Perceptual Mapping | Perceptual Map – Marketing Management

Perceptual mapping or Perceptual Map in Marketing Management is a graphical technique used in marketing and market research to visually represent the perceptions of customers or potential customers regarding a set of competing products, brands, or other entities. The goal is to understand how consumers perceive and position different offerings relative to each other based on specific attributes.

Perceptual Mapping – Marketing Management

For example, compare the viewpoints of a young adult analyzing a car’s safety and a veteran insurance salesman doing the same. Based on commercials, young adults might perceive that Ford makes the safest car. At the same time, the insurance salesman knows through experience and data analysis that Volvo cars get in accidents and boast better passenger safety.

This example helps demonstrate the key difference between perceptual maps and positioning maps. Perceptual maps only measure the customer’s perception of reality and might not reflect the truth.

Perceptual data mapping is still very helpful to businesses, and it helps create informed decisions about how customers view the general positioning of different brands. Depending on the data collected, they can also accommodate different scopes of comparison, helping businesses compare specific attributes or advantages. 

This knowledge is critical to businesses because it helps create strong marketing campaigns based on the feedback you’re receiving from your customer’s journey.

Perceptual Mapping or Perceptual Map in Marketing Management

Here are the key components and concepts related to perceptual mapping or Map – Marketing Management

1. Attributes or Dimensions:
   • Attributes are the characteristics or features that customers consider when evaluating products or brands. These could be tangible features such as price, quality, or size, or intangible factors like prestige or innovation.
2. Data Collection:
   • Data for perceptual mapping is typically collected through surveys or interviews where respondents rate or rank different products or brands based on selected attributes.
3. Mapping Techniques:
   • The data collected is then used to create a visual representation, often a two-dimensional map. The most common types of perceptual maps include:
     • Two-dimensional Maps: Products or brands are positioned on a graph with two axes representing different attributes.
     • Multi-dimensional Maps: For more complex analyses, multiple attributes are considered, and the map might have more than two dimensions.
4. Distance and Proximity:
   • Proximity on the map indicates how closely related or similar products are perceived to be. Products or brands placed close together are seen as similar, while those farther apart are considered more dissimilar.
5. Market Positioning:
   • Perceptual mapping helps businesses identify their current market position and potential areas for improvement. It can also be used to identify market gaps and opportunities for differentiation.
6. Targeting and Strategy:
   • Companies can use perceptual maps to identify target segments and develop marketing strategies. For example, if a brand is positioned closely to a competitor but offers a unique feature, the company may emphasize that feature in its marketing to differentiate itself.
7. Dynamic Analysis:
   • Perceptual maps can be used over time to track changes in consumer perceptions and preferences. This is valuable for assessing the effectiveness of marketing strategies or product modifications.

8. Limitations:

   • Perceptual mapping relies on customer perceptions, which can be subjective. Additionally, the technique may not capture all relevant factors influencing purchasing decisions.

Types of perceptual map

There are two types of perceptual maps: the standard and the multi-dimensional. Their use depends on the situation. Let’s take a look at each one.

1. Standard perceptual map

   The standard perceptual map has two axes and uses visuals to show the most important facts. In other words, a standard perceptual map shows the most important results of a study quickly and with as little trouble as possible.

2. Multi-dimensional scaled perceptual map

   A multidimensional scaled perceptual map template is used to show overall market research. Statistical tools like the Excel template are used to give more information. Plus, it needs a professional who knows how to map and interpret properly to show important information. This type of perceptual map is used for study on a large scale.

How to build a perceptual map

To make an accurate perceptual map, you need to know how people see your brand or product and the brands or products of competitors. So, you’ll need to do thorough target market research before building the map.

Follow our steps plan to get the best use out of your accurate perceptual map.

1. Pick parameters

   When building a perceptual map, the first step is deciding what parameters you want to compare and focus on. These variables will be on your map and placed on the X and Y axes. These variables will usually be determinant attributes.

   Determinant attributes are features of a product/service that ultimately convince the buyer to choose that option. They might not be the most important feature, but they are important to the customer.

   In our car example, some determinant attributes might be comfort, price, top speed, interior design, or safety rating.

   Usually, depending on these parameters, the scale is from low to high on each axis, creating different general relations in each quadrant. The placement in the quadrant is important, but the placement relative to the other variables is equally as important. This way, you can analyze your factor’s individual performance and their performance relative to their competition.

2. Define competitors

   Once you determine which parameters you want to use, it’s time to distribute surveys, gather customer feedback, and identify competitors. The second part of making a perceptual map is figuring out who your rivals are. The more rivals you add, the better, so try to include at least 10 of them. A big sample size will give you the best idea of where you stand about your competitors. 

   The best way to do this is to look at what your competitors are doing. A competitive analysis will show you who your main and indirect rivals are, as well as your strengths and weaknesses in comparison to them. 

3. Place competitors

   The next step of building your perceptual map is placing your competitor factors in the matrix and seeing how they compare to one another. Online whiteboards make creating and analyzing a perceptual map incredibly easy while allowing you to manipulate it in whichever way you need.

   You can start making your map once you know your business’s parameters and competitors. Draw your map and put the competitors where you think they should be based on what you learned from your competitive analysis. 

   For example, if you’re trying to figure out where to place your new fashion brand, add ten or more competitors in the fashion business before placing yourself. 

   By putting your company last, you can look at your competitors first and better understand where you fit. Returning to our car example, the perceptual map might look something like this.

4. Share map

   Finally, it’s time to build and share your map when you have all the required elements. The most common diagram for a perceptual map is a simple XY Matrix, with the vertical axis representing one variable and the horizontal axis representing the other. Lastly, show your marketing partners and shareholders your perceptual map to find out if you’re positioning your brand or product correctly. What can you do differently? 

   Some ideas that might come out of these discussions are: 

• Your business plan is too similar to those of your competitors, and you need to set your brand apart from them. 
• The way people think about your brand isn’t right, so you need to change your ads. 
• You can take advantage of a gap in your business. 
• You could gain from a campaign to change how people think about your business. 
• You are exactly where you should be. Congrats!

Perceptual map applications

As we said earlier, perceptual maps are great tools for comparing any two variables in a customer’s eyes, but they have special importance in some fields.

• Product management

  Perceptual maps can help product managers who are looking to identify some empty market share that they can capitalize on with a new feature or product. Identify gaps and analyze them in the map. They can see what spaces are unfilled and can also look to see how poor-performing features can be improved.

  Not only this, but it can help product managers compare different features of their competition and analyze which are most and least effective in the eyes of the customer. This helps prioritize future changes based on what is used the most.

• Marketing teams

  Marketing is the field in perceptual maps that are most applicable because it’s a place where customer perception is the gold standard of performance. It matters less which product is actually better — what drives a purchase is which product your customer perceives to be better.

  Survey data is important to perceptual mapping because you get direct feedback on what campaigns perform best, what customers want, and how you can meet these needs in the future. Not only can perceptual mapping analyze the customer viewpoint, but it’s also a gauge for the competitive landscape in terms of customer engagement. A perceptual map template helps look into how your customer engages online and with what specific information is, another thing critical for the marketing team. Perceptual Mapping Marketing Management

• Sales teams

  Perceptual maps are also important to sales teams because they can help narrow down the importance of different variables to the customer. When conducting sales calls and developing sales strategies, discovering what’s important to the user is critical, and conducting research through perceptual mapping is a great way to gain this insight.

  When you complete your perceptual map, you might find that functionality trends highly, or maybe price, or even unique features. Depending on this research, you can conduct more effective sales effective calls and emphasize the elements that convince the user to buy your product/service. These are just some of the applications of perceptual maps, and if you aren’t convinced, here are the biggest advantages to using them. Perceptual Mapping Map Marketing Management

Why use a perceptual map?

A customer’s opinion of your business can be analyzed with the help of a perceptual map. They are essential tools for marketing people. Product managers use perceptual maps to find and talk with product managers.

With the help of it, you can figure out what and how people feel about your product. As such, it is a vital tool for marketing and product teams. Product and marketing involved people can benefit from perceptual maps in the following ways:

1. Identify market gaps for new products

   This show brands against two or more parameters based on customer perception. Product managers can uncover gaps between consumer wants and existing goods if they evaluate them attentively. From the customer’s perspective, the holes in the perceptual map indicate unmet market needs. This helps begin your study on how a new product might meet those demands.

2. Launch effective marketing campaigns

   Businesses can also use perceptual maps to look at how well a recent marketing effort or change to the marketing mix worked. In fact, a perceptual map is one of the best ways to make a business plan.

3. Enhance brand identity

   A perceptual map helps businesses learn what customers think about their products, which is important for figuring out how to meet their wants by adding new features. This information helps to improve the use of features, customer satisfaction, and company identity.

4. Understand market segment

   Lastly, perceptual maps help you learn more about the different market segments, look at how competitors position themselves over time, figure out how customers’ needs change, and track new goods introduced to the target market segment over time.

Perceptual map advantages

Perceptual maps have many advantages; as we’ve previously seen, they apply to many scenarios. These are the biggest advantages of building a perceptual map.

• Gain accurate insights into the opinions of your customer base.
• Understand why customers choose the options related to your determinant attributes.
• Track the perception of the competition and understand how people view them.
• Gain an accurate understanding of how your brand is perceived in the ecosystem.
• Visually identify market share and possible gaps to capitalize on.
• Create new marketing strategies based on the relative success of other campaigns.
• Track ecosystem evolution as time moves forward and different brands reposition themselves.

Perceptual Map – Marketing Management

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