Positioning Messaging

positioning-messaging

Built on Dunford's Obviously Awesome framework. Delivers sharp, defensible positioning through a 6-phase discovery and stress-test process.

Onboarding

Run this block once at the start of every new session. No output until complete. One question at a time. This is the Settings screen — not discovery.

Step 1 — Check brain:

Does /foundation/brain.md exist?
  YES → Load silently. Note ICP, alternatives, market context, voice guide, energy state. Proceed.
  NO  → Surface once: "No brain found. You can still run this skill, but output will be less precise. Run product-marketing-context first for sharper results. Continuing."

If Section 5 (Market Context) or Section 4 (Voice & Tone) is missing or thin, note it silently — don't block, but flag once: "Section 5/4 is thin — running market-context / brand-voice first would sharpen this output, but continuing without it."

Step 2 — Select mode:

Ask: "What are you trying to accomplish today?"

Present options (let user pick one — no typing required):

• [BUILD] — New positioning from scratch
• [AUDIT] — Review and score existing messaging
• [FLETCH] — Internal positioning deck (6 slides)
• [SALES-ENABLEMENT] — Persona cards + competitive playbook
• [HOMEPAGE] — Production-ready hero, pillars, and CTAs

Step 3 — Confirm persona focus:

Ask: "Which persona are we positioning for today?"

• If a buyer-personas session ran recently and named a primary persona: surface it — "Based on your last committee map: [primary persona]. Use this?"
• Else if brain has ICP: surface it — "Based on your brain: [ICP]. Is this correct?"
• If neither: ask for title, company type, and triggering situation

Step 4 — Confirm alternatives:

Ask: "What are buyers comparing you against?"

• Minimum 3 required (direct, status quo, do-nothing)
• If brain has alternatives: surface and confirm

Step 5 — Surface any attached images:

Parse all attached images before reading user text. Extract claims, flags, and implied category. Report as: "Your current materials say: [findings]"

After Steps 1–5: state the session setup back to the user in one paragraph. Await confirmation. Then proceed to Phase 1.

Trigger

• When: Positioning, messaging, value prop, sales copy, competitive messaging, homepage copy, messaging audit, or any request involving how a product should be described to buyers

• Not for: Product specification → use prd. Building the ICP itself — demographics, behaviors, JTBD, needs — before positioning work → ideal-customer-profile, run first if Section 2 is still firmographic-only. Mapping the buying committee or building persona cards → buyer-personas, run first for a real primary-persona pick instead of guessing. The "why now" narrative → market-context, run first if Section 5 is thin. How the brand should sound → brand-voice, run first if Section 4 is thin.

• Example prompts:

  • "Build positioning for [product]"
  • "Our messaging sounds like everyone else"
  • "Help me position against [competitor]"
  • "Write our homepage headline and pillars"
  • "Audit this messaging for coherence"
  • "We can't explain what we do to sales"
  • "Is this positioning working?"

Inputs

• Args: Product/market context, target persona (required), alternatives (3+ minimum, must include status quo + do-nothing), customer evidence or win/loss signals

• Defaults: If no persona named, surface from brain or ask. If fewer than 3 alternatives, block and ask before proceeding.

• Context keys:

  • /foundation/brain.md — preferred. Sections 1 (product), 2 (ICP), 3 (alternatives), 4 (voice) if available

Pre-flight

• Load /foundation/brain.md if it exists. Extract Section 1 (Product Context), Section 2 (ICP), and Section 3 (Alternatives & Positioning) silently.

• If /context/meta-patterns.md exists in the user's workspace: if a pattern has actually fired 2+ times in prior positioning runs logged there, surface it now. If it doesn't exist, skip this step silently.

• If brain exists but Section 3 (Alternatives) is empty or marked 🔴 Placeholder: block and surface: `"⚠️ Your alternatives map is incomplete. Complete Section 3 (Alternatives & Positioning) of your brain via product-marketing-context

• If fewer than 3 alternatives provided by user and not found in brain: block intake and ask for status quo + do-nothing before proceeding. Hard stop.

• If no brain found: surface once, non-blocking. Continue.

Steps

All modes run all 6 phases unless noted. Shortcuts produce weak output.

Phase 1: Discovery

Run as a conversation. One question at a time. Never generate on the first message.

Hard floor — all four required before Phase 2:

• Product: what it does today (not roadmap)
• Buyer: one primary (title, company type, triggering situation)
• Alternatives: 3+ including status quo and do-nothing
• Outcome: single most important buyer result in one sentence

Ideal additions: T1 customer quotes · win/loss transcripts · sales objections · win reasons · pricing model · company stage

Evidence tier on input:

• Verbatim quotes, win/loss transcripts, NPS verbatims → T1 (anchor a pillar)
• Usage data, churn rates, win rates, A/B results → T2 (support a pillar claim)
• Product descriptions, PMM assertions, founder hypotheses → T3 (must carry [T3 — NEEDS VALIDATION]; cannot headline a pillar)

Exit: Summarise all four hard-floor items back to user. Await confirmation.

Phase 2A: Market Energy Check

Identify primary segment energy state before mapping competitors.

Confirm with user. Primary positioning serves one state only. Multiple states require separate tracks — never mix in primary messaging.

Phase 2B: Competitive Mapping

Map all five alternative types honestly:

1. Direct competitors (same category)
2. Adjacent competitors (overlapping use case)
3. Status quo (spreadsheets, legacy tools, manual process)
4. Build in-house
5. Do nothing

For each: what it does well / what it fails / what the buyer must believe to choose it.

Find the gap — intersection of: buyer cares deeply + product does well today + no alternative addresses it.

Exit — cannot proceed without completing this sentence:

"For buyers who need [outcome], alternatives fail because [gap], and we address this with [specific capability today]."

If you cannot complete it: the product has a positioning problem messaging cannot fix. Stop and surface this to the user.

Phase 2C: Options-First

Generate 3–4 distinct positioning bets before committing to one direction.

Each bet: the claim · target segment + energy state · primary risk · what it forces you to stop saying.

Present to user. Await selection. Do not proceed to Phase 3 without a chosen direction.

Phase 3: Positioning Development

Follow the Dunford sequence:

1. Competitive alternatives (from Phase 2B)
2. Unique attributes — specific only ("3-click onboarding" not "better UX")
3. Value translation — "So what?" × 3 levels; Level 3 belongs in messaging
4. Who cares most — narrow to trigger-event segment, not demographic
5. Market category — frame that makes strengths obvious, not odd
6. Positioning statement × 3 versions:

   "For [segment] who [situation], [product] is the [category] that [differentiator], unlike [alternative] which [limitation]."

Pick sharpest version. Exit: Statement cannot be said honestly by any named competitor. If it can, rewrite.

Phase 4: Messaging Hierarchy

Build top-down. Layer 3 claims must trace to Layer 1. Cannot trace → remove.

Layer 1 — Strategic Narrative (150–250 words)

Old world → Shift → New world → Your role. Product appears after the problem is fully established.

Layer 2 — Core Positioning

Tagline 5–8 words · One-liner 15–25 · Elevator pitch 50–75 · Boilerplate 75–100

Layer 3 — Key Message Pillars (exactly 3–4, MECE)

Each: headline claim + 2–3 sentence explanation + 2–3 proof points

Layer 4 — Persona Cards (1–3 max)

Each: pain in their language · promise tied to their metric · 3 proof points · one objection pre-handled verbatim · stage-appropriate CTA

Exit: All layers complete. Persona CTAs match actual sales motion.

Phase 5: Differentiation Stress-Test

4-question test per differentiator. YES or NO only:

1. TRUE? — Provable with evidence a skeptical buyer accepts
2. RELEVANT? — Buyer cares enough to switch or pay more
3. UNIQUE? — 2+ competitors cannot honestly claim the same
4. SUSTAINABLE? — Still true in 12–18 months

Scoring (no exceptions):

• 4/4 → Layer 3 pillar headline
• 3/4 → supporting proof point only
• ≤ 2/4 → removed entirely

Phase 6: Output Packaging

Self-Verification Gate — binary pass/fail, 7 checks. Re-enter named phase on any failure. Do not deliver with a caveat instead of a fix.

Before delivering, state: "Self-verification passed. [N]/7 checks clear."

Mode outputs:

BUILD — All 4 layers + stress-test table + approved/forbidden language + channel usage guide + positioning traps rejected + validation plan

AUDIT — 5-dimension score (specificity / differentiation / coherence / proof / buyer language) + P1/P2/P3 rewrite queue + before/after for P1 items

FLETCH — 6 slides: segment + trigger · alternatives map · gap · positioning statement · pillars + proof · homepage wireframe with copy

SALES-ENABLEMENT — Persona cards (pain / promise / proof / objection / CTA) + competitive playbook with "never say" column

HOMEPAGE — Hero headline <8 words · subhead <20 words · 3 pillar headlines

• 1-sentence descriptions · primary + secondary CTA · 2 proof strip options. No placeholders.

All modes include: Approved language · Forbidden language + reason · Version + review date · Next steps

Phase 7: Learning Close

End every completed session by appending one row to /context/skill-sessions.md (create the file with a header row if it doesn't exist yet):

skill: positioning-messaging
session_date: [YYYY-MM-DD]
pattern: [one falsifiable statement about what happened this session, or "none"]
source: [surprised / wrong / missing / n.v.t.]

Write this row directly — do not ask the user for permission. This is an observational log entry, separate from the mode output above, which still requires the user's go-ahead on where to save it. If nothing notable happened this session, still write the row with pattern: none.

Outputs

• Files written: /context/skill-sessions.md — one appended row per session, per Phase 7. Mode output itself is delivered in chat only; if the user wants that saved anywhere, ask where — this skill doesn't write mode output to any file on its own.
• Chat output format: Mode-specific (BUILD / AUDIT / FLETCH / SALES-ENABLEMENT / HOMEPAGE). All modes include approved/forbidden language list, version, review date, and next steps
• External side effects: n.v.t.
• Next skill: After BUILD or FLETCH mode delivers output, check next-skill-map.md for "After positioning-messaging (BUILD or FLETCH mode)" and surface that prompt. AUDIT mode does not trigger a next-skill suggestion — it's a checkpoint, not a chain step.

Verification

• Positioning statement cannot be said by any named competitor
• All pillar headlines scored 4/4 on stress-test (true, relevant, unique, sustainable)
• Self-verification gate passed all 7 checks before delivery
• Mode-specific output matches expected format
• Evidence tier respected: T1/T2 claims anchor content; T3 claims flagged
• Onboarding confirmed mode, persona, and alternatives before Phase 1 started

Do Not Use For

• ideal-customer-profile — when the task is building the ICP itself (demographics, behaviors, JTBD, needs) rather than producing positioning output. Run that skill first, then this one.

• product-marketing-context — when the task is the full brain build from zero, or mapping competitive alternatives (Section 3) rather than producing positioning output

• buyer-personas — when the task is mapping the buying committee or building persona cards, not producing the positioning statement or messaging hierarchy itself. Run that skill first, then this one.

• market-context — when the task is building the "why now" narrative itself, not the positioning statement it feeds. Run that skill first if Section 5 is thin, then this one.

• brand-voice — when the task is building the voice and tone guide itself, not applying it to a positioning statement. Run that skill first if Section 4 is thin, then this one.

• value-prop-statements (pmm-growth) — when the task is fast, segment- or channel-specific copy variants of a positioning that's already set, not building or revising the canonical positioning statement itself. Send the user there once this skill's output is confirmed.

• (no dedicated skill yet) — sales competitive response cards; handle within this skill's SALES-ENABLEMENT mode instead

• experiment-doc — when testing messaging assumptions; this skill builds messaging, not validates it experimentally

Commands

/build [product name or context]

Run full BUILD mode: Onboarding → all 6 phases → 4-layer messaging document.

/audit [existing copy or landing page]

Run AUDIT mode: score existing messaging + rewrite queue.

/fletch [product name]

Run FLETCH mode: 6-slide internal deck + homepage wireframe.

/sales [product name]

Run SALES-ENABLEMENT mode: persona cards + competitive playbook.

/homepage [product name]

Run HOMEPAGE mode: production-ready hero + subhead + pillars + CTA.

/settings

Re-run the Onboarding block. Use to change mode, persona, or alternatives mid-session without losing prior work.

Operating Rules

1. Run Onboarding before everything. Mode, persona, and alternatives must be confirmed before Phase 1 starts. No exceptions.

2. Load brain first. Context changes which energy state (M1/M2/M3) applies.

3. Parse attached images before asking discovery questions. Every explicit claim and visual signal tells you something.

4. No positioning without 3+ alternatives — status quo mandatory. If you can't name it, you don't understand the choice.

5. Never skip phases. All 6 phases run for every mode. Shortcuts produce weak output.

6. Primary persona must be ranked. Ask: who has this problem worst, right now?

7. Stress-test all pillars before delivery. 4/4 or remove. No exceptions.

8. Layer 3 claims must trace to Layer 1. Cannot trace = doesn't belong.

9. Evidence tier is binding. T3 claims must be flagged. Don't hide assumptions.

10. /settings resets Onboarding only. Prior session work is preserved.

Quality Gate

Runs after output generation, before delivery. Surface failures — do not deliver incomplete output.