A positioning typology of consumers’ perceptions of the benefits offered by successful service brands

Kim and Mauborgne [2000. Knowing a winning business idea when you see one. Harvard Business Review September–October, 129–138] (hereafter K&M (2000)) have suggested that there are just six drivers of ‘utility’ or consumer benefit that products and services are capable of providing: productivity; simplicity; convenience; risk reduction; fun and enhanced image; environmental friendliness. If this is true, the K&M (2000) model offers a complete positioning typology of consumers’ perceptions of all possible benefit types offered by products and services. This article tests the validity of the K&M (2000) model in a services context using exploratory qualitative analysis of a number of service case studies given awards by the UK Institute of Practitioners in Advertising (IPA) Advertising Effectiveness Awards (1998 and 2000). These cases provide detailed material including rich descriptions of consumer perceptions of benefits derived, with supporting evidence from consumer surveys, focus groups and interviews. The validity of the K&M (2000) model was assessed by investigating the extent to which it was or was not able to capture all of the benefits offered by the various consumer service providers.The six-lever K&M (2000) typology was found to be broadly supported, although the definitions of two of the levers were re-defined. The ‘risk’ lever was expanded to include elements of functional and social and psychological risk. The sixth lever ‘fun and image’ was re-named ‘hedonic benefit’ and expanded to encompass emotional benefits derived from consumers’ sensory interpretation of data, including sub-components of image, emotional benefit and sensual or sensuous benefit.