Market Category

A market category is a frame of reference that helps customers understand your product and its value. It's a "box" that you put your product in, so that customers can easily compare it to other, similar products.

Declaring a market category for your product triggers a powerful set of assumptions in the customer's mind about:

Your competitors: Who you are competing with.
Your features: What features your product is expected to have.
Your pricing: How much your product is likely to cost.

Choosing the right market category is a critical positioning decision.

A good category choice can work in your favor by setting the right expectations and making your unique value more obvious.
A poor category choice can work against you by creating confusion and forcing you to spend time and energy battling incorrect assumptions.

For example, a product positioned as "email for lawyers" that doesn't have a calendar will likely be seen as a flawed email product. Repositioning it as "team collaboration software" could make its file-sharing features more valuable and avoid the negative assumptions associated with the "email" category.

Your market category should be chosen deliberately to put your product's strengths in the best possible context.

Related Concepts: