Every now and then it pays to pick up a classic and see how marketing philosophy has evolved. Positioning (Ries & Trout) was such a classic. A lot of what it says holds, so toss it onto your reading list, but be warned: much of it is painfully out-of-touch.

Then again, in the pre-Internet days (Page 7: “…Philips has just introduced a 3.5 inch disk that holds 600 megabytes of data”!) businesses and consumers were out of touch. You made a product, and pushed it. There was no “permission marketing“, no online instant feedback, no e-pinions (or blogs!).

But one thing self-proclaimed “gurus” like to do is make blanket statements without data to back them. (more…)