In Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind, advertising consultants Al Ries and Jack Trout bring more than 20 years of marketing experience to the concept of positioning—a strategy of framing your product, service, company, or self against your competitors and within your market. The authors primarily focus on how to use positioning to market a product or service, but they also provide some tips on advancing your career by using similar strategies to position yourself as a professional.
Positioning was originally published in 1981 and was the first of several collaborations between the authors, who are credited with popularizing the concept of positioning as a marketing strategy. They’ve written several other books together since then, including Marketing Warfare, Bottom-Up Marketing, and The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing, and are regarded as some of the world’s best-known experts on marketing strategy.
In this guide, we’ll describe what Ries and Trout mean by “positioning,” compare it to how others have defined the concept, and explore strategies and techniques you can use in a positioning campaign. We’ll also touch on a few positioning strategies that Ries and Trout caution against. Finally, we’ll discuss how the authors apply the concept of positioning to career development.
According to Ries and Trout, “positioning” is getting your prospective customers to view your product in a certain way relative to competing products and the general market landscape. The “position” of a product is its basic identity in the mind of potential consumers in contrast to other products.
For example, when you think of a Ferrari, you think of an expensive, high-end sports car. When you think of a Corvette, you think of an iconic sports car that’s still expensive, but more affordable than a Ferrari. These mental images are the “positions” that Ferrari and Corvette occupy in your mind.
(Shortform note: Ries and Trout define positioning primarily as an action (what you do to influence the customer’s perceptions), and they use the word to cover the results (the customer’s actual perception of your product) by extension. Other sources reverse this approach, defining positioning primarily as the customer’s actual perception of your product, and secondarily as what you do to influence their perceptions. Marketing consultant Geoffrey Moore views positioning by this definition, insisting that your customers position your product, while you merely try to influence them.)
Mostly, positioning takes the form of advertising. Ries and Trout point out that advertising is just a means of communication. To position your product, you have to communicate a message that influences how people think about it, especially in relation to other products.
However, they also point out that advertising is often an unwelcome form of communication: We are bombarded with so many ads from so many different sources that we can’t possibly pay attention to all of them, and so we filter out most of them.
(Shortform note: Marketing experts have long noted that in order to prevent your message from getting filtered out, you must appeal to your customers’ “unconscious mind.” In Blink, Malcolm Gladwell explains how your intuition (your unconscious mind) has evolved to sift through information, picking out what is relevant and discarding the rest so you can focus on only what truly matters in any given situation. Because our minds work this way, your marketing message must be tailored to speak to your customers’ intuition, rather than their analytical minds.)
Ries and Trout advise that to penetrate your customer’s mental filter and influence their perception of your product, your ads need to do three things:
1. Over-simplify the message. According to Ries and Trout, most people overlook the best positioning strategies because they seem too simple and obvious, but the authors contend that the simpler the message, the better, because simpler messages can more easily get through your brain’s information-overload filter.
The authors explain that simplicity matters so much because your brain can only store and process a few ideas at once, and it thus ignores anything that would exceed its capacity. As evidence, they cite psychological research on the brain’s limitations, such as psychologist George Miller’s discovery that the human working memory can only hold about seven pieces of information at a time.
(Shortform note: More recent research indicates that simplicity might be even more important than the authors originally supposed. Miller’s “seven pieces” discovery has been superseded by studies suggesting that working memory capacity is even smaller: It’s likely around four pieces of information, and perhaps as little as two. This means Ries and Trout’s ideas are even more important to get right, as the margin of error for your message to get through is even less than they imagined.)
2. Reflect reality as your customer understands it. Ries and Trout assert that our expectations shape our perceptions: We are more likely to accept a message that fits with what we already know or accept to be true, and we’re more likely to ignore a message that goes against it.
(Shortform note: Psychologists refer to this tendency as “confirmation bias.” Psychologist Raymond Nickerson, who studied this phenomenon extensively, concluded that it is practically universal, affecting individuals, groups, cultures, and nations. He added the wry caveat, however, that he could not rule out the possibility that his own conclusion might also be tainted by confirmation bias.)
3. Present a consistent message over time. According to Ries and Trout, positioning is a long-term proposition, because people don’t like to change their minds. Over time, you’ll need to update your ads to keep them fresh, but you should stick to the same basic message to maintain your position.
(Shortform note: Today this directive is arguably more difficult to execute because investors and shareholders encourage businesses to focus on short-term growth to realize quick profits. As Ries and Trout explain, effective positioning is a long-term investment. Making that investment wisely by maintaining a consistent positioning stance can be an uphill battle in a business environment that rewards short-term gains instead.)
According to Ries and Trout, before you can effectively position your product, you must think through three areas:
Let’s consider each of these in turn.
How do your prospective customers view your business? Who are your competitors, and how do they compare in your prospective customers’ view? Ries and Trout warn that people outside your company usually don’t view your company or product the way you do. They advise spending money on surveys or other research, if necessary, to answer these questions decisively.
(Shortform note: When discussing positioning, marketing consultant Geoffrey Moore puts particular emphasis on identifying your competitors because customers position your product mostly based on how it compares to alternatives. He draws a distinction between “market alternatives,” which are other products that compete directly with your product in the same market, though potentially using different technology, and “product alternatives,” which apply the same technology in a different market context. Moore argues that both types play important roles in positioning.)
Ries and Trout assert that, in addition to a clear idea of the position you currently have, you need a clear and realistic idea of the position you want.
Ideally, you’ll want to position your product as a market leader, because leading the market has significant advantages: Brand loyalty drives greater demand for your product, both from customers themselves and from distributors, it’s easier to attract good employees, and your stock prices tend to be higher, making it easier to raise capital. These advantages tend to make success self-perpetuating for leading products or companies.
(Shortform note: Geoffrey Moore corroborates these assertions, arguing that the psychographics (the combination of psychology and demographics that influences a person’s buying habits) of mainstream customers lead them to position one company or product as the market leader in any given venue, and then maintain the leader in that position. Specifically, mainstream customers tend to evaluate products based on the reputation of the product and the company that makes it, rather than their own technical evaluation of the product. This reputation factor is what makes displacing a market leader nearly impossible, even when your product is technically better.)
The authors argue that with these advantages, market leaders become entrenched, so that if a competitor tries to supplant them simply by making a better product, they’re almost never successful. Instead, Ries and Trout recommend that to become a market leader, you become the first to occupy the leading position in your chosen market.
To do so, find (or create) a niche in which you can be the first to make a credible claim of market leadership. Ries and Trout warn that this often involves sacrificing your product’s appeal to the general market in order to appeal directly to a target niche where you can be the first to claim the leadership position.
The Appeal of Niche Markets
Other marketing experts offer advice on targeting a niche that expands Ries and Trout’s recommendations:
According to Geoffrey Moore, selecting a niche that is small enough for your product to dominate is crucial because it has an amplifying effect on marketing: The smaller and more close-knit the niche, the faster word spreads, and the easier it is to establish your position there.
Regis McKenna identifies four “golden rules” of positioning, one of which is to target a specific niche with the best product in that niche. He notes that to become the market leader, people must perceive your product as being the best, so he recommends targeting only a specific industry or application where your product provides a clear advantage.
The basic premise of Blue Ocean Strategy is to find an uncontested market by introducing a product that provides some unique value to your customers. In practice, this strongly resembles identifying an open niche, although the blue ocean approach typically involves creating a unique product to appeal to a unique audience.
Ries and Trout offer a number of suggestions to help you find an open niche by adjusting different aspects of your product or advertising to stand out from the crowd:
Blue Ocean Strategy Insights
In Blue Ocean Strategy, Kim and Mauborgne offer suggestions for opening up an uncontested market that add nuances to many of Ries and Trout’s insights:
Consider why customers trade up and down in quality and price. Concentrate on delivering the critical factors while eliminating needless ones. This expands on Ries and Trout’s advice on price. Considering the why behind prices may reveal market niches other than those at the upper and lower end of the price spectrum.
Consider what happens before, during, and after your product is used, as you might find ways to bundle complementary products that enhance the use of your product, thus adding unique value. This expands on the setting aspect of Ries and Trout’s advice. It also may shed more light on distribution if it provides an improved product experience, and can even shed light on your consideration of demographics if it encourages you to explore how different people use your product.
Consider making an emotional product more functional by stripping away unnecessary extras, or making a functional product more emotional, in the same way that Ries and Trout encourage you to reconsider your product’s expected size.
Ask how you can improve on any step of the product life cycle, from purchase to delivery to use to maintenance to disposal. If your product provides a unique advantage in any of these areas, that could set it apart in its own niche in the customer’s mind. This expands upon Ries and Trout’s discussion of distribution.
According to Ries and Trout, your product name (the third element of preliminary positioning) is your most important marketing decision, because the name is what people use to mentally place your product in the market landscape. If they can’t easily place your name where you want them to position you in the market landscape, then your name doesn’t support your positioning strategy. In this case, Ries and Trout advise you to change the name.
They assert that for a prospective customer to position your product where you want, your product name needs to be representative of the product, unique, and memorable. By the same token, they assert that your company name should be representative of the company’s role. A company name that is not representative, or has ceased to be as the company has diversified can hinder growth.
For example, imagine that the Central Nebraska Trucking Company expands beyond the state of Nebraska, and buys out an airline company. Now they offer the best deal on flights from New York to Florida, but nobody flies with them, because people looking to fly from New York to Florida have no interest in the kind of services they would expect the Central Nebraska Trucking Company to offer.
Naming a Product in the Internet Age
The internet adds another dimension to selecting a product name, as so much of advertising now takes place online. Here are some additional criteria to consider when selecting a name:
Search Preference: Check search engine statistics to see how people are likely to search for products in your category. For example, if you’re naming a new line of kitchen cutlery, find out whether people are more likely to search for “cutlery” or “kitchen knives.” Basically, this is an extension of Ries and Trout’s principle that names should be representative: Search statistics allow you to see how people refer to things, and find out which names are truly the most representative of your product.
Availability: Check the availability of web domains and social media profiles matching your possible names. If they’re already taken, that will hinder your positioning. This is basically a digital extension of Ries and Trout’s stipulation that a name be unique.
Spelling: Don’t name your product something that spell-check algorithms will flag as a misspelling of something else. In a sense, this is an extension of Ries and Trout’s memorability criterion. If spell check flags the name or auto-corrects it when the user types it, users may second-guess their own memory of the name, weakening their recall of it.
Ries and Trout point out that in speech, people tend to shorten names to reduce spoken syllables. This makes some names more suitable than others for abbreviating as acronyms.
They assert that names are more memorable than acronyms. Thus, you may want to avoid selecting a name that people are likely to turn into an acronym. They say phonetic acronyms (acronyms that make up words you can pronounce, like NASA) are more memorable, and thus may offer an alternate solution.
However, the authors warn that acronyms can backfire if the acronym sounds contrary to your positioning claim. For example, suppose you’re rolling out a program that helps people stay in shape by teaching them psychological techniques to maintain a positive attitude about exercise. You call the program “Fitness Attitude Training,” which gets shortened to FAT.
(Shortform note: Psychological studies on the memorability of acronyms have had mixed results, but generally corroborate Ries and Trout’s assertion that they are less memorable than names. One study also highlighted the significance of social context, finding that how a person answers the question, “Would you say this name in conversation at a party?” was the strongest predictor of their receptiveness to the product. Thus, if you’re designing a survey to compare the effectiveness of different names, questions about using a product name in a social context may give you more accurate results than questions like, “How likely would you be to buy this product if it was named…?”)
Vague or Arbitrary Names: A name that’s too vague makes it harder to establish a strong position, because it’s less obvious what kind of product the name stands for.
For example, what would you expect “W Magazine” to cover? Maybe finances, or gambling: ways to double your money? Maybe women’s issues? It appears they actually focus on art and fashion, but you need more than their name to figure that out.
(Shortform note: Other analysts add that you should not choose a name that’s too generic because your product can’t be everything to everybody.)
Obsolete Names: Cultures change over time, and so do businesses. Names that used to be good may no longer reflect the nature of the product or the role of the company in a way that resonates with prospective customers. We already discussed the importance of the company name accurately reflecting its role. However, even if the product and the company stay the same, the name can become obsolete due to changes in culture or language.
(Shortform note: Globalization can also render names obsolete if they appeal to the original local customers but not to a broader global audience. The Harvard Business Review provides some pointers on brand naming for success in the global market, such as choosing a name that is easy to pronounce in a variety of languages.)
Technical Names: Ries and Trout observe that engineers often come up with technical names for products they are developing that are meaningless to outsiders. Thus, they argue that these names should be changed when the product is brought to market.
(Shortform note: While this is probably good advice, there are exceptions. For example, WD-40 stands for “Water Displacing Agent, experimental formula #40,” a name that obviously carried over from the company’s R&D efforts. However, the product was highly successful, and is widely regarded as the market leader in water displacing agents.)
Confusing Names: Ries and Trout point out that if your name is too easily confused with a competitor’s name, it becomes difficult to position yourself relative to that competitor.
(Shortform note: This is true if you’re trying to position yourself as the market leader in your own niche, as Ries and Trout recommend. However, sometimes companies with copycat products deliberately adopt names that could easily be confused with the market leader. For example, Surefire is widely acknowledged as the brand leader in tactical flashlights, while superficially similar but much cheaper lights are available from Ultrafire and Trustfire.)
So, you understand your current position, you have a realistic vision for the position you want, and your name is appropriate for the position you want. Now how do you cement your position as the market leader? Ries and Trout discuss different strategies depending on whether you already are the market leader and just need to stay there, or whether you want to become the market leader.
If you are already in a position of market leadership, maybe all you need to do is reinforce your existing position. However, according to Ries and Trout, simply advertising that your product is the best won’t convince anyone.
Instead, Ries and Trout recommend promoting yourself as the originator of the genuine article. Since leaders are typically the first to occupy their respective positions, this claim seems credible, and it implies that competing products are mere imitations, giving people a reason to buy the real thing from you.
(Shortform note: This strategy assumes that the market is not disrupted by technological breakthroughs. However, in some scenarios, being known as the originator of a genuine article that’s now regarded as obsolete can work against you if everyone wants the new and improved version. In The Innovator’s Dilemma, Clayton Christensen explains that disruptive innovations can allow small start-ups to displace established market leaders. He explains that the new technology may be first introduced in a niche market that is too small for the overall market leader to bother competing in, but if it gains traction there, it may expand into adjacent sectors until it dominates the whole market and displaces the market leader.)
Suppose you’re not a market leader yet, but you have identified a niche that is worth developing, which nobody else is developing yet. In this case, based on Ries and Trout’s recommendations, we may infer that all you need to become the market leader is a product that fulfills the demand, a suitable name, and an ad campaign that raises awareness about it.
However, their discussion of this scenario also highlights the importance of appealing to expectations and repositioning the competition.
Recall that it's easier to get a message across if you appeal to people’s expectations. Thus, Ries and Trout point out that if you introduce a totally new product, it’s important to compare it to something they’re familiar with. As an example, they discuss how early automobiles were marketed as “horseless carriages.”
Market Alternatives and Product Alternatives
Moore takes this concept a step further, asserting that people need alternatives to compare your product to before they will position you as the market leader. If you’re introducing a disruptive technology, he recommends presenting it relative to two alternatives: the market alternative and the product alternative.
The market alternative is what your product will most directly compete with in the market. Building on Ries and Trout’s example, the automobile would ultimately replace horse-drawn carriages as people’s primary means of transportation. Thus, calling an automobile a “horseless carriage” helped to position it as a market alternative to horse-drawn carriages.
The product alternative is a product that is based on similar technology but is used for something else. For example, if gasoline-powered railroad engines had caught on before automobiles did, early automakers might have tried marketing their cars as “personal locomotives” instead of “horseless carriages.”
Ries and Trout also assert that you can establish an advantage in a market sector by repositioning your competitors. To do so, discredit the existing market alternative to your product.
For example, perhaps you’re a pharmaceutical company looking to introduce a new flu vaccine that’s formulated specifically for women. To become the leader of this niche, you’ll have to convince people that your product is better for women than your competitors’ gender-neutral flu vaccines.
However, according to Ries and Trout, simply claiming that your product is better in some way is generally not effective. Instead, they advise that if you expose a deficiency of the current lead product, that creates an opening in your niche for a product that overcomes that deficiency, and compels the market to inaugurate a new leader in the new niche.
They go on to point out that people are more likely to pay attention to bad news than to good news, which means any bad news about your competitor that you disseminate is likely to get more traction than good news about your product. In our womens’ flu vaccine example, you could run an ad campaign to raise awareness about side effects of the gender-neutral vaccine on women’s health. Then you would present your product as a solution to mitigate the risk of these side effects.
Exploring the Origins of Negativity Bias
A recent study reviewed much of the psychological research to date on negativity bias, or the tendency to weigh negative impressions more heavily than positive ones. It explored many dimensions of negativity bias, ranging from food-based studies with animals to studies of language, culture, and morality across many different populations. It concluded that negativity bias is a real phenomenon that is common in both humans and animals, and may arise partly from natural selection: Individuals that fail to react to negative stimuli tend to be eliminated from the population, while there is no comparable effect for positive stimuli. However, the study also concludes that negativity bias is too complex to be explained by natural selection alone, and calls for further research.
What if you’re in a position of market leadership with one product, but you want to launch a new product in a different market sector? Ries and Trout argue that it’s better to introduce a new brand that you can position in the new market even if you’re already a leader in another market. The reason for this is the pitfall of line extensions, which we will discuss next.
Ries and Trout use the term “line extension” to refer to new products that you add to an existing product line, under the same name. Within the product line, you distinguish individual products either with descriptions (for example two types of pasta sold under the same brand name) or with other qualifiers (for example, you’ve been selling “Lotion X” for years, and now you roll out a premium version and call it “Lotion X Supreme”)
Ries and Trout observe that line extensions are usually based on the assumption that if you tack a new product onto a successful product line, your success will carry over to the new product. They concede that in the short term, line extensions do provide instant brand recognition and credibility. They also acknowledge that it saves money relative to starting a new marketing campaign for a new product.
However, they generally advise against line extensions, for two reasons: brand dilution and internal competition.
(Shortform note: Other analysts echo these concerns, adding that overuse of line extensions is also driven by the recent trend toward a business structure that rewards short-term gains over long-term success. This is the case because, as Ries and Trout point out, line extensions provide immediate benefits, even though they are often bad for business in the long run.)
According to Ries and Trout, the first problem with line extensions is that a name has to represent the collective essence of everything it stands for. Thus, the more your brand gets associated with diverse products and market positions, the harder it is for a customer to identify exactly what your brand stands for, and so the weaker your position becomes.
For example, imagine what would happen if Ferrari started selling economical commuter cars in addition to their high-end sports cars: Instead of standing for a high-end sports car, the Ferrari name would then just stand for cars in general, and so it would lose most of its meaning.
Why Market Leaders Avoid Line Extensions
When Ries and Trout expanded on this idea in The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing, which they published over a decade later, they codified this as their 13th Law: Don’t extend your brand to other categories. There, they observe that market leaders seldom have line extensions, and argue that there are two reasons for this: First, market leaders know that they can’t be everything to everybody, and would rather do well in one market sector than poorly in many sectors. Second, a market leader’s brand name becomes synonymous with their product, which helps maintain their market leadership, because when people know a product by its brand name, they tend to buy that brand (think Q-tips). But it also makes line extensions hard to sell, because the brand name isn’t synonymous with the new product.
Ries and Trout explain that line extensions tend to compete for sales mostly within your existing product line. If you do expand your product line, you want to expand into adjacent market sectors, taking market share away from your competitors, not from your existing products.
Ries and Trout point out that introducing a new product under a different name gives you the opportunity to position it as the leader in a new market sector, but introducing the same product as an extension of your existing product line forfeits this opportunity.
(Shortform note: In Good Strategy Bad Strategy, Richard Rumelt argues that an overuse of product line extensions that compete internally can be a symptom of a company’s loss of focus. He presents a case study of General Motors as a warning. In an effort to appeal to all kinds of customers, the company expanded each of its models, so that their high-end cars started making lower-end models and vice versa. Consequently, their luxury cars (like Pontiac) ended up competing with their economy cars (like Chevrolet) instead of complementing them. By 2009, the company declared bankruptcy. This shows that internal competition can arise between separate product lines as well as within a single product line.)
Because of the pitfalls of line extension, Ries and Trout advise expanding only when the following conditions are met:
(Shortform note: Given the danger of internal competition, it might be prudent to consider the opposite perspective and add another condition to the test: Is the new product functionally different enough that it will add value to your product line instead of just competing within it? For example, if you already make spaghetti noodles, and you add macaroni noodles as a line extension, you’ll likely pick up some additional customers, because a customer planning to make macaroni for dinner probably won’t be interested in your spaghetti noodles, but they might buy your macaroni noodles. However, if you add a line of linguini noodles, it might only compete with your very-similar spaghetti for customers.)
While positioning is most often discussed in the context of marketing a product or company, Ries and Trout say you can use the same principles to advance your career. They even recommend applying the same overarching strategy: Understand your current position, identify your desired position, select a suitable name, and then chart a course from your current position to your desired position.
According to Ries and Trout, first you need to understand your current professional positioning. How do others perceive you in terms of your strengths and weaknesses relative to other candidates or employees?
(Shortform note: According to Douglas Stone and Sheila Heen, the key to understanding how people perceive you is learning how to receive feedback effectively. They advise that to stay open to feedback, you should become aware of certain triggers that might prevent you from listening—for example, a relationship trigger might cause you to ignore advice from someone you dislike, or an identity trigger might make you ignore feedback that criticizes who you are as a person. Ironically, the kind of feedback that an identity trigger might block could be especially useful in determining your current position, because it implies a disconnect between how you see your identity (or position) and how someone else sees you.)
Second, Ries and Trout advise that you realistically identify your desired professional position. They caution that you can’t be the best at everything to everybody, and argue that the biggest challenge in positioning yourself for career success is often figuring out specifically what professional positioning you want.
(Shortform note: While Ries and Trout don’t mention it, we might infer a connection between identifying your desired position and finding an open niche. To identify your desired career positioning, you might need to also identify the niche where you can succeed professionally.)
Third, Ries and Trout assert that your name is a crucial element of how people perceive you, just as a brand name influences how people perceive products and companies. As with company acronyms, they advise you to avoid going by initials, as they’re less memorable.
Furthermore, they argue that some names intuitively sound more credible than others for a given role. Thus, as with brands, if your name doesn’t support your desired positioning, Ries and Trout recommend changing it, or using an assumed name (for example, many authors write under a pen name).
Your Name and Your Career
While the extent to which your name affects your career is a matter of some speculation, studies do show correlations between names and various aspects of career success. For example, people with names that are more common or easier to pronounce are statistically more likely to be hired, and names associated with a certain ethnicity will favorably affect your job outlook in places where that ethnicity is favored by employers.
If you think a different name would help advance your career, how should you go about changing it? Ries and Trout don’t provide details on this, but depending on the situation, you may have several options:
You could just use an assumed name on your resume. This would be similar to an author using a pen name, or having your coworkers call you by a nickname. It’s simple, costs nothing, and requires no paperwork, but it can backfire if your prospective employer gets suspicious when they find out you’re not using your real name. Many companies require you to show some kind of identification at some point in the application process. Some may require a background check. If you’re hired, you’ll need to provide your legal name along with your social security number to payroll. So the company will find out your real name, one way or another.
You could change your legal name. This mitigates the pitfalls of using a nickname, but it’s a long process. Generally, if your name change doesn’t relate to a change in marital status, you’ll have to file a petition, attend a court hearing, and publish your proposed name change in a newspaper, in addition to paying filing fees.
You could start an LLC and name it whatever you want. In most states, creating an LLC is much easier than changing your legal name, and the company is a legal entity that can enter into contracts and receive payment. However, this would probably only be an option if you were paid as a contractor rather than an employee.
Ries and Trout then offer some specific suggestions for charting a course from your current professional positioning to your desired position.
First, they emphasize the importance of fit. Your boss and company should fit with your values and goals—in other words, your desired positioning. Conversely, your desired positioning should fit with your company’s vision and goals. Ries and Trout advise that when applying or interviewing with a new company, you emphasize this fit. To do so, they advise that you focus on how your strengths match the company’s strengths rather than how your strengths can help the company’s weaknesses.
(Shortform note: Determining whether you fit with the corporate culture is often a significant part of a job interview. If you’re a good fit, your strengths will tend to match what the company values. Thus, Ries and Trout’s advice is consistent with showing that you’ll fit in with the company culture.)
Second, Ries and Trout emphasize the importance of networking and staying in touch with people outside your own organization. They contend that you get most of your big opportunities through these contacts.
(Shortform note: In Give and Take, Adam Grant argues that being a generous person makes it easier to network with people, ultimately leading to career success. He draws a connection between generosity and trust: To cultivate a generous personality, start by giving others the benefit of the doubt. Most of them will reciprocate, building mutual trust in your network. Similarly, he associates generosity with powerless communication: You make yourself more approachable by asking questions, seeking advice, and signaling vulnerability.)
Finally, Ries and Trout emphasize the importance of persistence, since positioning is inherently a long-term proposition.
(Shortform note: The admonition to persevere is common among career advisers. For example, in A Mind for Numbers, Barbara Oakley asserts that persistence is more important than innate intelligence for your success, both academically and in your career.)
According to Ries and Trout, to position yourself as the leader of a market, you typically have to be the first to take that position, and so the key is to find or create an open niche that you can lead.
For this exercise, think of something you want to position as a leader, whether it’s a product or service your company sells or yourself as a professional.
Briefly describe the product, service, person, or company that you want to position.
One factor that can open up a new niche is price point, or the balance of price and quality. Where does your product lie on the price spectrum, and how does its quality compare to alternatives?
Another factor that can afford you a unique niche is the setting or context of your product. For example, is it particularly suitable for a certain time of day, season of the year, a certain gender, age group, ethnicity, or subculture? What elements of your product might make it the superior choice in a certain context?
Think about how the customer obtains your product or service in the first place. What is the hardest part of getting it? What could you do to make the purchasing experience stand out in a positive light?