JBIMPositioning Strategiesin Business Marketsby Kalafatis Tsogasand Blankson 2000
JBIMPositioning Strategiesin Business Marketsby Kalafatis Tsogasand Blankson 2000
JBIMPositioning Strategiesin Business Marketsby Kalafatis Tsogasand Blankson 2000
net/publication/38176126
CITATIONS READS
142 18,087
3 authors:
Charles Blankson
University of North Texas
124 PUBLICATIONS 2,118 CITATIONS
SEE PROFILE
Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:
All content following this page was uploaded by Charles Blankson on 31 October 2016.
Roger Brooksbank, (1994),"The Anatomy of Marketing Positioning Strategy", Marketing Intelligence & Planning, Vol. 12 Iss
4 pp. 10-14
Access to this document was granted through an Emerald subscription provided by 385529 []
For Authors
If you would like to write for this, or any other Emerald publication, then please use our Emerald for Authors service
information about how to choose which publication to write for and submission guidelines are available for all. Please visit
www.emeraldinsight.com/authors for more information.
About Emerald www.emeraldinsight.com
Emerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of
more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online
products and additional customer resources and services.
Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication Ethics
(COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation.
stability of the proposed typology and the relevance of the concept of positioning in
business markets. The authors suggest that although business positioning is
predominantly determined by hard criteria (e.g. product quality) and relationship
building factors (e.g. personal contact), other considerations such as company structures
(i.e. geographical coverage), breadth of offerings and degree of integration (i.e. location
in the distribution chain), also play an important part. Finally, we offer support to the
claim that, level of familiarity with a specific company is a contributing factor to
perceptions of the pursued positioning strategies.
Introduction
Concept of positioning There is general agreement that the concept of positioning has become one of
the fundamental components of modern marketing management (Kotler,
2000; Hooley et al., 1998). Its importance is further supported by evidence
that indicates a positive relationship between company performance (in
terms of profitability and/or efficiency) and well-formulated and clearly-
defined positioning activities (Brooksbank, 1994; Devlin et al., 1995; Porter,
1996).
lthough a number of authors in business marketing fail to deal/debate issues
of positioning (Wilson, 1991; Powers, 1991; Haas, 1995) there is also clear
acknowledgement of the relevance and importance of the concept within the
domain of business marketing. Dovel (1990) contended that:
Positioning shouldn't be just a part of your strategy. It should be the backbone of
your business plan.
This is echoed by Webster (1991) who stated that:
Positioning is an important strategic concept, developed in consumer marketing
but with equal applicability for industrial products and services.
He goes on to refer to it as ``. . . the firm's value positioning . . .'' which he
defines as ``. . . the firm's unique way of delivering value to customers.''
An earlier version of this paper was presented at the IUFRO & FPS Conference held
in British Columbia, Canada, in June 1997.
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
http://www.emerald-library.com
416 JOURNAL OF BUSINESS & INDUSTRIAL MARKETING, VOL. 15 NO. 6 2000, pp. 416-437, # MCB UNIVERSITY PRESS, 0885-8624
Despite the above, we have been unable to identify empirically developed
and reliable positioning typologies and models that would allow the
development of normative guidelines. Such observations formed the basis
of the research reported here. More specifically, the purpose of the
present research is to test a new positioning typology in the domain of
business marketing and determine whether the proposed typology contains
predictive and/or explanatory powers in terms of positioning strategies as
perceived by those operating within a well-established, commodity market
sector.
Cross-sectional study In this paper we first debate general issues of positioning before we proceed
to review literature that deals specifically with the diffusion and use of
positioning strategies in business marketing. Results of a cross-sectional
study of industrial firms operating within a specific sector of the UK
economy are presented and a number of implications are drawn for both
theory and practice.
1989). In the last few years, however, writers on the subject have credited
Ries and Trout for popularising the term. In their work, Ries and Trout
(1986) concluded that,
Positioning starts with the product. A piece of merchandise, a service, a company,
an institution, or even a person . . .
They go on to argue that positioning is not what is done to the product/
service, but rather what is done to the mind of the prospect, ``. . . positioning
shifts the emphasis of marketing from the product to the battle for your
mind.'' The emphasis of their debate (supported almost exclusively by their
consultancy and personal experiences) centered around the communications/
advertising elements of positioning. This theme has been adopted by Kotler
(2000) who provides the following definition,
Positioning is the act of designing the company's offering and image to occupy a
distinct place in the target market's mind.
Although the definitions of Ries and Trout, and Kotler are among the most
widely quoted, a single, universally accepted definition has yet to emerge. At
the same time, several terms such as positioning (Kotler, 2000), position
(Smith and Lusch, 1976), product positioning (Harrison, 1987) and market
positioning (Greenley, 1989) have been proposed in the literature. However,
we believe that Arnott's (1992) statement that the various definitions and
terminologies are simply ``. . . several sides of the same coin . . .'' illustrates
the fact that most of the apparent definitional differences are substantively
superficial. He goes on to state that:
. . . positioning is the deliberate, proactive, iterative process of defining, modifying
and monitoring consumer perceptions of a marketable object . . .
Deliberative and proactive In other words, the process of positioning can be described as iterative, it
necessitates deliberate and proactive actions, it involves decisions at
conceptual, strategic and operational levels and should reflect the triumvirate
deliberations of the company, its competitors and its target market/
customers.
Unfortunately, the above are not reflected in current literature. Despite its
apparent relevance to a broad spectrum of marketing activities, a review of
Methodology
Cross-sectional survey The research took the form of a cross-sectional survey of companies
operating at all levels of the UK Timber Trade. The choice of this particular
sector is based on:
. its relative long-term stability (i.e. potential respondents were expected
to be familiar with the main companies operating in this market); and
. market structure in terms of products/materials which are regarded as
commodities (branding is very rare and promotions are based on
company name), and market coverage (wide variation among suppliers
in terms of geographic coverage and degree of integration).
Scale items encapsulate In terms of the descriptors, these have been borrowed from initial work
dimensions of positioning carried out by Charles Blankson who developed a set of 66 statements/scale
items to encapsulate dimensions of positioning (see Appendix). These items
were designed:
. to be generic in nature; and
. to reflect the bases on which consumers/customers differentiate between
providers of goods and services.
The adopted approach for the development and validation of the items
followed well-established scale development methodologies (see, among
others, Churchill, 1979; DeVellis, 1991; Spector, 1992) and was pre-tested
using a convenience sample of 215 practicing managers undertaking
executive programmes. Following discussions with industry experts the
number of items in this research was reduced to 45 (see Appendix).
Measures were in the form of a rating scale of 1 to 7 with 1 anchoring the
lower end and 7 the upper end of the scale. For the scale items the
respondents were requested to evaluate each of the 45 statements in terms of
. . . how relevant you perceive that the descriptor reflects their [i.e. each
company's] overall standing in the UK Timber Trade.
Randomising the Order bias was minimised by randomising the presentation of both suppliers
presentation and descriptors and in order to avoid fatigue, each respondent was requested
to provide answers to only three out of the nine suppliers (an equal number
of replies could not be guaranteed despite the fact that a balanced design was
devised).
Results
Construct reliability
Analysis of the reliability of the constructs is presented in Table I where it is
indicated that the scales possess considerable internal consistency (see
Appendix for a list of the scale items in each construct as determined by
exploratory factor analysis). All scales are associated with reliability values
above the recommended levels (see Hair et al., 1998; Churchill, 1979;
Nunnally, 1967) and consequently are viewed as providing reliable
measures.
We posit that a strong association between a specific company and a
construct provides an indication of the company's position against other
providers. In other words, we consider that our measures reflect the market's/
customers' perceptions of positioning strategies pursued by the different
companies as compared to managers' own beliefs of their adopted
positioning strategies.
Downloaded by University of North Texas At 11:32 26 September 2014 (PT)
Number of Weighted
Constructs items means* Reliability**
Pricing 3 4.41 0.8783
Easy to do business 4 4.34 0.8114
Personal contact 5 4.28 0.9125
Product performance 3 4.25 0.8811
Range of offerings 3 4.25 0.8225
Presence 3 4.03 0.6605
Safety 3 4.00 0.7558
Leadership 2 3.84 0.8360
Distinct identity 2 3.36 0.7473
Status 5 3.34 0.8777
Country identity 3 3.05 0.6981
Differentiation 4 2.96 0.8932
Attractiveness 5 2.73 0.8634
Notes: * In subsequent analysis mean values are viewed as indicators of the degree of
association between a company and a specific construct. Higher values are
taken to reflect close association
** Figures represent either Cronbach's alpha coefficient (for scales with less
than four items) or the GFI values obtained from confirmatory factor analysis
(for scales with four or more items)
Harcross Jewson KDM Arnold Laver Meyer Travis Perkins Timbmet Howarth James Latham
(0.000) (0.030) (0.013) (0.398) (0.000) (0.201) (0.078) (0.030) (0.025)
Strategies/companies ns ns ns
Pricing ✓ ✓
Easy to do business ✓ ✓ ✓
Personal contact ✓ ✓
Product performance ✓ ✓
Range of offerings ✓ ✓
Presence ✓
Safety ✓
Leadership ✓
Distinct identity
Status
Country identity
Differentiation
Attractiveness
Note: ✓ denotes the strategies belonging to the highest construct grouping
Harcross Jewson KDM Arnold Laver Meyer Travis Perkins Timbmet Howarth James Latham
(0.016) (0.265) (0.876) (0.000) (0.000) (0.006) (0.000) (0.000) (0.000)
Strategies/companies ns ns
Pricing F F NF F/NF F/NF F
Easy to do business F F F F NF
Personal contact F/NF F/NF F F
Product performance F F F F F
Range of offerings F F F/NF F
Presence NF NF NF NF
Safety F F
Leadership F NF F F F NF
Distinct identity F/NF NF NF NF
Country identity
Differentiation NF
Status F
Attractiveness
Notes: F ± familiar; NF ± not familiar (only the highest groupings are presented)
Values in parentheses indicate significance of covariance test
Theoretical contributions
Conceptualisation of From a theoretical standpoint the findings reported here have provided
positioning considerable empirical support to the claim that the conceptualisation of
Downloaded by University of North Texas At 11:32 26 September 2014 (PT)
Managerial contributions
Central element Managerially, it is clear that positioning must be a central element of
business marketing and the results presented here are viewed as offering
important guidelines for the management of positioning activities. First, they
emphasise differences in the relative impact of positioning strategies along
the familiarity dimension. More specifically, the findings indicate that
positioning efforts should reflect/take account of the stage and extent of
inter-organisational exchange. It is proposed that strategies which represent
non-commercial aspects such as status and differentiation (e.g. presence and
distinct identity) should be pursued during pre-exchange stages while
commercial/tangible strategies (e.g. pricing, product performance and easy
to do business) should dominate post-exchange stages. This implies that the
conceptualisation and implementation of positioning strategies should follow
the cognitive to repeat buying progression pathway.
Second, this study provides clear evidence to support the claim that a single
positioning strategy did not dominate the market sector. Instead the results
lead to the conclusion that strategic market considerations (e.g. product
performance) rather the image building factors (e.g. attractiveness) are
determinants of perceived positioning strategies. The following three broad
determining factors have been identified:
a strategy founded on a strong price message. The problem was that the
business had built its success on a message of quality and good value rather
than on a price message. Moreover, Sainsbury were unable to deliver across-
the-board price reductions and shoppers found little difference in the amount
they spent each week. The firm's positioning became confused because they
could not deliver against the low-price positioning.
While positioning does develop and evolve, the initial choice of market
position means those significant shifts in positioning are very difficult to
achieve and are impossible in the short run. Any changes need to be
believable and sustainable for a change in positioning to succeed.
Company Activities
Harcross Nationwide coverage; operates at the downstream level of the distribution
chain through a very large number of retail outlets; offers all types of
timber and complementary materials and products
KDM Small company operating out of a single location; operates at the top of
the distribution chain (agent) and has no selling outlets; offers all types
of material and products and related services (e.g. finance)
Arnold Laver Small company with local coverage; operates mainly at the upstream
level of the distribution chain though wholesale and retail outlets; deals
exclusively in timber and offers only a limited range
Howarth Large company with local coverage; operates mainly on the upstream
level of the distribution chain through wholesale outlets; deals
exclusively in timber and offers all types materials and products
Constructs Items
Pricing Reasonable prices; affordable prices; value for money
Easy to do business Convenient to do business with; familiar procedures; suitable
arrangements; comfortable
Personal contact Personal attention; consider people as important; impressive
service; good service provision; friendly
Product performance Satisfaction from usage of products; product reliability; good
quality products
Range of offerings Choice of products offered; extra features offered; wide range of
products
Presence Better than others; superior; well known
Safety Stable/long-standing provider; safe; warranties
Leadership Market leaders; well-known name
Distinct identity Differentiation; own brands
Status Upper class; posh; status; top of the range; prestigious
Country identity Country of origin of management; patriotism; represents
national interests
Differentiation Common; discriminatory; middle range; non selective
Attractiveness Attractive; cool; elegant; sophisticated; eye-catching ads
Powers, T.L. (1991), Modern Business Marketing: A Strategic Planning Approach to Business
and Industrial Markets, West Publishing Company, St Paul, MN.
Reeder, R.R., Brierty, E.G. and Reeder, B.H. (1987), Industrial Marketing: Analysis, Planning
and Control, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ.
Ries, A.L. and Trout, J. (1986), Positioning: The Battle for your Mind, McGraw-Hill, London.
Sekhar, K.M. (1989), ``Positioning strategies for the British commercial vehicles'',
unpublished MPhil thesis, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow.
Shipley, D. and Howard, P. (1993), ``Brand naming industrial products'', Industrial Marketing
Management, Vol. 22, pp. 59-66.
Smith, R.W. and Lusch, R.F. (1976), ``How advertising can position a brand'', Journal of
Advertising Research, Vol. 16 No. 1, pp. 37-43.
Spector, P.E. (1992), Summated Rating Scale Construction, Applied Social Research Methods
Series 82, Sage Publications, Newbury Park, CA.
Webster, F.E. Jr (1991), Industrial Marketing Strategy, John Wiley and Sons, New York, NY.
Wilson, A. (1991), New Directions in Marketing: Business-to-Business Strategies for the
1990s, Kogan Press, London.
Wilson, D.T. (1995), ``An integrated model of buyer-seller relationships'', Journal of the
Academy of Marketing Science, Vol. 23 No. 4, pp. 335-45.
Wilson, E.J. and Woodside, A.G. (1995), ``The relative importance of choice criteria in
organizational buying: implications for adaptive selling'', Journal of Business-to-Business
Marketing, Vol. 2 No. 1, pp. 33-57.
Wind, Y. (1978), ``Issues and advances in segmentation research'', Journal of Marketing
Research, Vol. XV, August, pp. 317-37.
Appendix
Scale items
Following recommendations by Spector (1992), and Churchill (1999), nine focus group
sessions were employed in the initial generation of statements/scale items. In order to ensure
the generalisability of the ultimate typology, consumer products, consumer services and
industrial products formed the subject of discussion in three focus groups each (see, for
example, Aaker and Shansby, 1982; Hooley et al., 1998). Analysis of the group sessions
resulted in 140 statements. With the help of experts this initial list of statements was examined
in order to identify and delete duplicate/overlapping statements. The resulting 66 statements
are listed in Table AII.
While positioning does develop and evolve, the initial choice of market
position means those significant shifts in positioning are very difficult to
achieve and are impossible in the short run. Any changes need to be
believable and sustainable for a change in positioning to succeed.
1. Stanley Coffie, Nana Owusu-Frimpong. 2014. Alternative Positioning Strategies for Services in Ghana. Thunderbird International
Business Review n/a-n/a. [CrossRef]
2. Charles Blankson, Stavros P. Kalafatis, Stanley Coffie, Markos H. Tsogas. 2014. Comparisons of media types and congruence in
positioning of service brands. Journal of Product & Brand Management 23:3, 162-179. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
3. Sittichai Meesrichan, Wanno Fongsuwan. 2014. An Analysis of Thai Commercial Banks Branch Expansion Factors Including
Leadership, Location, Cost and Economics. Research Journal of Business Management 8, 552-565. [CrossRef]
4. Anne Maarit Jalkala, Joona Keränen. 2014. Brand positioning strategies for industrial firms providing customer solutions. Journal
of Business & Industrial Marketing 29:3, 253-264. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
5. Lisa Qixun Siebers, Tao Zhang, Fei Li. 2013. Retail positioning through customer satisfaction: an alternative explanation to the
resource-based view. Journal of Strategic Marketing 21:7, 559-587. [CrossRef]
6. Mahmut Sonmez, Deli Yang, Gerald Fryxell. 2013. Interactive Role of Consumer Discrimination and Branding against
Counterfeiting: A Study of Multinational Managers’ Perception of Global Brands in China. Journal of Business Ethics 115:1,
195-211. [CrossRef]
7. Julie McColl, Catherine Canning, Louise McBride, Karina Nobbs, Linda Shearer. 2013. It’s Vintage Darling! An exploration of
vintage fashion retailing. Journal of the Textile Institute 104:2, 140-150. [CrossRef]
Downloaded by University of North Texas At 11:32 26 September 2014 (PT)
8. Johanna Vanderstraeten, Paul Matthyssens. 2012. Service-based differentiation strategies for business incubators: Exploring
external and internal alignment. Technovation 32:12, 656-670. [CrossRef]
9. Azita Sherej Sharifi. 2012. Islamic Azad University Function Analysis with Using the SWOT Model in Order to Provide Strategic
Guidelines (Case Study: Faculty of Humanities). Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 58, 1535-1543. [CrossRef]
10. Charles Blankson, John C. Crawford. 2012. Impact of positioning strategies on service firm performance. Journal of Business
Research 65:3, 311-316. [CrossRef]
11. Saloni Pawan Diwan, B. S. Bodla. 2011. Development of empirically based customer-derived positioning typology in the
automobile industry. Journal of Strategic Marketing 19:6, 531-550. [CrossRef]
12. Paul de Bruyn, Paul Freathy. 2011. Retailing in post‐apartheid South Africa: the strategic positioning of Boardmans. International
Journal of Retail & Distribution Management 39:7, 538-554. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
13. Charles Blankson, David Strutton. 2011. A longitudinal examination of positioning strategies in a liberalized developing African
economy: The case of Ghana. Thunderbird International Business Review 53:1, 51-67. [CrossRef]
14. Carsten Baumgarth, Marco Schmidt. 2010. How strong is the business-to-business brand in the workforce? An empirically-tested
model of ‘internal brand equity’ in a business-to-business setting. Industrial Marketing Management 39:8, 1250-1260. [CrossRef]
15. Professor T.C. Melewar, Dr Lynn L.K. Lim, Carsten Baumgarth. 2010. “Living the brand”: brand orientation in the business‐
to‐business sector. European Journal of Marketing 44:5, 653-671. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
16. W Chandraprakaikul, T S Baines, R Y Lim. 2010. Strategic positioning of manufacturing operations within global supply chains.
Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, Part B: Journal of Engineering Manufacture 224:5, 831-844. [CrossRef]
17. Claudia Amonini, Janet R. McColl-Kennedy, Geoffrey N. Soutar, Jillian C. Sweeney. 2010. How professional service firms compete
in the market: an exploratory study. Journal of Marketing Management 26:1-2, 28-55. [CrossRef]
18. Debra Zahay, Abbie Griffin. 2010. Marketing strategy selection, marketing metrics, and firm performance. Journal of Business &
Industrial Marketing 25:2, 84-93. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
19. Olavi Uusitalo, Toni Mikkola. 2010. Revisiting the case of float glass. European Journal of Innovation Management 13:1, 24-45.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
20. Xenophon Koufteros, Sunil Babbar, Mehdi Kaighobadi. 2009. A paradigm for examining second-order factor models employing
structural equation modeling. International Journal of Production Economics 120:2, 633-652. [CrossRef]
21. Celine Chew, Stephen P. Osborne. 2008. Strategic Positioning in UK Charities that Provide Public Services: Implications of a
New Integrating Model. Public Money & Management 28:5, 283-290. [CrossRef]
22. Umut Asan, Seçkin PolatModular design capability and product positioning: An integrative view 29-53. [Abstract] [Full Text]
[PDF] [PDF]
23. Raj G. Java, Charles Blankson, Stavros P. Kalafatis. 2007. Positioning strategies of international and multicultural‐oriented service
brands. Journal of Services Marketing 21:6, 435-450. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
24. Edar Da Silva Añaña, Walter Meucci Nique. 2007. A professional category positioning: The role of personal values and
their influence on consumer perceptions. Journal of Database Marketing & Customer Strategy Management 14:4, 289-296.
[CrossRef]
25. K. Bridges, T.C. Melewar, B. Olutayo Otubanjo. 2007. “Geiz‐ist‐geil” strategy: a three‐company study. Management Decision
45:6, 1023-1037. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
26. Gerald W. Ramey, Mihai Niculescu. 2006. Strategic positioning in Romanian higher education. Journal of Organizational Change
Management 19:6, 725-737. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
27. Norman P. Archer, Paul Hong, Jungsik Jeong. 2006. Supply chain management practices of SMEs: from a business growth
perspective. Journal of Enterprise Information Management 19:3, 292-302. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
28. Norman P. Archer, Paul Hong, Jungsik Jeong. 2006. Supply chain management practices of SMEs: from a business growth
perspective. Journal of Enterprise Information Management 19:3, 292-302. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
29. Patrick Hartmann, Vanessa Apaolaza Ibáñez, F. Javier Forcada Sainz. 2005. Green branding effects on attitude: functional versus
emotional positioning strategies. Marketing Intelligence & Planning 23:1, 9-29. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
30. Charles Blankson. 2004. Positioning strategies and incidence of congruence of two UK store card brands. Journal of Product &
Brand Management 13:5, 315-328. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
31. Ehab M. Abou Aish, Christine T. Ennew, Sally A. Mckechnie. 2003. A Cross-Cultural Perspective on the Role of Branding in
Financial Services: The Small Business Market. Journal of Marketing Management 19:9-10, 1021-1042. [CrossRef]
Downloaded by University of North Texas At 11:32 26 September 2014 (PT)