Brand Positioning, Marty McFly, and UberEats

Brand Positioning, Marty McFly, and Uber Eats

When it comes to blockbuster movie hero(ines), you're nothing without your nemesis. Batman has the Joker. Hans Solo has Darth Vader. Wonder Woman has Cheetah.

In category building, you're also nothing without your nemesis. Much has been made of the fact that if you don't have a competitor, you don't have a category. That's true. However, your nemesis may not be your competitor. Stay with me.

Although in the pop culture examples above, the nemesis is a person, there are many other examples where that's not the case. After all, Marty McFly's "nemesis" was his ego—he couldn't stand being called 'chicken'. Garfield's nemesis was gluttony—he couldn't resist a steaming plate of lasagna (same.) In the movie Memento, it's the protaganist Leonard Shelby's faulty memory that he's fighting with all his might.

Now let's look at a business example. Uber Eats is a business that is trying to build a category—custom food delivery. From the sounds of it, they've been pretty successful. But you know what would make them even more successful? Correctly identifying their nemesis, which this article does not. Forbes says Uber Eats's competitors like GrubHub, Postmates and Seamless are it's nemesis. That's what most people would assume.

But is it? I’d argue that Uber Eats's real competitor is shame. Young, urban professionals, feel ashamed of ordering Uber Eats all the time. I know my fingers fly to minimize my Uber Reciepts the second they pop up in my email, lest my coworker's know what a lazy, non-cooking colleague they have. I'm the first to discreetly shove the brown bags out of the way with my foot when my mother-in-law walks through the door. I've heard the lecture too many times. The grocery store is a five minute drive! Just pop a chicken breast in the oven.

Now, to be clear, I am definitely not just going to pop a chicken breast in the oven. I assure you of that. But what I am going to do is urge you to think about this example, and then go re-visit your own nemesis. When I do this as a category building or branding exercise with companies, we go in a room with a giant whiteboard and I urge them to throw out every single suggestion they can think of, no matter how off-the-wall. There are no bad ideas. Is your nemesis your competitor? Is it time? It is complacency/lack of urgency? Is it your own internal culture? Is it your price point? Is it market maturity? Is it the weather? Is it lasagna?

The possibilities are endless when you really get going. Now, a common pitfall here is when the executives I work with will want to choose "all of the above." You can't do that. Just like Hans Solo only has one Darth Vader, you can only have one nemesis also. Or you can have multiple nemesis (nemeses? nemesii?) but you need to very clearly tier them in order of importance, like the monsters at the end of SuperMario. You can't have 3 Darth Vaders.

Maybe you will end up with the exact same nemesis as when you started. Maybe you'll find someone or something totally different. Either way, it's worth revisiting pre-conceived notions to make sure you're really positioned strategically.

If you are reading this and would like a personal consultation on identifying your own category nemesis, I love helping people with that. Just reach out to me on LinkedIn, where I will most likely be reading my messages while dumpster dive eating Phad Thai from a restaurant five minutes away. Sorry, Elaine!