What Is Market Mapping? (Brand Positioning Map Tool)

What's up brand builder Stephen Houraghan here at brandmasteracademy.com and in this video you're going to learn what market mapping is so you can understand this effective brand positioning tool to uncover gaps and opportunities that you can take advantage of now if you're new to the channel and you want to build brands that go beyond the visuals and the logo using strategy psychology and creative thinking then you're in the right place hit that subscribe button and the notification bell if you want to fast track your results make sure you grab the pro brand strategy blueprint it's

a free download and the link is in the description now one of the foundational principles of branding and marketing is positioning that is defining a unique position in the market that's both different from your competitors and valuable to your target market but competitive positions aren't just sitting about waiting for the next company to show up and snap them up they're hidden and they require tools and deep creative thinking to be found now without a doubt market mapping is one of the most effective competitive positioning tools available and in this video i'm going to show you

exactly what they are and just how effective they can be so what exactly is market mapping well market mapping refers to the mapping of your competitive landscape so it's the process of using a graph to visualize a given competitive environment by plotting individual competitors using a set of two criteria so this mapping process brings the market to life visually helping to uncover gaps and opportunities for brands to take advantage of through the unmet needs of the consumers now the right set of criteria used to plot the map can help to uncover untapped opportunities or voids

or gaps in the market that the audience wants so in other words the market map in the right hands is a very valuable positioning tool so why exactly is market mapping important well when you hear the word market you might think of traditional market stalls with vendors selling fresh produce such as vegetables cured meats or cheese but most markets aren't physical places and the landscape of competitors aren't easily seen or visualized in a way that's effective for comparison or competitive analysis it's also very easy for business leaders to make assumptions and to believe that they

have the full picture of their competitors strengths and weaknesses though this can result in costly missed opportunities now when it comes to competitive positioning and competitive analysis there is no magic key or silver bullet like most industry tools the positioning map has some advantages and it also has some disadvantages as well so let's take a closer look at what these are now there are plenty advantages to using a market map market mapping has been used by business leaders and marketers for decades and although this tool isn't on the cutting edge of science it still can

be used to great effect so here are some of the advantages of using a market map it creates a visual snapshot it displays entire markets it's easy to understand you have direct comparison with competitors there is unlimited variable combinations and it's easy for quick market analysis but there are also some disadvantages to using a markup map as well now despite those many advantages using a market map is not a foolproof science and there are some disadvantages that should be considered and some of those disadvantages include a lack of scientific accuracy they can be subjective they

can be biased there are no real facts or statistics and it's only based on two variables as well so let's take a look at some examples of markup mapping variables now in reality the positioning map or the perceptual map is overly simplistic but there is power in that simplicity and the value of the map or the results that it produces is largely dependent on the importance and the creativity of the variables that are used on the map now you can plot pretty much any variable though the closer you are to the important buying decision factors

of your audience the more impactful and valuable the gaps and opportunities that you find will be so here are a few examples of market mapping variables or market mapping dimensions high price versus low price low quality versus high quality low tech versus high tech simple versus complex short turnaround versus long turnaround low capability versus high capability necessity versus luxury unhealthy versus healthy inconvenient versus convenient now the reality is market mapping has been around for decades it's not based on cutting edge software and it's not a science either but some of the best tools in the

world are so effective because of their simplicity and market mapping is the exact same so take the time to uncover what's important to your target market and use a market map to uncover gaps and opportunities that might be lying and wait for your brand now if you want to learn more about creating market maps using a step-by-step markup mapping template then my next video will help you out until next time brand like a master and I'll see you in the next video