Marketing Mix: Product / Service Guide #1

Product / Service Guide #1 -- Good names are suggestive of benefit or use.

What do you do with Kleenex tissue?  You clean your nose.  What do you put on your cut finger?  A Band-Aid (which is a clever contraction of bandage and first aid.) What does Ultra-Brite toothpaste give you?  Bright, white teeth.  What will you be able to do if you use Close-Up toothpaste?  Get close to the people you want to get close to.  And what does the Close-Up package show?  Two people getting close-up to one another.  

Think about the disposable diaper category.  Mothers want to take good care of their infant children, and the brands in this category deliver that care: Want to demonstrate your love for your baby?  Buy Luvs.  Want to take extra good care of your baby?  Buy Pampers.  Want hold your baby closely?  Buy Huggies.

This guide doesn’t mean that a brand won’t be a success if its name doesn’t suggest benefit or use.  Throw enough marketing dollars at almost any name and you can get your target customers to remember the name and associate some use or benefit with that name.  Rather, this rule speaks to marketing efficiency.  It will take fewer marketing dollars for your target customers to remember a name that suggests use or benefit than one that doesn’t.

Many marketers inherit their brand and product names so they can’t follow this guide.  However, if you’re creating a new brand or new product name, follow this guide.

Positioning Guide #21

Don’t try to change the customer’s mind.

In the consumer tire product category in the U.S., Michelin brand owns the brand benefit of security.  This is truly remarkable in light of the fact that the U.S. Federal Trade Commission has a regulation that prevents tire marketers from making any safety claim.  This ownership is attributed to the historical quality of Michelin products and almost 20 years of the famous Michelin baby tire advertising.  The Michelin baby conveyed the benefit of safety without actually saying the word safety.  Additionally, consumers don’t attribute their safety to their tires on an unaided basis; rather, they attribute it to their vehicle.  However, on an aided basis consumers will readily agree that their safety is also attributable to their tires.  To remind consumers that their tires are a source of safety, Michelin developed the themeline, “Michelin. Because so much is riding on your tires.”  As long as Michelin nurtures this brand benefit with it’s marketing actions, neither Bridgestone nor Goodyear can take it away.  Neither Bridgestone nor Goodyear should attempt to change the customer’s mind.

In sports drink category, Gatorade owns the brand benefit of winning.  As long as Gatorade continues to invest in and nurture its associations with sports and winning athletes, Coke’s Powerade won’t be able to be the brand for winners.  Powerade shouldn’t attempt to change the customer’s mind.

If customers already attribute the benefit to the larger brand, it’s folly to attempt to change what customers already believe.  For example, want something quick for lunch?  Where to go?  McDonald’s.  Why?  McDonald’s owns the brand attribute of speed of service which translates into the customer benefit of convenience.  This is possibly the motivating benefit for a majority of customers in the fast food category.  Burger King or Wendy’s could spend millions of dollars in advertising trying to convince target customers that they are faster than McDonald’s, and they would fail because target customers already believe that they’ll get in and out of McDonald’s quickly. 

Positioning Guide #20

As long as your customers believe that you have a given brand benefit, they will not believe that you have a different brand benefit.

McDonalds Brand Benefit:  Speed of Service/Convenience

Great tasting food at McDonalds?  Healthy food at McDonalds.  Food like you like it at McDonalds?  Since McDonalds already owns speed of service/convenience, customers won’t give them any of these attributes and benefits.  This is good news for competitors, if they’re willing to accept the resulting smaller market of customers to whom these things are important.

From an outsider’s perspective, McDonalds competitors’ best marketing efforts have been when they distinguished themselves from McDonalds.  If you don’t want catsup on your hamburger, it’ll be a problem at McDonalds.  You’ll order, move to the side and wait … and wait … and wait.  For you, McDonalds has lost its benefit of speed of service/convenience.

Burger King Brand Benefit: Burgers Customized to Your Taste

In the 1970’s Burger King, the number two U.S. hamburger chain, exploited this weakness in McDonalds’ positioning.  The campaign was often lampooned, but nevertheless extremely effective.  The jingle lyrics were “Hold the pickles, hold the lettuce. Special orders don't upset us. All we ask is that you let us serve it your way!”  Burger King became the brand for those consumers who wanted a hamburger that was customized to their taste rather than the standardized McDonalds burger.

Wendy’s Brand Benefit: “Fresh” – or – “Hot n’ Juicy?”

Wendy’s, the number three U.S. hamburger chain, has attempted to distinguish itself from McDonalds with their “Fresh. Never Frozen.” product claims.  In my opinion, the problem with this approach is that it is indirect.  The real product benefit is that fresh meat will produce a hamburger which is “Hot n’ Juicy.”  It’s a safe assumption that hamburger consumers want hot and juicy hamburgers; however, I’m not so sure that hamburger consumers are interested in the healthy connotations of “fresh”.  In my opinion, they have reversed the product benefit and the product benefit support.  To appeal to the hamburger consumer, the claim should read, “Hot n’ Juicy because they’re made from fresh, not frozen, meat,” rather than “Fresh, Never Frozen so that we’ll have Hot n’ Juicy hamburgers.”

Hardee’s Brand Benefit: Gluttony

The number four hamburger chain in the U.S. is Hardee’s which has stores located primarily in the South and Midwest.  While the trend in American eating habits is toward fresher and healthier foods, there must be some segment in the fast food market which isn’t interested in fresher and healthier.  I would assume that this segment is composed primarily of young males whose high metabolism rapidly burn calories and whose elevated hormone levels make them feel that they are going to live forever.  For this target segment, Hardee’s seems to be attempting to position itself as the brand of choice.  Additions to their menu include the Monster Thickburger which consists of two one-third-pound slabs of Angus beef, four strips of bacon, three slices of cheese, and mayonnaise on a buttered sesame seed bun.  With 1,420 calories and 107 grams of fat, the target consumers for this product should have high metabolism and believe that they will live forever.

Positioning Guide #19

If you aren’t the pioneering brand in a given category, create a new category in which your brand can be the pioneer.

With apologies to Al Ries and/or Jack Trout, this guide stems from their writings.

While it’s not always true that the innovator, or pioneer, is going to be the long term winner in a given product category (see Positioning Guide #16), the pioneering brand with adequate marketing skills is likely to be the long term winner.  Once the pioneering brand with adequate marketing skill becomes the leader, it also becomes the winner and most customers want to be associated with winners.

I’m no expert in the analgesics (pain reliever) category, and someone with experience will probably correct me.  Nevertheless, I’m going to use the category as an example for this positioning guide.  My counting of generations of new products may not follow the category accepted pattern, but that doesn’t matter in illustrating this guide.


Bayer was first with the aspirin tablet.  They created the product category of aspirin tablets in 1914.  At the time of Bayer’s innovation, aspirin (acetylsalicylic acid) had been around for a while, but in powder form rather than tablet form.  Aspirin relieves pain, is an anti-inflammatory, and reduces fever.  I don’t believe that any of the newer pain relievers do all three of these things.  The problem with aspirin powder, however, was that it took some effort to mix the powder with water prior to ingestion.  Admittedly, the effort required to mix powder is minimal; but, nevertheless, it is effort.  A tablet is more convenient.   

At one time Bayer owned the trademark in the U.S. and many other countries, not only on the Bayer name, but also on the Aspirin name.  As a result of World War I, they lost their trademark on the Aspirin name in the U.S., France, and the United Kingdom (the World War I allied countries).  However, Aspirin is still a registered trademark owned by Bayer in most of the rest of the world including Canada in North America.

The aspirin was the product of choice in pain relief, and Bayer was the leader.  However, the aspirin tablet has some negative side effects, such as upsetting the stomach.  The likelihood of stomach irritation is reduced when aspirin is in powered form, and the powder form gets into the blood system faster than the tablet form.  Nevertheless, consumers preferred the convenience of aspirin tablets.  The problem of stomach irritation was addressed by the first non-aspirin pain reliever - acetaminophen.  Tylenol created a new product category -- non-aspirin pain reliever.  Tylenol became the dominant brand in the new category that they created. 

Americans almost always believe that newer is better.  First, you had aspirin.  Next you had non-aspirin pain relievers.  The third generation of pain reliever was ibuprofen.  The pioneer was Advil, and the product category that Advil created was “advanced medicine for pain”.   Americans were given the choice of aspirin  -or-  non-aspirin pain reliever  -or-  the advanced medicine for pain.   Given this choice, Americans embraced the pioneering brand, Advil.

Now, what’s the problem with aspirin, non-aspirin, and the advanced medicine for pain?  You have to take all of them multiple times during the day to sustain the pain relief.  Introducing the fourth generation of pain reliever -- naproxen.  Naproxen is marketed as Aleve by the company which started this story, Bayer.  “Two Aleve provide relief that can last all day.”  “Compare it!  Based on minimum label dosing for 24 hours, you could take eight Extra Strength Tylenol or four Advil to get the same all-day relief as just two Aleve.” So Aleve has created the fourth new product category, the all-day pain reliever.

Pain relievers is an interesting product category for learning about marketing.  It is a mature product category, but one in which innovation occurs frequently.  The brands in this category don’t talk about their technology, however.  They seek to find unique solutions to human needs, and each unique solution creates a new product category in which the pioneering brand can assume leadership.  Ask yourself, how can you apply this guide to your product category?