In One Word

On a recent shop­ping trip to the mall, I was walk­ing past store after store think­ing to myself “If I had to use one word to describe (insert name of retail store) what would it be.  For some, it was easy to do.  For oth­ers, not so much.

From a mar­ket­ing stand­point, this was an excer­cise in posi­tion­ing.  How well does a par­tic­u­lar brand own an idea or con­cept in the mind of the con­sumer.    What, if any­thing, does that com­pany sym­bol­ize?  Try this the next time you are dri­ving past a shop­ping cen­ter or office park.  Look at the logo and think of the one word that comes to mind.  What do you think of when you see Sears? JC Penney’s?  Lim­ited? Star­bucks? Coca-Cola? Pepsi? Fed-Ex? UPS?  Tar­get?  Wal­mart? Taco Bell? Chipo­tle?  Whole Foods? If some­one is with you, ask them to do the same?  Com­pare notes and see how your per­cep­tions align.

Now if you are really dar­ing, by dar­ing I mean smart, ask them to describe your busi­ness in one word.  Can they do it at all?  Do they have any idea what you or your com­pany rep­re­sents?  Do they know what your posi­tion in the mar­ket­place is?  Prob­a­bly not.

Next ask your­self, do you have one? What does your com­pany sym­bol­ize? Can you tell them in one word?  Three?  Five?  Seven?  This is a fun excer­cise, and also very use­ful in estab­lish­ing a proper iden­tity for your com­pany.  Feel­ing really dar­ing, again by dar­ing I mean smart?  Ask peo­ple on the web, friends and strangers, to do this.  Use Twit­ter, Face­book, LinkedIn, cre­ate a google form, put a post on a blog, what­ever — ask them and see what happens.