42 Branding and Positioning Your Business
b"Entrepreneurial Journey with Thomas O'Grady\\n\\nMost of you listening to this podcast, you\\u2019re thinking in terms of wanting to have more money, save more money, start a business, have something on the side, or work on something for additional income just to put things on the side; you\\u2019re saving for your future or saving for new things.\\n\\nThis episode is one of my favorite topics, and this the positioning of your business or yourself. When I say \\u201cthe positioning,\\u201d you\\u2019ll often hear people talk about \\u201cbranding.\\u201d Branding, precisely, is the name, term, symbol, or feature used to distinguish. However, think of in terms of positioning, like in sports.\\n\\nWhere do you position yourself if you\\u2019re playing on the tennis court? Where do you position yourself if you\\u2019re a basketball player, playing a certain position? A soccer player? A football player? Positioning is not just where you\\u2019re standing, but knowing what\\u2019s around you; knowing and owning your space. That\\u2019s it. Owning your space \\u2013 that\\u2019s what we\\u2019re talking about when we\\u2019re talking about positioning a product or business, how to own that space so that you maximize your customers and your profitability.\\n\\nDid you ever feel, in a sense, that an ad that you see on TV or hear on the radio was just like it\\u2019s talking to you or talking to friends of yours? Why are friends of yours important? Because if you notice that ad, that means when you\\u2019re in need of whatever they\\u2019re selling, that will be in the back of your mind so they will still relate. Another part of it, and this is part of the positioning of the product, is if a friend goes to go by something and you\\u2019ve got a favorable opinion on it because you have seen an ad \\u2013 you have a positive influence on them.\\n\\nThink in terms of luxury cars. You build a luxury car that nobody\\u2019s friends know about\\u2026 By the way, Ford did this in the late 80s, early 90s. They built a car, and they targeted it so well. They targeted so well, and only informed and sent lots of literatures and brochures to those people who would be buying it. The problem is that a lot of what that person is buying at that time is the image that that vehicle projects, and nobody even knew what it was.\\n\\nLet\\u2019s look at some of the success stories, and some of the other stories as well. First of all, take a look at Volvo. How has it niched its way into the market and owned a space? It is known synonymous with safety. That doesn\\u2019t mean that you\\u2019re never going to have an accident, but it means that it\\u2019s built this protective shield around you, you have a certain image. It even projects it by the amount of space that is usually inside a Volvo. Usually, because a couple of times, they have designed a car that has less headroom, which would seem to fly in a direct competition with the concept of safety.\\n\\nLook at how well Starbucks has done. What has it tried to create as an image? And it has done it very well. The third place that somebody would go: You go to work, you go to home, and you can go to Starbucks to relax. It plays a little bit of light music, has comfortable places for you to sit, has some Wi-Fi for you to interact with or to get on to the internet if you want to, chat with friends, meet people, etc. That has given Starbucks the ability to have this massive network of stores all over the place.\\n\\nDoes that mean that they have the best coffee? I don\\u2019t think so. I don\\u2019t know whether they believe it or not, but they probably don\\u2019t have the best coffee. There\\u2019s actually ones that I prefer, and maybe you prefer, but it is reliable also everywhere you go. Every Starbucks you go to, you\\u2019ll get the same preparation, the same coffee done the same way. It\\u2019s reliable, and that place to relax. Often, in Starbucks when I\\u2019m someplace, in a strange city or something, I\\u2019ll strike up a conversation with somebody, usually with a start with something like: \\u201cIsn\\u2019t it nice that Starbucks provides all these offices all over the country just so we can go and get our work done in a nice..."