How To Write A Brand Positioning Statement

Composing a brand positioning statement is integral to your company's brand identity. Whether you are establishing a new brand, or looking to remodel your business, it is crucial that you articulate a bold brand positioning statement.

Brand positioning statements may appear straightforward, but writing one can be surprisingly challenging. Many business owners struggle with their statements because it is tricky to narrow your entire brand's values, unique selling point, and overall mission into a few words.

Keep reading to discover all the essential details to ensure you produce a compelling positioning statement that will help your brand blossom.

What Is A Brand Positioning Statement?

A brand positioning statement is intrinsic to your brand strategy. It explains how your establishment is designed to suit your target audience, with the ultimate goal of clarifying your business's intentions and determining how you stand out from competitors.

It is important to acknowledge that a brand positioning statement is not intended for customers to read. It's an internal document designed to inform employees of your brand's purpose.

A brand positioning statement is not a mission statement. The fundamental differences between these two statements are as follows:

• A Positioning Statement: Explicates how your brand will accomplish its goals, reach objectives and execute its purpose.

• A Mission Statement: Defines what your brand's goals, objectives, and purposes are.

Why Is A Brand Positioning Statement Important?

It is vital that you create an explicit statement in order to paint a clear picture of your brand, so that your marketing team can translate your intended brand identity accurately to your target audience.

Here are 3 factors that make a brand positioning statement imperative to fortifying a strong brand identity:

1. Provides Clarity

 Helps to position your establishment within your market category and helps you focus on how you can differ from competitors so that you may locate opportunities to guide employees when they develop your brand further and compile a relevant marketing strategy.

2. Ensures Consistency

 This is basically a guideline for your internal team. By having everyone on board with your brand's statement, your company will have cohesive communication, which will positively transfer when marketing your brand identity to customers.

3. Promotes Focus

Your positioning statement will enable you to fully understand how and where your brand will fit into its niche market category. It will pave your organisation's journey toward a fine-tuned brand so that it can prosper.

How Can You Write A Brand Positioning Statement?

A good positioning statement must be clear and concise in order to be effective. Although this sort of statement tends to only be a few sentences long, it is incredibly important that you incorporate these 4 steps to ensure your overall marketing efforts are sufficiently enhanced.

1. Revise Your Brand

Familiarising with the finer details of your brand will assist you when narrowing down your statement. There are several ways you can revise and audit your brand. A useful method to consider is a value proposition.

This states the emotional and functional benefits that your business will offer to its customers. It details the qualities of your brand, how specific consumer needs will be relevantly fulfilled, and how your brand's values differentiate from the competition.

By establishing the values rooted in your brand, you can begin to map out your unique selling point (USP), and start compiling a high-quality positioning statement that will help you to effectively engage with your target market.

2. Understand Your Target Market

By understanding who is buying into your niche, you can build a brand that caters to the specific needs of your customer base. Dive deeper into your target market by creating a buyer persona.

This is essentially a profile intended to personify the members within your target market, as a means of familiarising with who you are selling your product/services to. This allows you to dig deeper and unveil specific characteristics, traits and potential consumer pains that your audience may have. 

Employing a buyer persona as a guide to structure your positioning statement will allow you to shape your brand around the audience you are selling to. This will assist your internal team when tailoring marketing efforts to your target audience.

3. Make It Concise And Memorable

In order for your statement to be both clear and memorable, it must be short and straight to the point. For reference, your positioning statement should be no longer than five sentences long. Be sure to accentuate the characteristics and core values of your brand to positively portray your desired image.

4. Don't Overcomplicate It

Overcomplicating your brand positioning statement will negatively impact how your brand image is communicated. Over-saturating your statement with information will reduce its engagement and cause confusion, which will affect the consistency of your brand image.

Positioning Statement Examples & Template

You may be struggling to find examples of brand positioning statements because they are intended for internal display. We have shortlisted two exemplary positioning statements from reputable brands to help you further understand what this marketing tool looks like.

Dermalogica

At PicStudio, we have worked closely with Dermalogica to help them craft the name of a new product. Dermalogica is a highly successful personal care brand with a product line focused on skincare. Here is their positioning statement:

"We focus on skin health and products that truly deliver, not false "beauty" claims or miracle cures. Our industry is full of women entrepreneurs who choose only Dermalogica products to use professionally and sell in their business. They’re all trusting and partnering with you to help them reach the highest level of success in this industry."

This statement works well as it draws in the reader's attention in the first sentence. They have prioritised communicating their products, purpose and intentions as a brand, while simultaneously differentiating themselves from competitors.

Aesop

Aesop is an Australian-based vegan cosmetic brand that offers a variety of luxurious hair, face and body products. This is their positioning statement:

"Our objective has always been to formulate skin, hair and body care products of the finest quality; we investigate widely to source plant-based and laboratory-made ingredients, and use only those with a proven record of safety and efficacy."

In their statement, Aesop articulates their brand with a sophisticated level of clarity. This engages the reader by instantly defining what they do and what they sell, alongside their efforts to maintain their purposes as a vegan-friendly brand.

Positioning Statement Template:

We have created a basic framework to help you articulate a good positioning statement:

For [target audience] looking for the highest quality [product/service], [brand name] is focused upon utilising [core value/purpose] in order to provide [market need]. Our [product/service] offers [unique selling point that differentiates you from competitors] because we believe that [your brands ethos and overall intention].

Before You Go...

We earnestly hope that this article has helped alleviate any stress and uncertainty that you may be experiencing towards writing your own brand positioning statement.

At PicStudio, we are a boutique agency that admires the determination and strength of business owners and want to do all we can to help you during your inspiring journey. Discover more about us on our website.