Al Ries Quotes

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.

More money is wasted in marketing than in any other human activity (outside of government activities, of course).

You “burn” your way into the mind by narrowing the focus to a single word or concept. It’s the ultimate marketing sacrifice. Federal Express was able to put the word overnight into the minds of its prospects because it sacrificed its product line and focused on overnight package delivery only. In a way, the law of leadership — it’s better to be first than to be better — enables the first brand or company to own a word in the mind of the prospect. But the word the leader owns is so simple that it’s invisible. The leader owns the word that stands for the category. For example, IBM owns computer. This is another way of saying that the brand becomes a generic name for the category. “We need an IBM machine.” Is there any doubt that a computer is being requested? You can also test the validity of a leadership claim by a word association test. If the given words are computer, copier, chocolate bar, and cola, the four most associated words are IBM, Xerox, Hershey’s, and Coke. An astute leader will go one step further to solidify its position. Heinz owns the word ketchup. But Heinz went on to isolate the most important ketchup attribute. “Slowest ketchup in the West” is how the company

Take facsimile, for example. Over the past two decades, the facsimile has become an indispensable part of every company’s communication portfolio. Americans will send 65 billion pages of faxes this year, more than 230 per person. And 50 percent of all international telephone calls are now fax calls.

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

successful positioning requires consistency. You must keep at it year after year.

The fickle-fingers affair Another missed opportunity is known in hand lotion circles as “the fickle-fingers affair.” The story starts with Jergens, the No. 1 brand with the dominant share of market. First, the company introduced Jergens Extra Dry, a creamlike product in an era of liquidlike lotions. Jergens Extra Dry was really a significant innovation smothered by the similarity of names. The prospect didn’t recognize the difference. But the competition did. Chesebrough-Pond’s introduced Intensive Care. Now for the first time, the new creamlike lotion had a name which positioned the product clearly in the consumer’s mind. And the product took off. Of course, when Jergens realized what was happening, they countered with a brand called Direct Aid. But it was the old story of too little and too late because the marketing victory went to Intensive Care. Today Intensive Care is the No. 1 brand. It outsells Jergens, Jergens Extra Dry, and Direct Aid combined. But isn’t the brand really called “Vaseline Intensive Care,” a line-extended name? True, but customers call the product Intensive Care, not Vaseline. In the mind of the prospect Vaseline is petroleum jelly; Intensive Care is a hand lotion.

Names don't matter, many managers believe; it's the product that matters. With the right product at the right price, goes the thinking, we can win the battle of the marketplace. Names do matter. Depending on the category, the name alone can represent the primary reason for the brand's success. A company might spend hundreds of millions of dollars to develop a new product and then give that new product a brand name that almost guarantees failure. Innovation alone is never enough. Along with innovation, a company needs marketing to assure the brand's eventual success and survival. The heart of a good marketing program is a great name.

The primary objective of a branding program is never the market for the product or service. The primary objective of a branding program is always the mind of the prospect. The mind comes first; the market follows where the mind leads.

While tracking trends can be a useful tool in dealing with the unpredictable future, market research can be more of a problem than a help. Research does best at measuring the past. New ideas and concepts are almost impossible to measure. No one has a frame of reference. People don’t know what they will do until they face an actual decision.
The classic example is the research conducted before Xerox introduced the plain-paper copier. What came back was the conclusion that no one would pay five cents for a plain-paper copy when they could get a Thermofax copy for a cent and a half. Xerox ignored the research, and the rest is history.

"In the communication jungle out there, the only hope to score big is to be selective, to concentrate on narrow targets, to practice segmentation. In a word, "positioning.

Mind-changing is the road to advertising disaster.

You build brand loyalty in a supermarket the same way you build mate loyalty in a marriage. You get there first and then be careful not give them a reason to switch.

All truth is relative. Relative to your mind or the mind of another human being. When you say, 'I’m right and the next person is wrong,' all you’re really saying is that you’re a better perceiver than someone else.