The document provides guidance on positioning strategies for advertising. It discusses defining the target audience, determining the appropriate positioning for the brand, and selecting benefits to highlight. Effective positioning involves choosing whether to focus on central or differential benefits, product or user orientation, and positive or negative motivations. The positioning should then inform the messaging and taglines used in creative advertising content. Overall the document outlines a three step process for strategic brand positioning: 1) make an initial positioning decision, 2) select appropriate benefits, and 3) use the correct benefit focus.

1. Advertising Strategy
Creative Strategy - Positioning…
5

2. Percy and Elliott’s Five Steps…
Select the target audience
Understand target audience decision making
Determine the best positioning
Develop a communications strategy
Setting a media strategy
Percy and Elliott, 2016

3. what is a brand?
“A brand is the set of expectations, memories,
stories and relationships that, taken together,
account for a consumer’s decision to choose
one product or service over another. If the
consumer (whether it’s a business, a buyer, a
voter or a donor) doesn’t pay a premium,
make a selection or spread the word, then no
brand value exists for that consumer.”
Godin, 2011

4. what is a brand?
Fill, 2016, identifies that a brand has twomain attributes…
intrinsic extrinsic
functional…
design
performance
ingredients/components
size/shape
price
meaning…
value
brand image
images of stores where sold
perceptions of users of the
brand

5. what is positioning?
“Positioning refers broadly to the values and
associations, both tangible and intangible,
that are linked with a given brand. The
positioning differentiates the brand from its
rivals.”
Hackley 2010 p70

6. Why positioning?
To answer the question ‘what is it?’ in order
to drive awareness and ‘what does it offer?’
to determine benefits to support the
attitude.
Percy and Rosenbaum-Elliott, 2016
brandCategory
need benefit
What is it? What does it offer?
brand
awareness
brand attitude

7. Brand Positioning…
Questions to answer…
…a brand for whom?
…for what benefit?
…why does the brand exist?
…who is the brand positioned against?
Kapferer (2012

8. hypothesised perceptual mapping
cowboy brands premium brands
economy brands bargain brands

9. brand mapping (through the marketing mix)
unconventional aspirational
peripheral mainstream
Dawar and Bagga, 2015
centrality

10. what is positioning in advertising?
A key insight summed up in a positioning statement which is
part of the advertising strategy document and the creative
brief.
Needs to consider…
Who it’s for…
Reason to buy…
Product category…
Benefit(s)…

11. positions vary wildly…
…taste the feeling
…earth's most customer-centric company; to build a place where people can come to
find and discover anything they might want to buy online.
Think different
Our blades are f**king great
For the journey

12. Other points for consideration…
Competitive environment
Target consumers
What makes the brand distinctive
Consumer benefits (tangible and intangible)
Why/how consumers see the brand as different to its competitors
Adapted from Percy and Elliott, 2016
Brand values and personality
Why consumers believe and trust

13. Also important…
What the product does… functional positioning
What the product means… emotional positioning
Yeshin, 2006

14. Defining markets…
Perceived similarity… useful but simplistic
Through hierarchical definition… often relative and abstract
…to develop subcategories to define narrower markets
Bases that can be used include…
type of product
end benefit
usage situation
brand name

16. Hierarchical positioning…
Protein element of meal
Meat
Beef Pork Chicken Turkey Lamb
Alternative
meats
Meet the
Alternative
Meat substitute
Soya-based
Healthy Athletic
Quorn
Dietary
focus
Tofu-based

17. Central or differential?
Central positioning…
Delivers all the category benefits, Brand “owns” the category,
Best and most loved brand in category, Must already have a
large/majority market share
Differential positioning…
Delivers a specific category benefit better than the leading brand,
Different to the leading brand in an important way,
Different in a way sufficient consumers want, occupies a worthwhile
niche or is a new entrant
Percy and Elliott, 2016

19. User or product benefit
User-oriented position…
The user is the focus (“for the serious athlete”)
Underlying benefit is social approval (“for the discerning”)
User benefits drive the message (“because you’re worth it”)
Product-oriented position…
The product is the hero (“there’s no better”)
Product benefits drive the message (“the best a man can get”)

21. 𝐴 𝑜 =
𝑖=1
𝑛
𝑎𝑖 𝑏𝑖
Expectancy-Value Model of Attitude…
Ao = attitude towards something,
ai = importance of belief, bi = significance of belief
Feature/Benefit Importance Weight Belief Benefit?
Chocolate 3 3 9
Inexpensive 1 3 3
3 = Essential
1 = Desirable
0 = of no importance
3 = Definitely delivers
1 = Does OK
0 = Does not deliver Percy and Elliott, 2016

22. Selecting the appropriate benefit
Reflects the motivation that drives purchase behaviour
Important to the target audience
What distinguishes the brand from competitors in a way that is
important to the target audience
Must be…
Believable to the target audience
Deliverable by the brand better than the competition

23. Aspects of benefits…
Attribute – an objective component of the product
Characteristic – A subjective claim about the product
Emotion – A feeling associated with the product

24. •Draw attention to an attribute if dealing with expert target market
•Draw attention directly to a subjective characteristic
•Use an attribute to support a subjective characteristic of the brand
•Dispel a negative emotion or problems with a subjective
characteristic associated with the brand
Negative
motivation
•Use a subjective characteristic to draw attention to the emotional
consequences of the using the brand
•Simply deliver an emotion
Positive
motivation
…benefit focus options
Percy and Elliott, 2016

25. Link to advertising content…
L’Oreal - because you’re worth it
Tesco - every little helps
Lloyds - for the journey
Positioning then becomes a key component of the creative brief
Once this far in the strategy process, can brief the creatives to come up
with the advertising message/content
Positioning sometimes reflected in the advertising tag line…
BMW - the ultimate driving machine

28. Step 1
• Make the initial positioning decision
• Category – central or differential?
• Against competitors – product or user?
Step 2
• Select appropriate benefits
• Benefits that are – important to the target audience, the
brand can deliver, and deliver better than the competition
Step 3
• Use correct benefit focus
• Purchase motivation is positive – affective consequences
• Purchase motivation is negative – focus on benefits
…effective brand positioning
Percy and Elliott, 2016

29. Burtenshaw, K., Mahon, N. and Barfoot, C. (2006). The Fundamentals of
Creative Advertising. Switzerland: AVA Publishing.
Percy, L. and Rosenbaum-Elliott, R. (2016) Strategic Advertising Management.
Oxford, Oxford University Press.
Shimp, T. (2013) Integrated Marketing Communications. USA: Cengage.
Yeshin, T. (2006). Advertising. London, Thomson