with protecting your family. Consider what specific emotion your brand could deliver unlike anyone else.

4. Create your very own category

Instead of trying to fit into overcrowded, existing categories, why not create an entirely new one? Take Red Bull, for example. Sure, they are technically a soft drink in the same category as Coca Cola, Pepsi, and other giants of industry. However, to stand out, they expanded beyond that to create the energy drink category.

6 Brand Positioning Strategies to Stand Out in a Crowded Market | CIO Women Magazine
Source – productreviewmom.com

To develop your own category requires courage and clarity. Remember, you’re not just selling a product, you’re selling a new way of thinking about the problem you solve.

5. Turn your limits and liabilities into assets

View every constraint as a potential differentiator. Do you have a small team? If so, promote your personal attention. Do you have a limited product range? If so, position yourself as a specialist. 

Warby Parker, for example, turned the limitation of selling glasses online into a strength by offering home try-ons. This solved a huge hurdle most people had with online shopping. Often, this kind of brand positioning strategies comes from embracing what you can’t change.

6. Make your customers into heroes

When most brands tell their story, they are the hero. Even if your brand has overcome plenty of hardship, it’s better to give your customers the role of heroes instead. GoPro, for example, sells action cameras – this is true – but what they’re really selling is the ability to capture amazing moments and share them with family, friends, and millions of strangers across the globe.

6 Brand Positioning Strategies to Stand Out in a Crowded Market | CIO Women Magazine
Image by Pavel Danilyuk from Pexels

GoPro’s positioning is tightly focused on their customers’ adventures— and that makes their customers feel like better versions of themselves.

Brand positioning strategies aren’t just a marketing exercise—it’s a strategic choice that should guide everything your business does. So take a hard look at your market, your capabilities, and your customers. Find the intersection of what you’re genuinely good at, what customers genuinely need, and what competitors aren’t doing. That sweet spot is where memorable positioning lives.

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