Brand Positioning for
B2B Tech Firms:

Brand positioning for B2B tech firms has never been more critical. The world has changed, and how consumers choose – and stick with – brands has evolved. As buyers, we expect more from brands, we don’t chase down the information we need to make a purchasing decision, and we want to know that a brand’s values align with our own. There is a long list of customer expectations for the brands they support. We want and need to trust the companies that empower our businesses, but brands have to earn that trust. Misuse it? Many businesses struggle to get it back (if they can get it back at all).

Since the pandemic began, 75 percent of business respondents in a recent Adobe study shared that they have had a harder time building and maintaining trust with their customers. A study from Deloitte found that the highest-grossing brands (those with 10% or higher annual revenue growth) are comprehensively addressing the customer experience. 

At the heart of this is brand positioning. 

These are just a few of the critical business trends that are impacted by your brand positioning. The overall results of solid brand positioning on your B2B tech firm can be profound. Research shows that brands that are presented consistently see an average revenue increase of 10% to 20%. 

Your brand positioning serves as a navigator of sorts for your B2B tech firm. It guides your public relations, marketing and overall communications strategies. It provides a clear path for your engineers, your customer service team and your leadership. 

In this comprehensive guide, you get access to the advice of the Red Fan Communications team of brand positioning experts who will walk you (and your B2B tech firm) through the essentials of brand positioning. Specifically, this guide will examine the following: 

I. What is brand positioning?
II. Why is brand positioning critical for B2B tech companies?
III. What does a brand positioning statement entail?
IV. How to take control of your brand positioning.

You will find many different definitions of “brand positioning” from a simple Google search. Here is one of our favorites: 

Brand positioning is the space your brand and products hold in the market and in the minds of your customers. 

There are two connected-yet-slightly different vehicles for your B2B tech firm to occupy that “space” in the market and minds of your customers:

1. Your brand positioning statement
2. The day-to-day experience your brand delivers to customers 

1. Your brand positioning statement

Your brand positioning statement is a clear and concise statement that will influence your internal stakeholders in their day-to-day, as well as your external communications (including marketing and PR) strategies. It is a literal statement that is comprised of four main components:

1. What your brand does
2. Who you target
3. Why you do what you do
4. Why your brand is great (aka your differentiators)

We examine those four main components of a brand positioning statement for your B2B tech firm more closely in this blog post. 

While your main brand positioning statement will help guide your communications strategies and “steer the ship” for your internal stakeholders, many B2B tech firms drill down to craft brand positioning strategies in some or all of these core areas of their business:

• Customer service positioning, which is especially important for B2B tech firms, where other than price, service is often a primary differentiator from the competition. Clearly identifying and communicating your customer service positioning can be a powerful component of your overarching PR/communications strategy. 

• Price-based positioning is also important for B2B tech firms for obvious reasons (particularly enterprise tech).

• Differentiation strategy hones in specifically on those differentiators mentioned above in your primary brand positioning statement, defining a clear plan6y for communicating those differentiators that resonates with your ICP.

2. The day-to-day experience your brand delivers to its customers (and prospective customers)

If we go back to the definition of brand positioning, we see that it is the space your brand and products hold in the market and the minds of your customers. 

It is also essential to consider the non-communications pieces of the brand positioning puzzle. Part of that space is going to be filled with messaging. That’s where PR/communications/marketing comes in (and us specifically at Red Fan Communications). 

The experience your company delivers – from the first “touch” with your company – makes up a substantial percentage of your brand positioning. While it may seem a bit scary or out of your control, it is just as much under your control as your brand positioning statement and PR strategy. 

There are some PR and communications firms that will craft sharp-sounding brand positioning statements that get attention but ultimately do not deliver results. Oftentimes, that’s because the brand positioning statement doesn’t align with the actual brand experience. As we mentioned, that experience makes up a significant portion of your brand positioning. A strong brand positioning statement doesn’t just clearly state what you do, who you are, why you do what you do, and what makes you different. It authentically conveys what it’s like to work with you. 

To help illustrate this, let’s walk through a theoretical interaction a prospective customer may have with your B2B tech brand.

• Prospective Customer (PC) sees an online ad for one of your webinars and watches it. They find value in the webinar and have positive sentiment toward your brand (this contributes significantly to your brand positioning with that prospective customer, and your brand positioning statement helps to guide the theme and content within your webinar).
• One of your BDRs reaches out to Prospective Customer to ask if they have any follow-up questions about the material taught in your webinar, and offers a demo of your product.
• Prospective Customer is intrigued during the demo and proceeds through your sales process. Your sales representative is patient, answers all questions, and provides all necessary information to PC’s internal stakeholders to ensure they have everything they need to make a decision.
• PC becomes Customer, and is moved to your onboarding/customer success team to make sure they are set up and ready to take advantage of your product/platform to its fullest. 

This example represents a small number of touchpoints and brand positioning reinforcements that may present themselves to your prospective customers and customers. At every touchpoint, your B2B tech firm has the opportunity to reinforce your brand positioning statement, or confuse (and even turn off) customers due to inconsistencies. 

When your B2B tech firm works with a strategic PR partner like Red Fan Communications to develop your brand positioning statement and subsequent positioning strategies, we will work with you to ensure alignment between your messaging and customer experience, and maximize your PR/communications investment. 

Earlier, we stated that brand positioning is especially critical for B2B tech firms.  Companies must adapt to meet the constantly evolving demands of consumers. Customer expectations and needs will constantly fluctuate; however, there are some brand positioning “why pillars” that are especially helpful for understanding the importance of brand positioning in B2B tech. Here is a breakdown of those key pillars:

Differentiates you from your competition

It is especially important to differentiate in B2B tech, where commoditization runs rampant, and many buyers rely on word of mouth to make informed buying decisions. When crafted and disseminated strategically internally or with an external PR and communications partner, a clear and concise brand positioning statement illuminates your differentiators to make a profound impact on prospective buyers. 

Your brand positioning statement will inform and inspire all marketing, PR and other communications campaigns. Therefore, effectively identifying and defining those differentiators in your brand positioning statement is an essential fundamental of your initial and continued success. 

Informs every part of your brand

Your brand positioning statement will inform the language of your marketing, PR- and communications efforts. It will impact the colors and imagery used to represent your brand. Strong designers rely on insights into your brand positioning, messaging and customers to create the most compelling and effective work. Your brand positioning is at the heart of it. 

Impacts both internal and external

buy-in

While your brand positioning statement will influence all of your marketing, PR and communications efforts, it also has a major impact on internal communications. A clear brand positioning statement is integral for your sales team to communicate with prospective customers effectively. However, the influence of your brand positioning statement expands to include every member of your team. Many successful B2B SaaS companies include their brand positioning statement as part of their onboarding or training programs because it is essential to have buy-in from every member of the team from Day 1. Every decision, interaction and ultimately, workday will be impacted by your brand positioning statement.

Helps with retention

To build on the previous statement, clearly communicating your brand positioning and getting buy-in from your employees helps avoid confusion or contradiction of your brand positioning, which can contribute to employee turnover issues. This is especially important in B2B SaaS, where competition for talent is incredibly fierce (and is expected to be for the foreseeable future). Going beyond employee retention,alignment on brand positioning at every level of your company can also help with customer retention. Churn is a significant issue across B2B tech, and delivering a consistent, exceptional customer experience helps reduce churn. A customer service team that not only understands your brand positioning, is more likely to deliver those exceptional experiences.

It helps you justify your pricing

There are times when you (particularly your sales team) will need to justify pricing for your B2B tech company. Even the most successful companies and strong products need to do this from time to time! Your brand positioning statement will help you identify differentiators while comparing yourself to your competition. Clear identification of what makes you not only different but better, with specific comparisons to the competition, will help you (whether in your web copy or sales conversations) clarify your pricing. When used strategically, it can even prevent objections in the sales process by outlining this important factor upfront.

It is critical to buyer enablement

There is a deliberate choice of words here – rather than focusing on sales enablement, we put the focus on buyer enablement. Vetting prospective B2B SaaS partners takes a lot of time, effort, and resources. B2B buyers do not want to go through multiple calls and demos with you AND your competition. A strong brand positioning statement helps you easily build (even win) trust early in the sales process (or even before outreach, when used effectively in your PR and website copy), ultimately impacting your number of closed deals.

It helps you avoid commoditization

We touched upon this earlier, but commoditization can be a death knell for B2B SaaS companies. The difference between being viewed as a B2B vendor and a B2B partner can seem simple, yet has a potentially massive impact on your business. The clarity in your differentiators and messaging, beginning with your brand positioning statement, allows you to very effectively sell on value rather than price.

Now that we have taken a bird’s eye look at brand positioning and have identified why it is critical to your B2B SaaS company, it is time to dig deeper into a brand positioning strategy specifically.

This section will walk through the primary components of a brand positioning strategy, what goes into its creation, and what to do after you have created the brand positioning strategy for your B2B SaaS company.

There are some brands whose positioning is synonymous with their names. Think brands like Kleenex, Vaseline, or Band-Aid. You instantly know the names of these brands because they have essentially taken over the category.

While this type of brand positioning may seem out of reach for the average company, it is a distinct possibility in B2B SaaS. Of course, many factors come into play, but gaining ownership of your category, industry or vertical is absolutely possible with the proper brand positioning strategy development and implementation.

As a refresher, here are the four core components of your brand positioning that we outlined in Section I: 

1. What your brand does
2. Who you target
3. Why you do what you do
4. Why your brand is great (aka your differentiators)

The four components of a brand positioning statement 

Let’s look a bit more closely at those four components and what should go into their creation:

1. What your brand does

This may seem obvious, but it can be difficult for those within an organization to clearly and concisely communicate what their product or service does for its customers. 

Effective marketing, PR and even internal communications need to get to the point quickly. Every communication (internal or external) will be informed and influenced by your brand positioning, which means that it is essential to have this part of your statement refined and powerful.

Going a step further into this component, one or two lines about the literal “what” of your product or service is just the beginning. You should also highlight the top one or two pain points that your product or service alleviates (or the problem solved) for your customers. 

Note: These are not your differentiators. Your differentiators help you stand out from your competitors. The pain points you address help you quickly communicate why your product matters, and it is included as a part of “what your company does.”

2. Who is your target audience

Whether it is separate or in your first element, prospective customers or other prospective stakeholders must know quickly whether your product, service, or company is the right fit. This could be part of your brand positioning and built into your one or two sentences describing what you do.

3. Why you do what you do

Your company’s “why” helps prospective customers, stakeholders and even prospective employees establish an emotional connection with your brand. Research from Sprout Social found that nearly two-thirds of consumers want brands to connect with them. And insights from McKinsey also help to illustrate why a connection to your brand “why” is also important for employee retention. 

What goes into your “why”? It could be why your company was founded in the first place. It could also entail why you continue to exist as a company. Is there a “greater good” for your company? 

Note: Your “why” could also help to illuminate how your company helps to address your prospective customer's pain points.

4. Why your brand is great (aka, your differentiators)

Differentiators effectively communicate and define the success of your brand and your brand positioning. They create guidelines and messaging that will resonate with your prospective customers.

A company can grow without clear differentiators but that growth tends to be capped. It can be extremely costly and challenging to go back and identify those communicators later, so as an essential element smart companies invest in prioritizing this work

Many organizations think they understand their differentiators without actually understanding what makes them stand out from their competitors in the eyes of customers. Leaders can be too close to their product or service to be able to take an objective lens to their company.

Tip: It can be beneficial for a third party (such as a PR and communications partner) to conduct an audit and/or surveys of customers, employees and other stakeholders to help hone in on your differentiators. 

The impact of brand positioning strategy across your company

Before we examine some specific positioning strategies, let’s take a closer look at the parts of your business that will be impacted by brand positioning (and how):

Public relations

Your brand positioning is at the heart of your PR efforts and will  influence all PR outreach. This may include anything from news releases to media pitches and every other part of a strong integrated marketing communications plan.

Marketing

Your marketing department will rely on strong brand positioning to influence all marketing and advertising efforts. Powerful differentiators, a targeted audience and clear “what” and “why” statements will touch every social media post, Google ad, streaming commercial, and/or any piece of marketing collateral created for your B2B SaaS company. 

Sale

Your sales team will live and breathe your brand positioning while engaging with prospective customers each day. Your BDRs and account executives bring your “why” to life. They communicate clearly based on your differentiators. Reaching sales goals and solving your customers’ problems will be essential to the continued growth of your company. 

An introduction to your brand positioning should be an essential component of onboarding and training for every new sales professional joining your B2B SaaS company.

Recruiting

Your recruiters will rely on solid brand positioning to help them attract desirable candidates. The market is especially fierce for IT and engineering professionals right now, your recruiters are relying on leadership to give them every tool possible to make it easier for them to attract top talent. Strong brand positioning helps them craft better job postings/ads, better communicate what makes your company attractive in interviews, and can even help drive more candidate referrals. 

HR

Human resources is, in many ways, the heart of your company. They will similarly need to embody your brand positioning. That’s because the talent journey for your team does not end with recruiting. Ensuring the company lives up to its brand positioning can often fall to HR. Falling short in this area can lead to significant retention issues, which impact productivity and output from your team. This is a major hole for many B2B SaaS firms, as talent struggles continue to be prevalent industrywide. Strong brand positioning can help “tighten any leaks”, contributing to improved retention numbers and even employee net promoter scores.

Customer Service

It is incredibly jarring for customers when the brand positioning that helped “sell” them does not match the day-to-day experiences and interactions with your products and employees. Your Customer acquisition is costly. Bringing in a trusted brand positioning team to help you craft the right strategy can help avoid any embarrassing customer churn due to flashy messaging that doesn’t match the realities of your brand.

Similar to other areas of your business, training on your brand positioning for new customer service professionals should be an essential component of your onboarding/training program.

How to put your brand positioning strategy into action

Once you have put in the time, research and effort to prepare a powerful brand positioning statement, it is time to put that into action across your company. Here are the steps to ensure that your B2B SaaS company has a smooth and effective implementation:

Gather input

Before you broadcast your new brand positioning to the masses, you should consider testing it out with a target group of customers or prospective customers. You may need to do some outreach to gather a small focus group, or you may already have a customer advisory committee intact. However, gathering input early can help avoid any backtracking or changes once your brand positioning has been rolled out to the masses.

Develop a brand positioning guide

Your brand guide should include all visual and positioning elements of your B2B SaaS company. This will potentially include your mission statement (you may also want to revisit your values statement if there are profound changes based on your brand positioning exercise). Pantone, logos, mission statement, target audience, differentiators, brand voice/tone, even specific words you do and do not use (for example, one common word that B2B SaaS companies define is the choice of customer versus client). These may seem like minute details; however, they combine for a singular brand experience – from first touch, say a social media post from the marketing department – to ongoing interactions with customer service. Consistency and authenticity are essential. 

Integrate with training

Whether training is handled by your training & development, HR, or onboarding teams, ensure you have a clear process in place for every new employee to be taught the core components of your brand positioning.

If your B2B SaaS company is more established and you are revisiting your brand positioning (or investing in brand positioning a bit later), you will also want to devise a strategy for getting current employees on board with the positioning so that they embody your brand appropriately each day. 

Size up your competitors

It can be highly worthwhile to perform a brand positioning exercise for your top two or three competitors. Although they may have their own core messaging on their website, putting in some due diligence to contrast their messaging to their authentic experiences can help you determine where you stand in the market. It can also potentially impact your differentiators (if your research shows that a competitor’s brand positioning and brand experience aren’t in alignment). 

Now that we’ve examined the “why” and the “what” of your brand positioning, it is time to examine the importance of taking control of brand positioning for B2B SaaS companies. As we have touched upon previously, if you are not proactively defining and reinforcing your brand positioning, your employees, customers and even your competitors are defining it for you. It is, therefore, imperative that you take the reins to establish and leverage strong brand positioning. 

What does it mean to “take control” of your brand positioning

Although the notion of “taking control” may sound good in theory, it may not make total sense at this moment. Forget the notion of brandishing swords and galloping in to “take control” of your brand. The reality is far less gallant, and much more strategic. 

Initially, it is critical for you to decide who internally will be in charge of your brand positioning. Depending on the size of your team, this could be one (or more) employee in any number of roles. Here are some of the more common titles of individuals who are the go-to internal resource for brand positioning:

Brand Manager

This is the most ideal individual to take ownership of brand positioning within your B2B SaaS company. Depending on the size or age of your company; however, you may not yet have expanded your team to include a titled brand manager.

A brand manager is typically part of the marketing, PR, and/or communications team, and is the literal steward of your brand. This person is constantly researching the marketplace and your competition. A brand manager has fingers on the pulse of your company at every level, from the C-suite to (especially) customer support. 

Depending on when a brand manager is/was brought on board, another resource (internally or externally) may have prepared your brand positioning statement and brand strategy. In that instance, the brand manager would oversee its implementation and ongoing assessment/refinement. The brand manager works together with the rest of the marketing, PR, HR and communications team(s) to ensure consistency in brand messaging across all internal and external communications.

C-Suite Executive

For startups in particular, it’s common for a CEO to be the steward of your brand. After all, a company is quite often the CEO’s “baby,” and is treated extremely carefully as a result. Depending on the size of your B2B SaaS company a CMO may own- brand positioning. Although at that level, the nuances and day-to-day of brand strategy implementation are typically outside the scope of daily CMO activities. 

In other words, the C-Suite is typically way  too busy to be able to adequately oversee day-to-day brand positioning strategy and implementation activities. If your CEO (or another executive) is currently the only individual within your company that has any influence or stewardship over brand positioning, it may be time to have a talk.

Marketing and Communications Manager

It is common in many B2B SaaS companies (particularly startups) for a marcom manager to oversee all marketing, PR and communications strategy/implementation. This will often include brand positioning as well. 

If that sounds like a lot for one person, it is! 

Your marketing and communications manager may have several direct reports, supervise several contractors, a partner agency (or two), or this person may be a marketing department of one. As a result, it can be a challenge for your marcom manager to provide the time and attention specifically to brand positioning, strategy and implementation. Many marcom managers simply have too much on their plates.

 

Should you be considering an outsourced brand/PR partner

We would be remiss if we did not immediately point out our bias on this element; however, we encourage you to keep reading. The Red Fan team has been working in B2B SaaS for many years, and we have seen situations for all of the above – and then some – over the years. 

We have seen organizations struggle with brand positioning, PR and communications in general. We have seen others thrive. Lastly, we have had the honor and privilege to help define brand positioning and implement brand strategy for a host of successful businesses. 

We have seen it all. 

As a result, there are some common threads that make a compelling case for B2B SaaS Companies to partner with a PR/branding firm for brand positioning, strategy, and implementation, including:

Insider knowledge (with an outsider’s perspective)

The expertise and perspective of an experienced branding/PR partner can prove invaluable not only when defining your brand positioning, but also when building and implementing your brand strategy. It can be challenging for those closest to a company to take an objective look at not only your B2B SaaS company, but your competition as well. Your ability to accurately define the differentiators that matter to your customers (and actually differentiate you from your competition) is essential. 

Exceptional experience

There is simply no replacement for experience. When you choose to partner with an experienced B2B SaaS PR and branding firm (like Red Fan), you are gaining dozens – if not hundreds – of years of combined, relevant experience. Every situation, every challenge, every opportunity: We’ve seen them, been through them, helped companies thrive through, because, and in spite of them. That type of experience is nearly impossible to replicate. 

Cost savings

This may seem counterintuitive, but assembling an entire team of branding experts (particularly those with extensive B2B SaaS experience) is expensive. Even hiring just one brand manager with the right level of experience can set you back significantly. Many companies are surprised at how affordable it is to choose a PR and branding partner, rather than trying to assemble an entire internal team. 

Simplified processes

It can be especially challenging to work through branding exercises internally. That is often due to “too many hands in the pot,” in other words, too many people wanting to influence positioning, messaging, and strategy. A savvy and experienced partner is adept at navigating those situations effectively to ensure everyone is happy and heard, without compromising results. An internal resource; however, may feel compelled to “play politics” and may end up getting stalled or worse, having results diluted due to an inability to circumvent internal challenges. There is also the frequent challenge of having too many priorities. When there are urgent matters in front of you, it can be difficult to prioritize brand positioning and strategy (even though it influences every part of marketing, communications, and PR!). 

Get started with brand positioning for your B2B SaaS company

Now that you have a deep understanding of what your brand positioning entails, and what resources you should deploy to bring it to fruition, it is time to get started. Whether you are an early-stage startup or an established brand, the time is truly now. As we have mentioned throughout this guide, brand positioning influences every message, campaign, and component of your marketing and PR campaigns. It also influences nearly every facet of your business. 

Getting it right, and starting it right now, matters. 

Earlier in this guide, we walked through the components of your brand positioning. Now is the time to define (or refine) those components to create more compelling and impactful communications. 

Here is an outline of some of the most important steps:

Choose a branding/PR partner

Whether you are making an internal hire or are partnering with a branding and PR firm like Red Fan, you will want to make that decision before beginning (or beginning to refine) your brand positioning. It can be challenging to bring in a partner or resource midway through a project, especially one as nuanced and important as brand positioning. 

If you choose to work with a PR and branding partner, here are some factors to consider when making a decision: 

Relevant experience

We have mentioned this throughout and it bears repeating: Relevant experience matters. The Red Fan team, for example, has extensive experience getting results in B2B SaaS. We know your business, we know your competitors, and we know what it takes to succeed. There is always ramp up time when bringing in a new resource or partner. The time it would take to bring a partner or resource up to speed without extensive experience could kill your momentum. Or, moving forward without that critical experience could negatively (and significantly) impact your results. 

Communication chemistry

You need to know if the processes and communication style of any PR/branding partner or internal resource mesh with your own internal processes and communication style. It can be challenging for all parties involved to make a bad culture decision, and it can be detrimental to your branding outcomes. Any leading PR or branding firm will be vetting you in a similar fashion to ensure there is a fit. If you are choosing between multiple partners and are not feeling like prospective partners are vetting you as much as you are vetting them, it could actually be a red flag.

Prior results

Any new hire or prospective partner should have an impressive portfolio of work and results that is relevant to your vertical. Prospective PR or branding partners should have their work prominently displayed on their website, and should proactively offer to share these with you (or even introduce you to past or current clients). It may be another red flag if prospective partners fail to proactively offer those introductions or examples. 

Invest in ongoing branding implementation throughout your organization

If you have made the right choice in PR/branding partner, your partner firm will regularly work with you on strategy implementation. You will receive reports, suggestions, and frequent updates on results. In many ways, your PR and branding partner truly lets you enjoy the “fun parts” of brand positioning, letting you (and especially your marketing and communications team) focus on what they do best. 

It is important, though, not to forget the importance of brand stewardship across your organization. In particular, this comes back to brand positioning-infused training, so that your sales, customer service, and HR teams in particular live and breathe your brand. They know who you are, why you are the best, and they deliver on those promises to prospective customers and customers every day (that includes your employees). In many ways, building and fostering a culture that embraces your brand positioning is as important as the ongoing implementation of your branding partner. 

With this guide, you have the resources to begin working on your brand positioning, and to bring in the right resources to help you define, refine, and implement your brand positioning strategy. At Red Fan, we have delivered game-changing results for B2B SaaS companies for over a decade. We have the experience, passion, and commitment needed to build and deploy brand positioning and brand strategy that propels your growth. 

Contact us today to start the conversation.