Restaurant Branding: Brand Positioning

The father of modern day positioning – and my favorite marketing author – is Al Ries.  I certainly wouldn’t attempt to out-do him in explaining brand positioning so if you have not yet read his books, I highly encourage you to (starting with Focus).  What I can do though is help restaurant and food industry companies apply the principles to their own branding and marketing.

The idea of positioning is that “You don’t merely want to be considered the best of the best; you want to be considered the only one who does what you do”.

Thousands of years of human evolution have conditioned us to instinctual notice what’s different.  This was for survival.  When a cave man was walking in the jungle he would see “jungle bush, jungle bush, LION FACE” and noticing what was different kept him from being eaten.  This has not changed and is as true today.

A major league baseball player can see the entire field and stadium, but when the pitch is thrown everything else fades away and he sees only that 90 mph fastball hurling at him.  His eye is trained to see what’s different and to focus on that.

Great Restaurant Branding Beats Out the White Noise

Likewise, the modern day consumer is overrun with more than 4,000 commercial messages per day.  They have become conditioned to fade all of this cacophony of noise out and see only what’s different.  In a crowded sea of millions of restaurants around the world all shouting for the attention of more customers, employees and media mentions, yours has to stand out.  That’s the aim of brand positioning – to focus your brand on what makes you different.  That’s the point of your restaurant marketing – to communicate your brand personality, brand positioning, brand promise and brand story.