Eventually most marketers are presented with the task of creating a positioning statement for their business, brand, product or service. While some may dismiss this important step as unnecessary or time-consuming, a good positioning statement can start you off on the right foot, and ample time and effort should be invested in developing your positioning statement. In addition to the utility you’ll derive from your positioning statement once it’s crafted, the development process also forces you to think about your brand from a strategic point of view and consider the value your product or service has for your target audiences.
I was browsing around Wikipedia (yeah I know, John Moss is a nerd), and came across the brand entry, where I was struck that local brands are still differentiated from global brands. Are they still teaching this in business schools? If so, a good dose of the real world is needed.
As a marketer I am amazed that people still fail to consider the effects of technology and communications on brands, and that this position persists on a site thought to epitomize “Web 2.0″ is shocking. Does anyone really believe that a brand in one market has no exposure in another? Is there anything such as a local brand? I would argue that if your brand is limited by geography and that your brand fails to add value to your products when consumers are contemplating a purchase, regardless of distance, you really aren’t doing your job as a marketer. The very tools that have made product research and development, promotion, price competition and distribution (also known as “place”) easier for marketers have also made the concept of a local brand archaic. Call it a lesson in the Law of Unintended Consequences.
Today’s marketer has to consider many things that have made the world smaller. Here are just a few examples:
- Yelp: Offers business and service reviews. With just a few keystrokes, a consumer can find out everything about your brand and the products you market, find out what others have said about your brand or even share their own experience with your brand. Exciting or scary, depending on your view of your brand and whether it’s ready for prime time.
- Google: Again, with just a few keystrokes, a consumer can find out all about your brand. And with the way Google’s algorithms work, consumers don’t even need to be looking for your brand specifically. Even if you are marketing a small, “local” brand, you may find it alongside a larger brand with more marketing muscle behind it. For example if you are marketing a locally owned pet shop in a small town, your brand has as much of a chance of showing up in a visitor’s search results if your site is targeted to the search terms the visitor is looking for and your site is optimized for search.
- Ebay. No matter where you are or where you saturate your brand’s promotion most, your products can be sold worldwide. Therefore, the need for a strong brand is the most evident on a site like Ebay.com. And if you don’t sell your products on Ebay yourself, don’t think they aren’t selling there. Do a quick search and see who is selling your products at what price and what your competitors are doing. You may not be ready to set up an Ebay Store yet, but you need a strong brand to make the job of those intermediaries who are selling your products easier. They may be ultimately selling your products, but they are buying your products in the meantime.
There are tons of examples I could go through, but in the end I just don’t think there is such a thing as a local brand any more when you truly consider what a brand is in the world we live in. Yes, there may be some business names that resonate with a certain area, but given the growth of technology and communication, and the resulting shrinking of the world, these examples are becoming harder to find.
The purpose of this blog/site to discuss the marketing we see around us. Every day we are bombarded with thousands of marketing stimuli, some done well and some not so well. By examining these messages and their impact, we can learn how to become better marketers ourselves.
I’d love to get feedback and suggestions for topics, so please feel free to leave comments. But please do not spam us. If you have to ask yourself whether your message can be construed as spam, it probably is.
