Brand Repositioning vs. Revitalization
The marketing halls of business schools across the land feature how-to courses on Brand repositioning; considered by many to be the Magic Mushroom of marketing.
Theoretically, this sounds great. After all, we want the high associated with strong sales figures and the brotherly love that relevant mindshare brings. It seems like a groovy trip to reposition the Brand.
Unfortunately, most repositioning efforts work out about as well as painting stripes on a horse and calling it a zebra. As rational, thinking humans we know this won’t work, but because we learned “repositioning techniques” in school we believe we can make our Brand into something it isn’t.
Brand repositioning causes a hangover because, in our effort to keep up with our peers, we overindulge in the heady brew of being something we are not rather than examining our Brand’s DNA and rekindling what makes us relevant in the cold light of day.
By contrast, Brand revitalization focuses on getting realignment with the core of who we are and what made us great in the first place.