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Brand Positioning & Repositioning: Case Study: SABENA' Belgium World Airlines

The document discusses brand positioning and repositioning through various case studies. It explains that positioning involves creating a distinct image for a product in the consumer's mind based on functional and emotional benefits. Several examples are provided of how companies have successfully positioned or repositioned brands, including SABENA airline positioning Belgium as having "five Amsterdams", Maggie noodles as an "anytime snack", and 7-Up as the "Un-Cola". Pitfalls discussed include promoting irrelevant attributes, drawing in competitors, and deviating from an established position.

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273 views8 pages

Brand Positioning & Repositioning: Case Study: SABENA' Belgium World Airlines

The document discusses brand positioning and repositioning through various case studies. It explains that positioning involves creating a distinct image for a product in the consumer's mind based on functional and emotional benefits. Several examples are provided of how companies have successfully positioned or repositioned brands, including SABENA airline positioning Belgium as having "five Amsterdams", Maggie noodles as an "anytime snack", and 7-Up as the "Un-Cola". Pitfalls discussed include promoting irrelevant attributes, drawing in competitors, and deviating from an established position.

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Nitin
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Brand Positioning & Repositioning

28 Apr,2017 Amit KumarLeave a comment

 Brand positioning, starts with the understanding or ‘mapping’ of a


consumer’s mental perceptions of products.
 The consumer’s mind space is neither available for sale nor for lease. A
brand can hope at best to occupy a space as a tenant, for a period,
depend on the quality and quantity of marketing efforts behind that brand.
The aim of the marketer is to find a strong position in the mind and sit on
it.
 Positioning is the art of creating a distinct image for a product in the
minds of the customers. For example; the “Automated Teller Machine
(ATM)” is a product, while for most of the customers it is meant as “Any
Time Money”, that is a positioning.
 This perception is based on its functional attributes and benefits (tasty,
sporty, aromatic, roomy etc.) as well as the non-functional or emotional
association it has acquired mainly from its advertising (reliable,
prestigious, smart, modern etc.)

Case Study: ‘SABENA’ Belgium World Airlines

 SABENA was the national airline of Belgium from 1923 to 2001. Now it
became Brussels Airlines after a merger with Virgin Express in 2007.
 Initially, traffic for SABENA was small due to less tourists visiting
Belgium.
 The logical solution was to make Belgium an attractive destination for a
larger pool of tourists. But the problem was, that Belgium was not
associated with any big image in tourist’s mind like London is with Big
Ben and Thames, New York with Statue of Liberty, Paris with Eiffel
Tower etc.
 The problem was positioning the country not the airline.
 During that time “The Michelin Guide”, gave a 3 star status to six cities in
Europe which were “worth a special journey”, including Bruges, Ghent,
Antwerp, Brussels, Tournain andAmsterdam; of these, five were in
Belgium. Amsterdam was already a hot tourist destination so, this gave
birth to the positioning statement of Belgium: “In beautiful Belgium,
there are five Amsterdam”.

Case Study: Maggie

In 1982 Nestle considered launching Maggie instant noodles in India.

 Option of positioning –
 Cooking tasty Chinese dishes at home
 As a ‘TV dinner’
 As a ‘mini meal’

Consumer research suggestion –

Tasty, instant snack, made at home and aimed at children.

Target market –

In-home segment in snack category

Distant Competitors –

All snack products in general

Ready-to-eat snacks; biscuits, wafers, peanuts and samosa

Direct Competitors –

Snacks prepared at home; papad, peanuts, sandwiches and pakoras

Traditional pasta products such as Chinese noodles and macaroni,


however they were invariably used for meals, requiring a fair amount of
cooking time and garnishing was essential

Successful Positioning of Maggie –

Maggie noodles was launched in Delhi in January 1983 and it became an


overnight success. The annual target for that market was increased from
50 to 600 tones. The Indian market became the second largest Nestle
market for this product worldwide, next only to Malaysia.

Maggie noodle found a vacant, strong position and sat on it as “the good
to eat, fast to cook, anytime snack”.

Latest positioning is based on nostalgia.

Case Study: 7-Up as the ‘Un-Cola’ Soft Drink

The sale of 7-Up was mainly as a mixer with hard drinks in the USA.
However the market of Cola based products had massive potential, mainly
dominated by Coke and Pepsi.

Using Cola as a frame of reference, 7-Up advertising announced itself as


the Un-Cola soft drink.

The positioning was aimed to:

7-Up as a soft drink

Different from Colas

Intriguing – What’s an Un-Cola?

The strategy was so-successful that it gave birth to many such ideas
like; Citibank’s ‘Unfixed’ Deposit – where a customer can take loan
against their FD by just signing a cheque, thus creating a perception of
easy liquidity.

Case Study: Milkmaid – Positioning & Repositioning

 Milkmaid condensed milk has followed four distinct successful positioning


strategy till date:

1.Milkmaid was initially positioned as a “creamer” or “whitener” for tea


and coffee.

2.The second position was “the tastiest milk made”. It had relevance at a
time when fresh milk was in short supply in some parts of India.

3.Next positioning was Milkmaid as a “topper on fruits and puddings”.

4.The fourth positioning was “Milkmaid for desert recipes”.

 In due course , the pack was designed accordingly, where label depicts a
desert and gives the recipe on reverse side along with a free recipe
booklet.
The Pitfalls of Brand Positioning

Case Study: Milkfood

Repositioning a brand always not succeeded.

e.g.:- Milkfood Yogurt


 Incorporated in 1973, Milkfood Limited is located in Patiala. It is a part of
the Jagatjit Group of Industries, with its base at Hamira in Jalandhar
(Punjab) and its corporate office in Delhi.
 Milkfood’s Yogurt was initially positioned as “anytime snack”. This did
not seem to have work. So it was repositioned as “It is not just curd”,
hinting at both the fun value and nutritive value of Yogurt.
 Eventually this positioning also didn’t work. It was again positioned
as “mishti-doi (sweet curd)” for the East and North Eastern part of
India, but finally it has to be removed from the companies product
portfolio.

Companies often promote attributes that consumers don’t care about.

e.g.:- Le-Sancy Soap

 Le Sancy Soap was a failed product mainly due to its wrong positioning.
It was a premium “egg-shaped” soap that positioned itself as “the long
lasting soap”.
 It was later discovered that the long lasting benefit can be an add-on
benefit for the consumer but not the core benefit, which is beauty, skin
care, health etc.
 Initially, a novelty value was added to the product because of its
different shape and size, but post use, consumer find it difficult to use on
the body.
Companies sometimes invest too heavily in points of difference that
can easily be copied. Positioning needs to keep competitors out, not
draw them in.

e.g.:- Neem Soap

 Margo’s strength is its health positioning supported through ingredients


like neem leaves. It is a popular brand in Eastern India. However, the
benefit of neem attracted other brands too to follow the suit.

Companies trying to respond to competition sometimes walk away


from their own established position

e.g.:- Horlicks vs Complan

 Complan was launched by GlaxoSmithKline, a British company in 1954.


In 1994, it was acquired by Heinz, both in India and UK.
 Its closest competitor is Horlicks, which is a malted milk hot drink
developed by James and William Horlick in 1873 in USA. In 1969
Horlicks was acquired by the Beecham Group which
became GlaxoSmithKline in 2000. Complan was positioned against
Horlicks as;
Rebuilding brand awareness after deviating from a clear brand
position.

e.g.:- Chik and Velvettte Shampoo

 Chik and Velvettte Shampoo introduced low priced sachet revolution and
surprised its competitors Clinic and Sunsilk.
 The consumer identified Chik as:
 One rupee shampoo Jasmine Shampoo or, Khusboo Shampoo (South
Indian actress Khusboo endorsed this product)
 So, when Chik increased the price to 1.25 rupees, its sales dropped.
Though its priced was rolled back to 1 rupee, but by that
time Sunsilk and Clinic started offering emotional benefit as well as
functional benefit, while Chik was confined to Jasmine content only.
Eventually it failed.

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