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23.09.2025
Mental Availability vs Postioning
Read Time: 3 Minutes
Hello
Byron Sharp gets credit for making marketers care about mental availability. But he’s created a new confusion: thinking availability equals positioning.
They’re not the same thing.
Mental Availability = Probability of being thought of in buying situations
Positioning = Owning a specific concept in the mind
Mental availability asks: “When someone wants coffee, do they think of us?”
Positioning asks: “What do we uniquely mean when they think of us?”
Sharp’s research shows brands grow by being easier to think of and buy. Build distinctive assets. Maximize physical availability. Refresh memory structures.
All true.
All useful.
But here’s what it misses:
McDonald’s has supreme mental availability. You think of them constantly. They dominate convenience, value, and consistency, but these are table stakes in QSR, not owned concepts. They have breadth without distinctive depth.
In-N-Out has lower mental availability (limited geography, minimal mass advertising). But they own “quality” in fast food. Less available, stronger position.
The practical difference:
Mental availability gets you considered: “What coffee shops are around here?”
Position gets you chosen: “I need the artisanal coffee place.”
Mental availability = breadth of recall
Position = depth of meaning
Why this confusion hurts brands:
Companies chase availability metrics (awareness, recall, consideration) without establishing what they fundamentally mean. They optimize for being remembered without owning anything worth remembering.
It’s like being famous for being famous.
Kardashians anyone? LOL
The relationship that actually works:
Position and availability work together, not in sequence.
Own something specific (positioning) while building mental and physical availability. They reinforce each other.
Volvo owns safety (position) and makes safety mentally available (in every ad, every design choice, and every communication).
Red Bull owns extreme energy (position) and makes it available through extreme sports, stunts like Stratos, and “gives you wings.”
The tell:
If your brand is mentally available but people can’t articulate what specific concept you own, you have an availability problem disguised as success.
High awareness + low meaning = commodity status
Sharp’s blind spot:
His research describes (what is) how big brands stay big through availability. But positioning explains (what could be) how small brands become big by owning unclaimed territory.
Availability explains Coca-Cola’s dominance.
Positioning explains Liquid Death’s rise.
The test:
Don’t ask: “Do people think of us?” (availability)
Ask: “What concept do we own?” (position)
If you can’t answer the second question with a noun, all the mental availability in the world won’t save you from commodity competition.
The synthesis:
Build availability without position = being easier to ignore
Build position without availability = being powerful but hidden
Build position with availability = category dominance
Pick the noun you’ll own, then build the memory and shelf systems that make that noun unavoidable.
Meaning and distribution, together.
Not one or the other.
Yours truly
Paul Syng
