The document discusses factors to consider when positioning a brand, including establishing a frame of reference, leveraging points of parity, and ensuring points of difference are compelling. It emphasizes the importance of defining the brand's goal for customers, meeting minimum industry requirements, and distinguishing the brand through performance, imagery, or insights. Marketing alone does not make a brand; a real brand identity and strong awareness must be created in customers' minds.

1. Considering factors when positioning brand
1) Emphasizing differences
2) The frame of reference within which the brand works and
3) The features the brand shares with other products
Asking three questions about your brand can help:
1) Have we established a frame?
 A frame of reference signals to consumers the goal they can expect to
achieve by using a brand.
2) Are we leveraging our points of parity?
 Certain points of parity must be met if consumers are to perceive your
product as a legitimate player within its frame of reference.
3) Are the points of difference compelling?
 A distinguishing characteristic that consumers find both relevant and
believable(trust and value) can become a strong, favorable, unique brand
association, capable of distinguishing the brand from others in the same
frame of reference.

2. Have we established a frame of reference?
① The frame of reference signals to the customers the goal they can achieve through
using the brand
② The frame of reference may change as the product goes through its lifestyle, and as
new competitors enter the market
③ Example: Fed Ex as an overnight delivery service, then as a speed and dependable
overnight service, now more focused on tracking capabilities (to compete with email
and faxes that are often lost)
Are we leveraging our points of parity?
① Think through the points of parity your brand needs to have with competitors if it is to
be accepted
② New brands – normally points of parity are thought of new brands
③ Brand extensions can be dangerous – Is your point of differentiation go against the
minimum requirements for the consumer to recognize you as a legitimate brand in this
business?
④ Established brands – over time, points of differentiation becomes points of parity
Are the points of difference compelling?
Three types of difference:
① Brand performance – How does it meet the consumer’s functional needs based on
intrinsic properties of the brand? Does the product do what it says?
② Brand imagery – when choices are based on experience, who uses the brand and under
what circumstances?
③ Consumer insight associations – when imagery and performance is less attractive, show
you know the customer

3. Don’t:
① Build awareness before position
② Talk about what customers don’t care about
③ Invest in differences that are easily copied
④ Focus too much on the competition
⑤ Reposition unless absolutely needed
Must make sure position is internally consistent at any point in time.
① “Ladder up”
 First round describes concrete attributes, second round how those
attributes change the users lifestyle, third round how better lifestyles lead
to happiness
② “The big idea”
 Identify the main idea and over time show a variety of attributes that
imply the benefit

4. Marketing does not make a brand, you need a real brand
1. "You have to know who you are before you can convince anyone of it."
2. "The brand is the nucleus of sales and marketing activities."(consultant
Alina Wheeler)
3. "Products are created in the factory. Brands are created in the
mind."(Walter Landor, president of Landor Associates, a San Francisco-based global brand
consulting firm)
4. Whenever a customer comes in contact with your brand (logo, Web site,
brochure, advertising, etc.)
① he or she forms an opinion about your company and
② if you don't define your brand, your customer will. Do you really
want your customers defining you?

5. Marketing does not make a brand, you need a real brand 2
6. Remember that everything
① Your customers read, touch and experience
② They can either strengthen or weaken your brand.
7. Confusing messaging tells consumers
① that you don't understand who you are and
② that can quickly translate into a loss of brand loyalty.
8. "Only one competitor can be the cheapest. The others have to use branding. The
stronger the brand, the greater the profit margin," (Martin Neumeier's "The Brand
Gap”)
 It takes time to define your brand but the results are worth it.

6. Marketing does not make a brand, you need a real brand 2
6. Become a power brand.
① Create brand identity -- make your brand visible, memorable and
sustainable .
② Build brand awareness -- increase how many of your ideal customers
know who you are.
③ Build brand equity -- so that your customers know why your brand is
worth paying more for.
7. The upside: Once you're there, it becomes nearly impossible to fall off. Brand
loyalty is so ingrained in consumers' minds that switching takes more money
than most companies can afford to spend.
8. Before you spend more money on marketing, ask yourself if you've invested
enough in your brand.