The five Cs of Global Brand Management Online

As much as the Internet empowers, it also overwhelms with information and choice, to confuses and even intimidates. That's why the role of brands in building trust loyalty is so critical to the web experience. It is also why recreating success in the online world is such a challenge.

The competitive edge will go global to global marketers who recognize and embrace what we call "the 5 Cs" global brand management online:

1. Control. Who controls the online channel at the corporate level? How is regional control over local sales marketing balanced against corporate branding imperatives?

Building brands has always been about control - of time and space, frequency and audience, n most of all, the message. In other words, controlling - in its totality- the brand experience. The globalisation of the web is perhaps the most dramatic example of force obliterating control. Globally, these complexities multiply across divisions, product lines, markets and agencies. Multiply that again across language, culture and border-and yet again scores if websites, each using different technologies. Controlling brand identity in this environment demands extraordinary flexibility.

2. Consolidation. How can redundancies be squeezed out of the global marketing process and underlying infrastructure? Can work flow be simplified and unified on a global basis? How can resources and marketing assets be deployed effectively across both online and offline sales channels?

Nowhere is the brand chaos more evident that in this aspect. All too often, numerous campaigns, local executions, one-off production efforts and off-strategy branding slip out into the marketplace without knowledge of the CMO. (Chief Marketing Officer).

Consolidation restores control - unifying budgets and teams is the first step to effecting the organizational and cultural changes necessary for a successful globalization effort. Utilizing the Web as the central hub to consolidate data, assets and processes is the most logical and cost effective solutions.

While the web may traditionally be a technology challenge, CMOs must lead the way to ensure that all decisions solve marketing's business requirements.

3. Communications. How do regional marketing teams around the globe stay informed and participate in the go-to-market process? How do you orchestrate marketing efforts on a global scale? How do you simplify access to crical marketing information and expose ongoing strategic communications? The efficient use of marketing resources and budgets, particularly on a global scale, calls for expanded insight, overview, and communication by all parties in the process. A centralized communications hub eliminates most obstacle to integration.

This orchestration of multiple marketing initiatives and communications efforts requires simple, fast and accurate views of all marketing components and activities across the company, and a shared vision of marketing goals and branding objectives. This level of transparency and open communications will foster creativity and encourage new initiatives across all regions and results in rapid adoption of emergent best practise.

4. Culture : How do you allow for local variances in message, voice, and design without breaking  underlying systems, creating a management night-mare, and fragmenting the brand? The seemingly contradictory forces of unification and centralization of brand processes on the one hand, and almost unlimited flexibility in global marketing processes and supporting technologies. Cultural relevancy exerts a powerful impact on brand perception and loyalty worldwide. The CMO can provide a vital function by demanding strategies that are globally viable from its advertising agency, in order to ease the rapid adoption and execution of these strategies from its regional marketing teams, while also providing a solid foundation for the brand online. The result is a communications platform that reinforces the integrity of the brand, while making it culturally relevant and thus stronger and more competitive, in all key global markets.

5. Creativity : How do you get maximum returns from your marketing resources regionally if the brand team spends all of its time cutting and pasting translations into webpages and recruiting corporate marketing efforts?

Given the pressures of accountability in marketing, it has never been more imperative for CMOs to focus on ROI. More disciplined approaches to global brand management save time and money, and create new levels of marketing efficiency.

Streamlining global brand management liberates time and resources for marketers to be the best marketers they can be. After all, the end game is snot about reducing costs so much as it is about enabling big ideas and igniting creative sparks that drive growth and build business.

TURN YOUR SITE INTO A GLOBAL MARKETING PLATFORM

Marketing vis a content management system is slow, costly and in flexible. Fortunately, a new breed of technology services gives marketers a unique opportunity to manage marketing communications on their Website independently from underlying IT infrastructure. Such service provide a unified environment for :

• Real-Time Analysis : The wealth of data gathered online can be overwhelming. CMOs must assemble the analytical tools and methodology needed to discover key insights, to sort out meaningful trends, and to answer critical questions about online marketing and website performance.
•  Intercept Marketing : Ensures that any online marketing effort is extended throughout the entire online marketing experience, making sure that timely and relevant ad messages are put in front of a user at any point during a web visit.
• Transaction Profiling : It is more critical than ever for corporations online to definet-methods and metrics for calculating ROI in online spending.. Transaction profiling provides a concrete way to track and measure the impact of marketing initiatives online. The ability of tying value to specific site behaviours has long been the Holy Grail for marketers, and has traditionally required huge IT investments to accomplish.
• E Mail marketing : Email marketing solutions must be firmly grounded in the same analytical framework that drives the rest of the online marketing services portfolio. A shared platform provides unprecedented capabilities for engineering a truly personalized online experience - and measuring the impact on user behaviours and the bottomline.

The Role of Online Brands

As Internet usage grows, brands are becoming even more important than they have been in other channels or environments. With more choices from many unknown providers, customers tend to choose a provider that represents a set of Values or attributes that are meaningful, clear and trusted. Breakenridge (2001:323) states that the strength of the brand together with technology has the potential to produce the "optimum brand". Pettis notes that branding has become much more important recently because of the proliferation of choice that's available to customers on the Internet. It is also important to note that branding is a critical component of the building long-term relationship on the Web. Mohammed et al suggest that, rather than viewing branding as a sub component of the product, it must be developed as moderating variable upon the elements of the marketing mix. Mohammed et al  explain that branding plays two roles in marketing activities. Marketing programmes affect how consumers perceive the brand, and hence its value. Second, branding is part of every marketing strategy. That is each marketing activity is enhanced if the brand is strong, or suppressed if the brand is weak. Therefore, branding is unique insofar it is both lever and an outcome of marketing actions.

By putting more information in the hands of consumers, digital technology might be expected to undermine the power of brands. Many said that the Internet would do away with the need for brands. This argument according to Bergstrom (2000:11) suggested that because people could  examine and access any product or services from every possible provider via the Internet, the brand would be irrelevant, since consumers would always choose the one with the lowest price. Whether decisions are solely base on price is questionable? A few years after Bergstrom's research, Rowley (2004b:131)) confirms that the notion of relying less on brands in the online environment still exists. The research further points out that since customers will gather detailed information on products and services and make their own judgment on the suitability of a product, brands can become superfluous. Both Bergstrom (2001:1) and Rowley (2004b:131), however, point out that over time it was proved that brands are even more important in cyberspace than they are in most other channels of environments.  The reason: " With more and more choices from many providers that are relatively unknown, customers tend to choose a provider they know--one that represents a set of values or attributes that are meaningful, clear, and trusted (a brand), especially if they cannot see or confirm that the provider is 'real'. "With many options to choose from and fewer personal relationship online, customers tend to turn to trusted and trustworthy brands that represent more intangible qualities. This was also the observation of Wind & Mahajan (2001: 12) who during the above period pointed out that as digital technology transcends national borders, companies need to pay more attention to the development of global brands. Breakenridge (2001:319) also warned that one must not underestimate the power of a well-known brand combined with a medium that enables it to reach audiences instantaneously, enhance user experience with engaging interaction ( prior to any purchase of a product or service), and increase overall awareness, allowing brands to reach new heights. Online Brands, according to Pettis (1995:209), delves into the depths of brands to a greater degree than most offline methods. Mohr (2001:287) argues that the growth of popular Internet companies shows that a brand  can grow and secure customer loyalty on the Internet. It is also a fact that brands are what people can rely on, and hence become even more important in an environment, such as the Internet, that has a low switching cost (The Economist, 1999:71). For some the idea of customer loyalty may seem outdated in the era of the Internet, where customers have the ability, to search and evaluate competing products at the click of a button (Calrke, 2001:160), However, the very fact that customers can so easily access alternatives, and then just as easily purchasing them, augments the importance of building strong ties of loyalty with online customers.

The Internet seems to be a marketing frontiers, in which tried and true models of advertising and marketing may not work in the same way traditional media.However, the reality is that emotional, fuzzy branding components that can be powerfully conveyed through television are not so easily conveyed in an online environment (Mohr 2001:287). It must be kept in mind that customers in a physical world can touch or feel products, but online customers do not enjoy the same level of sensory intake provided by online brands. Therefore, things such as speed and response time also play an important role. Online branding, for this reason, requires a credible and relevant promise with every interaction (Siegel & Zolli, 1999:50)

The opportunity are enormous for well-positioned brands on the Internet, since the potential audience for a product or service grows daily. it is however, important according Bergstrom (2000:12) to realise that branding on the Internet, if done correctly, can help to determine the difference between the winners and the losers. Despite the obvious advantage, many companies are likely to make some common mistakes in relation to their brands in Cyberland. They may for instance wrongly assume that their brands will have some appeal to Internet users as to traditional channel users, losing sight of the fact that Internet, users do have significant attitudinal differences.

Online Marketing

Online marketing is facing unprecedented change, brought on by a volatile economy, the meteoric rise of new channels, and the increased demand for financial accountability. 2010 is already shaping up to be an exciting year for online marketers. Pipe Fitting suppliers in India are also harnessing the power of internet to meet their marketing goals.

There are no signs that consumers will stop using search engines as their primary vehicle to find products and services. Marketing dollars are going where the customers and prospects are - online. Online channels are lower cost and more measurable, and as a result continue to cannibalize traditional media. 84% of marketers said it is important for their organization to shift their marketing focus to more online.

In 2010, web analytics will focus on integrating customer data from the web, search, mobile, and social measurement. 88% of marketers are already using or planning to use web analytics this year.
Safe Corporation has a new domain in http://www.safepipefittings.com/  The penetration and ubiquity of web analytics make it the logical point to integrate customers’ profiles across multiple online channels.

Sites like Facebook and Twitter have had a meteoric rise from obscurity. Marketers find themselves thrust into a world where they have to share control over their brand with consumers. Blogs, product reviews, and other social media are mixed with marketing messages to shape consumers’ perception of company brands. As companies pinpoint the specific social tactics that work best to engage their customers, they will expand their social media participation and continue to nurture a wide variety of social media tactics.

There are no signs that consumers will stop using search engines as their primary vehicle to find products and services. Marketing dollars are going where the customers and prospects are - online. Online channels are lower cost and more measurable, and as a result continue to cannibalize traditional media. 84% of marketers said it is important for their organization to shift their marketing focus to more online.

Sites like Facebook and Twitter have had a meteoric rise from obscurity. Marketers find themselves thrust into a world where they have to share control over their brand with consumers. Blogs, product reviews, and other social media are mixed with marketing messages to shape consumers’ perception of company brands. As companies pinpoint the specific social tactics that work best to engage their customers, they will expand their social media participation and continue to nurture a wide variety of social media tactics.

MARKET POSITIONING

Positioning has been described variously by different authorities. One way to define positioning is "the art and science of fitting the product to one or more segments of the broad market such as to set it apart meaningfully from competition".

Another definition of positioning is "a strategic approach to occupying consumer mind space."

The aim is to create a unique perception of the brand, comprising both tangible and intangible benefits relative to the perceptions of the competitive brands.

There various ways of making positioning operational. Both prior to doing so, marketers need to find answers to the following six questions:

1                What position (if any) do we have in the prospects’ minds?

2                What position do we want to own?

3                What companies / brands pose the greatest threat and must be overcome?

4                Do we have enough money / resources to occupy and hold that position?

5                Do we have the tenacity to stick with one consistent positioning strategy?

6                Does our creative match our positioning?

 

A brand may be positioned by various methods, such as: 

•  Positioning by product category / class
•  Positioning by attributes & benefits
• Positioning by price & quality
• Positioning by use / application
• Positioning by user segment
• Positioning by competitor
• Positioning by cultural symbols
  

Another approach to making positioning operational is to seek answers to the four questions given below, and formulate the positioning strategy accordingly.

1                Who am I? Corporate parentage of brand

2                What am I? Category / benefit / usage occasion or time / price-value

3                For whom am I? Demographics / Psychographics / Behavioural

4                Why me? USP / Difference

SMART

SPECIFIC

MEASURABLE

ACHIEVABLE/APPROCHABLE

REALISTIC

TIME

Every time customers experience your brand, you want them to remember what you do, why it is important to them, and why it is unique to you. By developing a clear expression of what is important to your customers and unique to you -- and reinforcing it with every customer interaction -- you will help your customers remember what your brand stands for. This starts with developing a brand positioning statement.

Developing a brand positioning statement involves four steps:

1.        Describe your customers

2.        Define yourself in terms of your competition

3.        Explain your greatest benefit

4.        Put it together into your brand positioning statement

1. Describe Your Customers

You start by examining your customers. Who buys your products or services? How would you define them as a group? They sound like an easy questions, but they deserve some serious thought. What do your customers do for a living? What is their income and education level? Their marital status? Gender? Religious and cultural background? Do they use your product or service at home or at work? If your customers are businesses, how would you describe those types of business as a whole? Make a list. Now determine what do your customers, as a group, have in common? How can you describe this group in three or four words?

Your goal is twofold:

1.        To create the broadest description of your target audience possible, while simultaneously.

2.        To keep it narrow enough to be relevant.

Few companies can actually describe their customers as "anyone," but some good examples of broad descriptions with a defined focus are "business travellers," "retired homeowners," "working parents," "small business owners," "farmers," "creative professionals," "frugal people,"  or "anyone with an e-mail address." When you've established who it is you'll be talking to, and what they have in common, you can start to define what's important to them.

2. Define Yourself in Terms of Your Competition

Every business, product, or service has competition. Even if you are introducing something completely new, you still have to compete with the "old way" of doing things or whatever it is people are already spending their money on that you now want them to spend with you instead. Blu-Ray discs compete with DVDs -- and once upon a time, DVDs had to compete with VCRs. We tend to think of things in terms of what we already know and understand. Blu-Ray and DVD didn't have to redefine home entertainment altogether, just the technologies that were currently available. VCRs, of course, were "like tape recorders, but for TV."

For many businesses, defining this category is simple -- a plumbing company competes with other plumbing companies, and law firms compete with other law firms. But in today's world, many businesses are based online, and offer services that aren't easy to understand on their own. So it's important to frame what you do in terms that people can understand based on what they already know.

For example, if I were to explain Twitter to a friend, I would say, "It's like a blog that is limited to 140 characters." By saying, "It's like a blog," I have explained it in terms many people can understand, but I have far less to explain that way. Who do you compete with? When you've figured out how to describe what it is you do (in terms of your competitors), it will be easier to explain how you're different and more beneficial.

3. Explain Your Greatest Benefit

Now comes the hard part. Once you've determined who your customers are, and who they're likely to compare you to, it's time to focus on how you're not only different, but better. What can you deliver with excellence that your competition can't touch because delivering it is baked into the very core of your business? This is often the promise at the core of your brand -- a commitment to service, or quality, or safety, or having fun, or saving money. Think back to who your target audience is. How would they describe the quality that makes it better in a way that's important to them? It's often different than the way you might describe it internally.

There may be several things that make you different, but people will only remember one, so choose the best one: the thing that is most important to your most important customers. If you offer guaranteed overnight delivery service, it will be hard to compete as the cheapest delivery service as well. People will eventually discover your other qualities, but build your brand around the very best thing you always provide, no matter what, and you will not let them down. Now you're ready to put everything together and build a brand positioning statement.

4. Put It Together into Your Brand Positioning Statement

When you've figured out what you do, who you do it for, and how you're different, it's time to put it all together into a sentence that states this concisely. This is can be structured as "For (target audience), (company name) offers (competitive frame of reference) that provides (greatest competitive advantage). For example, Web Marketing Today's brand positioning statement might be, "For small businesspeople, Web Marketing Today is an online information resource that offers weekly Web marketing advice from experts." With that in mind, Web Marketing Today can focus everything it does around delivering this promise with excellence.

Your brand positioning statement may sound familiar:

·         It will be similar to your mission or purpose statement, but takes into account your customers and competitors.

·         It will be similar to your unique selling proposition (USP), but takes into account your target audience.

Once you have developed your brand positioning statement, you'll be able to develop consistent communications and customer experiences to support it, and use it as the basis for developing a brand personality, which we'll discuss in future articles.

By defining a brand positioning statement for your business, you can focus on your best customers, help them understand what you offer more easily, and create a consistent brand that they will remember. Why not schedule a few hours during the next few weeks to create a brand positioning statement for your business?

DEVELOPMENT OF STRATEGY PLANNING FOR ADVERTISING

Strategy Planning for advertising (and other forms of communications used in Integrated Marketing Communications) is a dynamic process, whose development has been analyzed to reveal five stages.

Stage 1

This may be described as 'primitive' method that goes back to the time of ancient Greeks and Romans....it was also visible in the Egyptians civilization. It persisted in some form or another, even in the 19th century AD. Such communications indicated availability of some goods or services at a particular location, most did not give any further information not even about the attributes or features of the product or its price.

Stage 2

The only change from the 1st stage to the 2nd is the inclusion of information about the features of the product. Reasons why a particular product should be preferred over competitive products, or why specific buyers would get higher satisfaction, were not clearly enunciated...essentially this approach may be described as "manufacturers claim" that would not be of any use in the present day market scenario with well informed buyers conscious of their rights.

Stage 3

This is the first strategic attempt at setting a branded item apart from its competitors based on the concept of the Unique Selling Preposition - USP.

USP is generally depended on the physical features of ingredients competitor brand lack. Advertising based on USP may thus convince the potential buyer the superiority or suitability of the product over competition- it is thus inherently very powerful and useful but is is increasingly difficult to develop and retain due to the spread of technology. USP talks of genuinely differences but this advantage is eroded very fast.

Even with the best of laws protecting Patents and Intellectual Property Rights, technological innovations are often quickly copied or mimicked by competitors. The original brands tends to lose its competitive edge fairly fast. Hence, relying on USP for brand differentiation is an excellent idea but generally short lived.

It is relevant today, but a difficult proposition for most organizations. It must also be remembered that it is not enough to be 'unique' since the advertisement must also sell the product...the benefits must be relevant and powerful motivators in the context of the buying situations.

Stage 4

The next stage developed in late 1940s and through the 1950s and 1960s, as advertising and marketing professionals realised the shortcoming of USP - the fact that it was extremely difficult to retain or protect.

Strategists went on to develop advertising based on building a brand image or brand personality whereby the prospect was encouraged to think of a brand as not merely a bundle of physical features giving rise to tangible benefits. Advertising based on brand image & personality focussed on intangible aspects of a brand and on creating perceptual differences from competitive brands.

Stage 5

This development in strategy planning is based on the theory of 'positioning a brand' and attempts to give a sharper edge to advertising by recognizing that today's consumer lives in an 'over communicated' society. Today's consumer is exposed to a plethora of media, increasing fragmented and intrusive and hence is bombarded daily with hundreds of commercial messages-each with claims and counter-claims, impossible to remember of recall.

Market Segmentation Targetting & Positioning

Organizations that sell to consumer or business markets recognize they cannot appeal to all buyers in those markets or at least not to all buyers in the same way.  Market segmentation is the process of classifying customers into groups with different needs, characteristics or behaviour.

Why Market Segmentation?

Buyers are too numerous, too widely scattered & too varied in their needs and buying practices.

Rather than trying to compete in an entire market, sometimes against superior competitors, many companies try to identify parts of the market that they can serve best. They try to satisfy the needs and wants of specific segments of the market better than other players can… this strategy is expected to lead to customer loyalty.

Companies have not always practiced market segmentation. Marketing has evolved through the following three stages:

 Mass marketing: one product for all buyers, with no significant variations in the offering.


 Product Variety Marketing – two or more products (different styling, design, size, etc) to offer variety rather than to appeal to different segments

 Target Marketing: developing product(s) for targeted segment(s) to meet specific needs

Market Segmentation


 Many companies are moving away from conventional market segmentation

 They are aiming at “micro segmentation” and “a market of one”

 Target marketing can better help them find marketing opportunities

 Technology (especially IT) is an important factor in facilitating this process

Flexible market offerings

 Naked solution: Product and service elements that all segments value

 Discretionary options: Elements valued by some segments – options usually have additional charges

Market preference patterns

 Homogenous: no natural segments; all users want the same features, hence all brands tend to cluster around the middle of the market

 Diffused: no distinct patterns, great variation in customer preferences; first player usually in the middle of the market, later players adopt different strategies and positions

 Clustered: natural segments; first player might focus on largest segment or be in the middle while later entrants follow their own strategies

Target Marketing

Target marketing can be done at four levels – by market segments, aimed at niche markets, marketing by local areas and targeted at individuals.

Steps in Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning

 Market segmentation would entail identification of bases (criteria) for segmentation, followed by development of profiles of these target segments.

 Market targeting would have to start with developing measures of attractiveness for the segments, application of these metrics to the identified segments that would permit selection of segments.

 Market positioning starts with preparing the positioning statement for each of the selected segments, followed by developing the marketing mix strategy for each segment.

Effective Targeting

 Identification and profiling of distinct groups of buyers who differ in their needs and preferences

 Selection of one or more market segments to target (enter)

 Establishing and communicating the distinctive benefits of the market offering to the selected target segment(s)

Market Segmentation Parameters

Criteria / Parameters for consumer markets:

 Demographic – easy to measure variables such as age, sex, monthly household income, education, occupation, family size etc

 Psychographic – psychological variables like values, lifestyles, attitudes, opinions etc

 Geographic – based on geographic units such as country, region, urban / rural

 Behavioural – based on knowledge of, attitudes towards, usage rate of category etc

Demographic criteria / parameters

 Age

 Sex

 Education

 Household income

 Occupation

 Socio-economic class

 Family size

 Family life cycle stage

 Marital status

 Religion

 Nationality

 Ethnic origin / race

Psychographic criteria / parameters

 Values

 Attitudes

 Interests

 Lifestyles

 Opinions

 Preferences

 Personality

Geographic criteria / parameters

Continent – Region – Country – Town / town class – Urban versus rural

Behavioural criteria / parameters

 User status: non-user, ex-user, potential, regular…

 Attitudes: enthusiastic, positive, indifferent, negative, hostile

 Buyer readiness: unaware, aware, informed, interested, desirous, intending…

 Purchase occasions: regular, special, occasional

 Usage rates: light, medium, heavy

 Loyalty status: hard core, split, shifting, switcher

 Benefits sought: tangible/intangible (emotional)

 Decision role: buyer, user, influencer, decider, initiator

Criteria / Parameters for organizational markets:

Some of the same variables may be used – demographic, geographic, usage rates, buyer readiness status, buyer loyalty status etc. There are several other factors in addition:

 Demographic: industry, company size, location, growth rates

 Operating variables: technology, user/non-user

 Purchasing approaches: centralized/decentralized, structure (engineering/finance dominated), relationships, policies (leasing/bidding etc), quality/price etc

 Situational: urgency, size, application orientation

 Buyers’ personal characteristics: values, risk attitudes, loyalty /relationship

To be effective, market segments must be:

 Measurable in terms of size and purchasing power

 Differentiable so that they respond differently to marketing stimuli

 Substantial regarding size (large) and profitability

 Accessible so that they can be reached (physically) and served

 Actionable in terms of the degree to which effective marketing programmes can be devised and implemented

Market Targeting

After the market has been segmented, it is necessary to evaluate the segments prior to selecting the segments to be targeted using three sets of factors:

 Size and potential for growth

 Structural attractiveness

 Company objectives & resources

Selecting Market Segments

 Single segment concentration leads to strong knowledge of segment needs, helps achieve operating economies… but the segment may have limited growth prospects or may collapse.

Example: Polaroid due to digital photography

 Selective specialization helps to diversify risk by focusing on (unrelated) segments that are individually attractive.

 Product specialization focuses on a single product (or variations thereof) to sell to various segments but new technology can supplant the product. Example: mechanical typewriters, word processors

 Market specialization leads to serving many needs of a specific segment, but the segment may shrink, leading to loss of volumes and revenues

 Full market coverage is an attempt to serve all customer segments – suitable only for very large organizations

Full market coverage

Large organizations adopt one of two ways:

 Undifferentiated marketing – making one offer (that appeal to the entire market and ignoring differences among segments. This has the advantage of lower costs and might lead to lower prices.

 Differentiated marketing – designing different products and offers for each selected segment.

This approach increases costs of product modification, manufacturing, inventory, marketing communications & administration.

Market Coverage Strategy: factors

 Company resources

 Competitors’ activities / strategies

 Stage of Product Life Cycle

 Market variability

Positioning

Positioning may be viewed as the core perceptions about the brand in terms of tangibles and intangibles relative to perceptions about competing brands in the minds (perceptual space) of consumers and prospects.

Bases for Brand Positioning

 Brand parentage (corporate, parent brand)

 Product category

 Brand attributes (USP)

 Brand benefits

 Customer segments

 Usage occasions

 Price-value relationship

 Competitor orientation

Implementing Positioning

Three steps are involved:

 Identifying alternative / possible sets of competitive advantages

 Selecting the right advantage

 Communicating the advantage

A technique known as ‘perceptual mapping’ is often used to analyse consumer perceptions prior to brand positioning / re-positioning.

A difference is worth promoting if it is:

 Important to the target segments

 Distinctive and different from competitors

 Superior or better by way of benefits

 Affordable by selected target segments

 Pre-emptive

 Communicable

 Profitable for the organization