Positioning is a kind of marketing strategies which can make a brand occupy a distinct position in customers’ mind. In order to attract more customers or get one more customer segment, businesses may choose repositioning. Blackberry is one of examples.

As a corporate-workhorse devices, Blackberry is know for its security and reliability. However, it became no longer competitive in a consumer market with the fast developing technology. Nowadays, customers do not want an affordable corporate mobile phone anymore, they want a popular and high-technic one like iPhone. However, when Blackberry position in a mass market, it diluted its value and lost its elite image. As a result, it cannot compete against mass market mobile phone brands and also loss its own customer segment.

In fact, repositioning is a high-risky strategy. It’s a common sense that companies are quite difficult to change a consumer’s impression once it is formed. Moreover, firms which has been the first to claim a unique position in the mind of customers are difficult to be substituted by other competitors. In this case, Blackberry’s repositioning not only fail to change customers’ opinions, but also cannot turn the tables on leaders of mass market. Therefore, managers should think seriously before repositioning.

 

 

Reference:

http://marketingstall.blogspot.ca/2011/05/blackberry-boys-repositioning.html