Author Youngme Moon

Group 9 Section B
Prashansa|| Siddhi || Kangkana || Punit || Rahul || Rashika
Theodore Levitt introduce the marketing concept in 1965

Till today, this concept remains at centre of most firms marketing and positioning
strategies

Marketers layer new product offering benefits on top of the old to differentiate and
rejuvenate their offering

Over time, the augmented product becomes the expected product, and so it must be
further enhanced to remain competitive

By positioning or repositioning their products in unexpected ways, companies can
change how customer mentally categorise them

Three positioning strategies:
Reverse Positioning
Breakaway positioning
Stealth positioning
Traditional View: A consumer can never be fully satisfied therefore continuously
augment your product with new value proposition
Reverse Positioners view: Although consumer want something more than baseline
product, but not want endless parade of new features
It involves step off the augmented features that other competitors are providing.
Then supplement its baseline product with few carefully selected attribute that found
in highly augmented product
This unconventional combination of attributes allows product to assume a new
positioning within the category,
It move backward from maturity into growth position in product lifecycle phase.



IKEA
Competitors in mature category offer augmented offerings
In Ikea store there were no in-store sale promotion assistance
Supplemented its bare bones with store environment and
services
COMMERCE BANK
Competitive Banks offer dozens of accounts and interest rate benefits
Commerce bank reverse positioned itself as most convenient bank in
America
Customer may get limited offers and low interest rate but they are
flocking to the bank
JETBLUE
It dont offer meals, round trip fares or first class seating
It supplemented its bare bone offering with surprising
indulgence
Like leather seats, high end personal entertainment system with
satellite TV, extra legroom.
A product escapes its category by deliberately associating with a
different one

Manipulation of category membership attributes done to gauge
how consumers frame a product and therefore, how they
respond to it

By combining features of products in distinctly different
categories, companies can reposition a mature product for
growth

Best suited for consumer packaged goods (tangibles)
SWATCH
Before its launch in 1983, Swiss watches marketed as a form
of jewelry
Serious, expensive, enduring, discreetly promoted
Redefined as playful fashion accessories fun, ephemeral,
inexpensive, promoted impulse buying
Breakaway from default category (watches as high-end
jewelry) into fashion accessory category
Allowed industry giants Timex, Citizen etc. to expand
THE SIMPSONS
The Fox Network s first cartoon specifically for adults
Breakaway from default category (cartoons) and associate itself
with adult prime-time sitcoms
Disrupted the sitcom category transforming consumer expectations
of prime-time TV use of caustic satire and subversive commentary
Advantages of cartoon no compressed life cycle; generated
enormous merchandising business
Company conceals the true nature of their products by affiliating
them with a different category

Works by moving a product out of a category that customers may
resist (tainted) and placing it into more desirable one

Give products a fresh run at the life cycle and keep them from
dying out in introduction stage itself; advance the product from
introduction to growth

Risk - Thin line of difference between stealth positioning and
deceit
EYETOY: PLAY
Sony had to undo the perception that the product is an intimidating machine
for guys build wider platform
Introduced PlayStation product in Europe a video camera (the Eye Toy) and
game software (Play)
Simple yet groundbreaking game concept; fun social activity
More than a toy record brief video messages and Chat feature converted it to
a video phone
Establish in peoples mind as a game rather than a scary communication device
MAC MINI
Sold without a monitor, mouse or keyboard, minimalist aluminum box, 6
inches square & 2 inches tall
Apples marketers emphasized it as music server for car, Internet port for
kitchen, backup device for photos, digital entertainment hub for living room
Roadblocks Windows-based PC and Apple computers overpriced
Stealth positioned Mini as a competitively priced machine going head
to head in low-end PC market
Positioned as Not a PC dissociate from other low-priced,
commoditized PCs, future marketing options open
Customer Value Hierarchy
What the product is
capable of becoming!
- Marketers keep adding new
benefits/features to differentiate and
rejuvenate their offerings.
- Augmented becomes Expected
- Product Overshoot
- Required shift in focus: Positioning &
Repositioning
- Competitors already offering
- How is your product
different?
Intensive Growth Strategy
Market Penetration e.g. EZ squirt ketchup
Market Share increased by 10%
Market Development e.g. Swatch
$40 introduction price expanded its reach beyond its default category
Product development e.g. Sony AIBO
Household robot launched as pet; feedback used for further product development