‘Positioning’ by Al Ries and Jack Trout

Positioning: The Battle For Your Mind is a book written by Al Ries and Jack Trout. This book defined a new approach to communication, and may have defined the new era of marketing called “Positioning”. This is a book is as much about marketing as it is human psychology.

So what is Positioning? Simply defined, positioning starts with a product. But positioning is not what you do to a product. Positioning is what you do to the mind of the prospect. That is, you position the product in the mind of the prospect.

Don’t think “product positioning”, instead think “mind positioning”.

To be successful today, you must touch base with reality. And the only reality that counts is what’s already in the prospects mind.

• The basic approach of positioning is not to create something new and different, but to manipulate what’s already up there in the mind, to retie the connections that already exist.
• The only hope to be successful is to be selective, to concentrate on narrow targets, to practice segmentation. In a word – Positioning
• The mind, as a defense against the volume of today’s communications, screens and rejects much of the information offered it. In general the mind accepts only that which matches prior knowledge or experience.
• Mind-changing is the road to marketing disaster. Don’t create desire.

The Oversimplified Message

• In communication, as in architecture, less is more. You have to sharpen your message to cut into the mind.
• When marketing & advertising you should focus on the material that has the best chance to land.
• Only when you appreciate the nature of the problem can you understand the solution.
• You look for the solution to your problem not inside the product, not even inside your own mind. You look for the solution to your problem inside the prospects mind.
• In other words, since so little of your message is going to get through anyway, you ignore the sending side and concentrate on the receiving end. You concentrate on the perceptions of the prospect. Not the reality of the product.
• The medium of advertising may not be the message, but it does seriously affect the message. Instead of a transmission system, the medium acts like a filter. Only a tiny fraction of the original material ends up in the mind of the receiver.