Positioning Is a Decision, Not a Tagline

Ask ten marketers to define positioning and you will get ten descriptions of a slogan. But positioning is not what you say about yourself — it is the place you occupy in someone's mind relative to the alternatives. That place is earned by choices, not adjectives.

The cost of being everything

A brand that tries to appeal to everyone gives the mind nothing to hold on to. Specificity is what makes you memorable, and memory is the entire point of marketing.

If your positioning does not exclude someone, it is probably not positioning.

— Marcus Reed

A simple test

• Who is this unmistakably for — and who is it not for?
• What single alternative are you trying to replace?
• What would you have to be willing to be bad at?

If you cannot answer the third question, you have a tagline, not a position.