Being No. 1 in a Market or Category… What’s the (big) deal?
“We Must attain the No. 1 position!” ….. “It is time for our brand to become No. 1!”
Why?
What is it about being No. 1? Surely it is more than pride? After all, businesses are not run on the basis of pride.
Is it mere rhetoric, to ruse the competitive spirit of personnel or is there something more?
The Leader Perspective
My first thoughts on this, years ago were that – being a leader in a market or category enables one to “drive” the category.
In the sense, you can increase usage or consumption by existing users, create more customers and be generally a step ahead of competition.
The Financial Perspective
On further thought, it appeared that the No. 1 position would enable a company (or brand) to achieve more with less input. Financially, this would lead to superior profit. Hence the drive to increase market share within a category or sub-category
The Customer Perspective
Over time, I realized that the there is a huge advantage of being No.1 or No.2 – it is to do with the users or customers of a brand. The Customer remembers few brands per category only. For making a choice – there are fewer still. Possibly just 2 or 3 in most categories.
It is because of this that being the No. 1 or No.2 in a market really helps! It does not matter if it is B2B or B2C – choices are made, candidates considered – and the likely hood to be selected is far greater when you are “top of mind”. The ability to drive the market and financial gain are likely to result from this.
Each aspect mentioned is important, but equally important is to understand why we actually strive for the Market Leadership position.
Are these the reasons? Or is there more to this? Should becoming a leader in a market be the focus for marketers – or is it better to concentrate on other aspirations?
