jacob-balslev Concept of the skill
What it is: Positioning is April Dunford's method for choosing the market context that makes a product's differentiated value obvious to the customers most likely to care.
Mental model: Start with what customers would use if the product disappeared. From those alternatives, isolate what the product uniquely has, translate those attributes into customer value, identify who cares intensely, choose the category frame that makes the value understandable, add a trend only if it clarifies urgency, then capture the position for go-to-market teams.
Why it exists: Agents often produce positioning as a catchy statement, broad persona, feature list, or generic category claim. This skill forces the harder sequence: customer-relative alternatives first, value mapping second, target/customer and category choices after evidence exists.
What it is NOT: It is not company strategy, blue-ocean market creation, industry attractiveness analysis, moat classification, segmentation-only marketing, brand identity, final copywriting, or an OKR system.
Adjacent concepts: competitive alternatives, differentiated attributes, value themes, best-fit customers, market category, trend context, sales narrative, product marketing, segmentation, go-to-market alignment.
One-line analogy: Positioning puts the product on the shelf where the right buyers understand what it is, what to compare it with, and why it matters.
Common misconception: Positioning is not how the company wants to describe itself; it is the context that helps customers understand why this product is uniquely valuable for their situation.
Positioning
Coverage
This skill teaches agents to:
- Separate positioning from messaging, brand, category hype, and strategic planning.
- Start from customers' real competitive alternatives, including status quo and manual workarounds.
- Identify unique attributes only after the alternatives are clear.
- Translate attributes into value themes that matter to buyers.
- Determine which customer segments care most about those value themes.
- Choose a market category that makes the value obvious and sets useful buyer expectations.
- Add trend context only when it strengthens urgency and does not distort the position.
- Capture the position so sales, marketing, product, and customer success can reuse it consistently.
Philosophy of the skill
Positioning is useful because buyers understand new products by comparison. A product can be excellent and still fail if it is framed against the wrong alternatives, aimed at customers who do not care about its strongest value, or placed in a category that hides its advantage.
The method should make an agent less impressed by clever wording and more disciplined about context. The goal is not a prettier positioning statement. The goal is a sharper causal chain from customer alternatives to differentiated attributes to value to best-fit buyers to market category to reusable go-to-market proof.
Workflow
1. Define the positioning situation
Start by naming the product and the buying context.
Product:
Buyer or user:
Buying trigger:
Current category assumption:
Current positioning claim:
Observed confusion:
Decision this positioning must support:
If the request asks for final copy before the position is clear, produce the position first and label any copy as downstream draft language.
2. Identify true competitive alternatives
List what the customer would actually do without the product.
| Alternative | Evidence buyers use it | Strength for buyer | Weakness or frustration | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Status quo | ||||
| Manual workaround | ||||
| Direct competitor | ||||
| Adjacent tool or service | ||||
| Internal build |
Do not limit alternatives to companies the vendor fears. Include spreadsheets, meetings, agencies, internal scripts, doing nothing, or a hacked-together stack when those are the real substitutes.
3. List unique attributes relative to those alternatives
Attributes are features, capabilities, assets, data, processes, integrations, expertise, or delivery advantages the product has and alternatives lack.
| Unique attribute | Alternative it beats | Proof | Risk if buyer does not care |
|---|---|---|---|
Reject adjectives without evidence. "AI-powered", "easy", "modern", "premium", and "integrated" are weak unless tied to a concrete attribute the alternative lacks.
4. Map attributes to value themes
Convert each attribute into customer value.
| Attribute | Functional value | Economic value | Emotional or risk value | Evidence |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Use value language buyers can recognize: saves time, reduces risk, prevents rework, increases conversion, enables compliance, improves confidence, shortens onboarding, reduces dependency, preserves margin, or removes coordination cost.
If an attribute creates no buyer value, remove it from the positioning core.
5. Find who cares most
Do not choose the target segment before the value is clear. Choose the customers for whom the value is urgent, expensive, frequent, visible, or politically important.
| Segment | Pain intensity | Value fit | Buying trigger | Proof available | Positioning fit |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| high / medium / low | high / medium / low |
Strong positioning often narrows the target. A broad target is acceptable only when multiple segments share the same high-intensity value driver.
6. Choose the market category
The category sets expectations before the buyer hears the details.
| Candidate category | Useful assumptions it creates | Bad assumptions it creates | Comparison set | Pricing expectation | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Existing category | |||||
| Narrow subcategory | |||||
| Adjacent category | |||||
| New category |
Prefer the category that makes the differentiated value easiest to understand. A new category is a high-cost choice; use it only when existing frames consistently mislead buyers or hide the product's value.
7. Add trend context only if it helps
A trend can explain why the value matters now, but it cannot rescue weak positioning.
Good trend context:
- links to a buyer problem that is already changing,
- strengthens urgency,
- makes the category more credible,
- does not turn the product into a generic trend-chaser.
Weak trend context:
- starts with hype before buyer alternatives are clear,
- makes every competitor sound similar,
- overpromises inevitability,
- distracts from concrete value.
8. Capture the position
Use this as the reusable source of truth.
For: [best-fit customers]
Who currently: [competitive alternatives or status quo]
Our product is a: [market category]
That delivers: [primary value themes]
Because unlike: [alternatives]
We have: [unique attributes and proof]
Now matters because: [optional trend or buying trigger]
This is not final public copy. It is an internal positioning decision that should inform sales narrative, website structure, demo flow, proof points, onboarding, pricing comparison, and roadmap focus.
9. Translate into go-to-market implications
Positioning should change the work downstream.
| Surface | What the position should change |
|---|---|
| Sales discovery | Ask about alternatives, triggers, and value intensity |
| Sales deck | Lead with category and value before feature detail |
| Website | Make the comparison set and value obvious above the fold |
| Demo | Show proof of unique attributes tied to value |
| Product roadmap | Prioritize features that reinforce the chosen value themes |
| Customer success | Onboard toward the value promised by the position |
10. Pressure-test the position
Run these checks before presenting the position as usable.
| Check | Failure signal | Repair |
|---|---|---|
| Alternative realism | Alternatives are just direct competitors from the vendor's point of view | Interview buyers or inspect deals to identify real substitutes |
| Attribute uniqueness | The claimed differentiators are table stakes | Compare against alternatives feature by feature |
| Value clarity | Attributes do not translate into buyer outcomes | Rewrite as value themes or remove them |
| Segment intensity | Target customers care only mildly | Narrow to buyers with urgent, costly pain |
| Category fit | The category hides the advantage or sets wrong expectations | Test adjacent categories and subcategories |
| Trend discipline | Trend language is hype or broad inevitability | Remove it or tie it to a concrete buying trigger |
| Operational reuse | Sales, marketing, and product cannot use the output | Capture decisions in a shared positioning canvas |
Output Template
## Positioning Recommendation
### Competitive Alternatives
- [Alternative]: [why customers choose it today]
### Unique Attributes
- [Attribute]: [proof and alternative it beats]
### Value Themes
- [Theme]: [buyer outcome and evidence]
### Best-Fit Customers
- [Segment]: [why value intensity is high]
### Market Category
- Recommended category:
- Why this frame helps:
- Category risks:
### Trend Context
- Use / do not use:
- Reason:
### Captured Position
For [customers] who [current alternative/problem], [product] is a [category] that [value]. Unlike [alternatives], it [unique attributes/proof].
### Next Evidence Needed
- [Evidence that would strengthen or falsify the position]
Anti-Patterns
- Starting with a tagline, hero headline, or brand promise before competitive alternatives are clear.
- Treating all competitors as direct competitors while ignoring spreadsheets, agencies, manual work, or doing nothing.
- Naming features as differentiators without proving why buyers value them.
- Picking a target segment because it is large, not because it cares most.
- Choosing a broad market category because it sounds prestigious.
- Creating a new category to avoid competition rather than to clarify value.
- Adding trend language that makes the product sound generic.
- Treating the captured position as permanent instead of evidence-sensitive.
Boundaries
| Need | Use | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Choose the product-market frame and category context | positioning |
Owns competitive alternatives, value themes, target fit, and category framing |
| Build a full strategic choice cascade | playing-to-win |
Owns aspiration, where to play, how to win, capabilities, and systems |
| Create new demand through value innovation | blue-ocean-strategy |
Owns strategy canvas, ERRC grid, noncustomers, and new value curves |
| Diagnose industry profit pressure | porters-five-forces |
Owns rivalry, buyer/supplier power, entrants, and substitutes |
| Classify durable moat source | seven-powers |
Owns benefit plus barrier mechanisms |
| Write final interface or marketing copy | microcopy or writing skills |
Positioning supplies source truth; copy skills craft wording |
Verification
- Competitive alternatives are buyer-real, not company-internal.
- Unique attributes are concrete and compared against alternatives.
- Each core attribute maps to a buyer-recognizable value theme.
- Target segments are chosen because they care most about the value.
- The market category makes the product easier to understand and buy.
- New-category creation is justified only if existing categories mislead.
- Trend context is optional and tied to urgency, not hype.
- The captured position is reusable by sales, marketing, product, and customer success.
- The response does not present positioning as a tagline, brand exercise, full strategy cascade, Blue Ocean analysis, Five Forces analysis, or moat claim.
Do NOT Use When
Use another skill when the task falls outside the declared scope, matches an anti_examples prompt, or is owned by a more specific related skill.