The Father of Positioning
RIES is Positioning
Remembering Al's life and legacy
LAURA RIES | Positioning
How we help position your brand?
RIES is here to help your brand with the fundamental business strategy for success: positioning. Find out what Laura Ries and her RIES team can do for your brand.
Strategy SessionsPaul Kim“RIES has world-class thought leadership in brand positioning and competitive marketing strategy. They shed a light on our most pivotal product brand launch. True visionaries."
VP Strategy at SamsungSee Case Studies
Find an open hole.
Years ago marketing was considered to be communications. You studied your product, its features and its competitors and then prepared advertising that explained why your product was better than the competition. Al Ries realized the need for change, which led to his book that changed the field of marketing, Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind. Instead of focusing on the product, Ries focused on the mind of the prospect and developed the principles of positioning.
Narrow your focus.
Most marketing consultants have no coherent strategy themselves. They are perfectly willing to tell you what to do, but they seldom take their own advice. We do. We help clients build or refocus their companies around a singular idea
Dell
Sold directly to businesses.
Zappos
Free shipping. Both ways.
FedEx
Overnight delivery.
Name is foremost.
In our book, The Origin of Brands, we explain how divergence is creating endless opportunities to create new categories. The first companies to launch new brands to exploit these new categories will become the long-time winners.
Chobani
The first Greek yogurt.
Red Bull
The first energy drink.
Fresh Express
The first packaged salad.
The Visual Hammer
Our philosophy is simple, “Never settle for just a verbal approach.” Rather, try to find the right combination of a visual hammer and a verbal nail.
KFC’s Colonel Sanders
Coca-Cola’s contour bottle
Tropicana’s straw in an orange
The Verbal Battlecry
Every brand needs one more thing, to convert an ordinary slogan into a memorable battlecry. There are 5 techniques you could use: Rhyme, alliteration, repetition, reversals & double-entendre.
Ace is the place with the helpful hardware man.
Melts in your mouth, not in your hands.
The ultimate driving machine.
PR, not advertising.
A mistake companies normally make is to try to put a new idea into prospects’ minds with advertising. Advertising doesn’t have the credibility to do that. Rather, a company should use public relations, or PR to establish the position. PR first, advertising second is what we recommend in our book, The Fall of Advertising & the Rise of PR. But PR is just one of the ways to execute a new strategy.
Starbucks
Tesla
