Al Ries Quotes

The Avis campaign will go down in marketing history as a classic example of establishing the “against” position.

Големите компании виждат нещата такива, кавито са. Предприемачите ги виждат такива, каквито могат да бъдат.

Positioning is an organized system for finding a window in the mind. It is based on the concept that communication can only take place at the right time and under the right circumstances.

Quality is a nice thing to have, but brands are not built by quality alone.

Don’t try to trick the prospect. Advertising is not a debate. It’s a seduction.

A company can become incredibly successful if it can find a way to own a word in the mind of the prospect. Not a complicated word. Not an invented one. The simple words are best, words taken right out of the dictionary. This is the law of focus. You “burn” your way into the mind by narrowing the focus to a single word or concept. It’s the ultimate marketing sacrifice.

The most difficult part of positioning is selecting that one specific concept to hang your hat on. Yet you must, if you want to cut through the prospect's wall of indifference.

Marketing is a battle of ideas. So if you are to succeed, you must have an idea or attribute of your own to focus your efforts around. Without one, you had better have a low price. A very low price. Some say all attributes are not created equal. Some attributes are more important to customers than others. You must try and own the most important attribute. Cavity prevention is the most important attribute in toothpaste. It’s the one to own. But the law of exclusivity points to the simple truth that once an attribute is successfully taken by your competition, it’s gone. You must move on to a lesser attribute and live with a smaller share of the category. Your job is to seize a different attribute, dramatize the value of your attribute, and thus increase your share.

Branding opportunities do not lie in the pursuit of existing markets. Branding opportunities lie in the creation of new markets.

When you try to be everything, you wind up being nothing.

If “what is the size of the market?” is the first question your company asks itself, then you are taking the wrong road to success.

To find a unique position, you must ignore conventional logic. Conventional logic says you find your concept inside yourself or inside the product. Not true. What you must do is look inside the prospect’s mind.

Success in business inflates the egos of top management.

The world is round,” said Christopher Columbus. “No, it’s not,” said the public, “it’s flat.”

To convince the public otherwise, fifteenth-century scientists first had to prove that the world wasn’t flat. One of their more convincing arguments was the fact that sailors at sea were first able to observe the tops of the masts of an approaching ship, then the sails, then the hull. If the world were flat, they would see the whole ship at once.

All the mathematical arguments in the world weren’t as effective as a simple observation the public could verify themselves.

The easy way to get into a person’s mind is to be first.