Titleists: Perception Of The Leader In The Golf Industry

Brand Position is a holistic concept that embodies the perception consumers hold for an identified brand versus its competition. Recently, I have had several conversations regarding golf and how each element affects the game, so I decided to delve into the industry, and discover more about the leader in the golf ball industry, Titleist, and its competitors.

Titleist has been successful in building a brand positioning that is favorable among its target market, 24-35 year olds. Titleist has gained the perception of being the best in the golf ball game by effectively distinguishing themselves from its competitors. The brand has successfully segmented their target market and delivers the marketing mix appropriately. In the developing stages

Titlist has an understanding that consumers’ cultures have an influence on their decision process. Titleist champions this, through the use of top performing celebrity endorsers to influence amateur players. Titleist creates a quality, high performance ball that Pro Players consistently win with. Not only have they learned to appeal to the pro players, but are connecting with everyone. “The pyramid of influence, which trickles several layers down to recreational golfers, remains influential and vital to the validation of its product’s performance.” MGA Equipment Center. 2010. Titleist drives this through subliminal marketing through creative ads featuring Pro Players further drawing a connection with the amateurs or weekend golfers, highlighting their own differences, showing values they embrace that relate to the everyday consumer while all using a Titleist ball. Titlist has done a nice job with innovation and offering top quality balls at all price tiers and positioned the brand correctly in consumers’ minds through observing consumer behavior, psychographic factors and demographics that affect decision making processes in order to gain market

Three components essential to developing a clear brand definition are vision, meaning and parameters of relevance. The Titleist culture is about challenging up and supporting down. “Recognizing that the ultimate competitive advantage is an environment that utilizes and develops the creative energies of all associates, our objective will be to develop goal directed work teams empowered to anticipate and respond to changing consumer/market conditions” (Titleist, 2015). Titelist has put all the elements together and has met their goal and mantra of “we want every consumer, regardless of their skill level to think of Titleist first and foremost as the “Number one ball in golf”. Titlist has captured target market appeal through use of celebrity endorsement as well as a perception with producing balls with the best performance, and for that reason I positioned Titleist on the perceptual map in the top right