Positioning strategies in business markets

Abstract

Tests the relevance of positioning within the domain of business marketing through the application of a new typology of positioning strategies. The proposed typology is tested in a well‐established market sector which is characterised by commodity products and consequently the research deals with positioning as applied to actual companies rather than specific brands. Our results offer strong support as to the stability of the proposed typology and the relevance of the concept of positioning in business markets. The authors suggest that although business positioning is predominantly determined by hard criteria (e.g. product quality) and relationship building factors (e.g. personal contact), other considerations such as company structures (i.e. geographical coverage), breadth of offerings and degree of integration (i.e. location in the distribution chain), also play an important part. Finally, we offer support to the claim that, level of familiarity with a specific company is a contributing factor to perceptions of the pursued positioning strategies.