Competitive positioning defines your offering and creating value in the market.

Positioning strategy:

• Market profile: Size, competitors, stage of growth

• Customer segments: Groups of prospects with similar wants & needs

• Competitive analysis: Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats in the landscape

• Method for delivering value: How you deliver value to your market at the highest level

Product positioning is important in your marketing plan to determine your customer's need.

It is important:

• To focus on how a business is going and generate future earnings.

• To determine factor of future profits.

• To monitor the flow of stock prices.

• To know the management quality of a company.

Be honest and realistic in your assessment.

Company's assessment:

• Brand name

• Company/product/brand image

• Product quality

• Position in the industry

• Alliances with other firms

• Economies of scale

• Proprietary technology

• Patented processes

• Costs (raw materials or processes)

• Financial resources

• Distribution skills

• Management talent

• Marketing skills

• Employee commitment

Customer's assessment:

• Needs and wants

• Personality

• Values

• Interests

• Lifestyle

• Buying habits

• Preferences

• Usage requirements

• Decision-making process

• Budget

Tip

The more you know about your customers, the better you will be at developing products that your customers want and need. Identify factors that are most important to them. This will highlight factors about your company and competitors that should matter most to you.

Analyzing and understanding your company, competitors and customers, will identify and analyse competitive position.

Definitions you need to know:

• Core products are key products that contribute to the bulk of revenue

• Facilitating products are other products that contribute to revenue

• Strengths of your competitor which gives them a competitive edge

• Weaknesses of your competitor which puts you in a stronger position

• Value refers to the benefits perceived by your customer

• Emerging competitors in the market selling products that can replace yours.

Tip

Analyse your company, competitors and customers to find out how distinctive you are in the market.

Rather than relying on impressions and gut feel to make your marketing decisions, you should map out the competitive landscape and frequently reassess your position against your competitors in the market. A better understanding of how your strengths and weaknesses play out against each other will enable you to find innovative ways to position yourself for long term success.

(Johnson ET AL. 2015, p.107); Google, Pepsi Co and Singapore Airlines are all organisations that possess particular strategic capabilities which contribute to their standard competitive advantage.

The following report provides evidence that each organisation has achieved sustained competitive advantage and follows on to analyse and explain the reasons for the sustained competitive advantage and follows on to analyse and explain the reasons for the sustained - based view analysis and exploration of the implementation of Porter's Generic Strategies.

Google is a multinational technology organisation based in California, that specialists in internet related products and services, including software, internet advertising, and most famously, search (Google 2015). The case analysed is ‘Google’s strategy in 2008’ written by John E. Gamble from the University of South Alabama (Thompson, Strickland & Gamble 2008); the case examines Google’s history, financial performance, business model, product Google’s history, financial performance, business model, product