# Jm Literature Positioning > Use when positioning a Journal of Marketing (JM) manuscript in the literature — joining a substantive marketing conversation and defending against the "new-context replication" rejection. Positions the paper; it does not build the mechanism (jm-theory-development) or write the contribution statement (jm-contribution-framing). - Skill: `thedixitjain/jm-literature-positioning` (Agent Skill) - Install (CLI): `npx skillmds add thedixitjain/jm-literature-positioning` - Raw SKILL.md: https://api.skillmd.com/api/skills/thedixitjain/jm-literature-positioning/raw - Safety review: pending - Works with: Claude Code, Claude.ai, OpenAI Codex - Category: Marketing & Growth - Author: thedixitjain (https://skillmd.com/u/thedixitjain) - Updated: 2026-09-08 - Page: https://skillmd.com/skills/thedixitjain/jm-literature-positioning --- # Literature Positioning (jm-literature-positioning) ## When to trigger - The intro reads as "no one has studied X in setting Y" (gap-spotting) - A reviewer says the work "applies existing findings to a new context" - You are unsure which substantive conversation your paper belongs to - The cited literature is a methods reading list rather than a substantive one ## JM's positioning bar: a substantive conversation, not a gap JM's stated exclusion is sharp: papers that "merely replicate existing theory or findings or apply an existing set of findings to a new context" are rejected as not offering sufficiently new insight. That makes the classic "gap in the literature" move insufficient at JM. A gap is not a contribution; a **substantively important question whose answer changes what the field and practitioners believe** is. Position the paper as **joining and advancing a real marketing conversation** — about a market, customer, channel, brand, or policy problem — and show what new, consequential understanding you add. ## How to position - **Name the conversation** in substantive terms (e.g., advertising effectiveness, pricing fairness, customer-base dynamics, brand-purpose backlash, marketing-finance value), not by method. - **State the prevailing understanding** and where it is incomplete or wrong for a consequential class of real situations. - **Defend novelty against "new context"**: articulate what is *theoretically and substantively* different — a new mechanism, a reversal, a previously invisible boundary condition, a managerially decisive magnitude — not merely a new industry/country/platform. - **Cite the substantive canon** of the conversation (the works practitioners and scholars treat as load-bearing), plus directly adjacent JM/marketing work, so the editor can route the paper to the right Coeditor and reviewers. - **Bridge to relevance**: tie the conversation to a decision managers, policy makers, or society face — JM's dual mandate runs through the front end, not just the discussion. ## The "new-context" defense (write it explicitly) For each potential reviewer objection "we already know this," prepare one sentence: *What about the answer is new, surprising, or decision-changing beyond what prior work already told us?* If you cannot write that sentence, the paper is a new-context replication and needs a sharper question (return to `jm-topic-selection`). ## Before / after: rewriting a gap-spotting front end *Before (gap-spotting; invites a desk reject):* "Although influencer endorsements have been studied extensively, no research has examined them in live-stream commerce. We fill this gap." *After (conversation-joining, JM register):* "The prevailing view in the advertising-effectiveness conversation is that endorser credibility transfers to the brand. We show that in live selling this transfer reverses once viewers watch other buyers hesitate in real time — a boundary condition that flips the optimal influencer-tier decision for e-commerce category managers." The rewrite names the conversation, states the prevailing understanding, supplies a reversal rather than a gap, and lands on a decision. Run every intro paragraph through this before/after test until the "no one has studied" sentence disappears. ## What the desk reader scans for Within the first two pages, the handling Coeditor is judging whether the paper advances marketing thought or recycles it. Anticipate these implicit screens: - Is the question substantively important to marketing — would a brand, channel, retail, or policy audience recognize the stakes without coaching? - Does the positioning promise something we did not know *about marketing*, rather than about one setting? - Are the load-bearing citations substantive marketing works, so the paper routes to the right reviewer pool? - Is the managerial or societal payoff visible before the method ever appears? ## Checklist - [ ] The substantive conversation is named (not a method label) - [ ] Prevailing understanding stated and its limit pinpointed - [ ] Explicit "new context" defense written for the likely objection - [ ] Substantive canon + adjacent JM/marketing work cited (routing-aware) - [ ] Managerial/policy/societal stakes tied into the positioning - [ ] No "first to study X in Y" sentence stands as the contribution ## Anti-patterns - **Gap-spotting**: "Prior work has not examined X in context Y." - **Method-defined positioning**: framing the contribution by estimator or dataset novelty. - **Citation dump**: an undifferentiated wall of references with no conversation. - **Context-as-contribution**: treating a new setting as inherently novel. - **Relevance deferred**: leaving all managerial stakes to the discussion section. ## Output format ``` 【Conversation joined】[substantive, not method] 【Prevailing understanding & its limit】[...] 【New-context defense】new/surprising/decision-changing because [...] 【Canon + adjacent JM work cited】[...] 【Managerial/policy/societal stakes】[...] 【Next step】jm-methods ``` --- **Source:** [`brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills`](https://github.com/brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills) → `Journal-of-Marketing-Skills/skills/jm-literature-positioning/SKILL.md`