Turn a client's business goal into the marketing decisions every channel, advertisement and post must obey: who we serve, what we stand for in their mind, what we offer, at what price, through which routes, and which two or three messages carry the load.
Use When
- A campaign, advertising plan, content strategy or website brief needs an agreed segment, target, positioning statement and value proposition first.
- A client says "everyone is our audience", lists ten benefits, or wants to rebrand without a stated reason.
- Nobody has chosen which segments to serve or where the brand should sit against competitors and rivals.
- Creative keeps failing because the brief carries no single message or no reason to believe.
- A retainer review must diagnose whether weak results come from positioning, offer, price or channel, or the 4Ps (product, price, place, promotion) fight the position.
Do Not Use When
biz-dev-positioningfor the agency's own positioning statement or credentials, including an individual practitioner's practice.traction-channel-bullseyefor deciding which acquisition channels to test once positioning is agreed.brand-strategy-and-distinctive-assetsfor mental and physical availability, distinctive assets and standing out as an online shop (e-commerce differentiation).- Stop when customer evidence or decision authority is absent and cannot be obtained; return the intake gap. Full business-plan documents go to business-plan-skills.
Required Inputs
| Artefact | Source/provider | Required? | If absent |
|---|---|---|---|
| Business objective, offer list, price points and margins | Client owner or finance lead | Yes | Stop; request it or return a qualified intake list |
| Customer evidence (sales records, CRM export, enquiries, reviews, interviews) | Client systems or supplied research | Yes for final positioning | Label every segment provisional and plan a customer-insight sprint |
| Competitor list and their visible claims | Client, search and ad-library review | Conditional | Mark the competitive frame not assessed and avoid superiority claims |
| Market, legal or category facts | Digital Research Engine or source register | Conditional | Phrase as a check; never state as fact |
Workflow
- Confirm the decision, market, period and approver; stop if nobody can approve positioning.
- Build the customer picture: segment on needs and behaviour first, then demographics and location; record sample, method and date for each insight.
- Qualify each segment (reachable, large enough, willing to pay, incremental sales exceed tailoring cost) and choose one primary and at most one secondary target; write the excluded groups and why.
- Map the choice set the buyer really considers, including substitutes and "do nothing"; chart the attributes competitors already own.
- Select two or three value themes where customer importance, available proof and distinctiveness are all high; move every other benefit to supporting copy or FAQ.
- Write the positioning statement and run the seven tests and four failure-mode checks; withhold release if the reason to believe is not a verifiable fact.
- Set the marketing-mix decisions (product/offer, price, place, promotion, and for services people, process, physical evidence) and a Five F's message line; correct any mix element that contradicts the position, then rerun the tests.
- Hand over a one-page foundation sheet to the brief, channel, advertising and content skills, with open assumptions and the re-test date.
Outputs
| Artefact | Consumer | Acceptance condition |
|---|---|---|
| Segment and target decision table | Strategist, media planner, client approver | Each segment has evidence source/date, qualification result and a keep/drop decision |
| Positioning statement with proof | Creative, copy and advertising teams | Passes the seven tests; reason to believe is checkable; no failure mode present |
| Value-theme and message sheet (2–3 themes) | creative-brief-and-big-idea, ad-copy-and-hook-lab, content skills |
Every theme has proof and is distinct from the top competitors |
| Marketing-mix decision record | Client owner and business-plan-skills if a plan follows | Every mix element supports the position or is flagged for change |
Evidence Produced
| Evidence | Format | Acceptance condition |
|---|---|---|
| Customer-insight register | Table: insight, source, sample, date, confidence | Every segment and theme traces to evidence or a labelled assumption |
| Positioning test record | Completed checklist | Seven tests and four failure modes recorded with evidence |
Capability and Permission Boundaries
Read and search only; analysis is read-only. Publishing, spend, live account changes, outreach and personal-data processing need explicit, action-specific client authority. Surveys, interviews and list matching also need a lawful basis before they start.
Degraded Mode
Without customer evidence, return the narrowest qualified result and mark the affected checks not assessed. A provisional foundation sheet with hypotheses, a customer-insight sprint plan (interviews, short survey, CRM analysis) and a re-test date can still be delivered; never present a hypothesis segment as validated.
Decision Rules
| Condition | Action | Failure or risk avoided |
|---|---|---|
| Client names "everyone" as the audience | Segment with data; choose one primary target and write exclusions | Diluted message that reaches no one well |
| More than three benefits proposed as headline messages | Score importance × proof × distinctiveness; keep the top 2–3 | Communicating everything so nothing is remembered |
| Reason to believe is an adjective | Replace with a certification, process, partnership or datum, or withhold | Unprovable claims and regulatory risk |
| Position sits close to a stronger competitor | Reframe to an ownable attribute or niche | Double or confused positioning |
| Client wants a rebrand "because we are tired of it" | Ask for the business reason; pause until one exists | Expensive repositioning with no gain |
| Price contradicts the chosen position | Fix price, offer or position before creative | Mixed signals that break trust |
Quality Standards
- Segments are defined by needs and behaviour, then described by demographics and location (district, town or estate for East Africa).
- One label per brand: the statement says one thing clearly.
- Every claim is provable; comparative claims pass
docs/quality-gates/legal-market-release-gate.md. - British English, plain words, no superlative without evidence; apply
anti-ai-slop.
Anti-Patterns
- Treating demographics as the target ("women 25–40"). Fix: add the motive, behaviour and current alternative.
- Writing positioning from the founder's view of the company. Fix: start from customer evidence and the choice set.
- Listing ten benefits. Fix: keep two or three value themes; move the rest to FAQ.
- Borrowing a competitor's owned attribute. Fix: map owned attributes first and choose white space the brand can prove.
- Setting price after the creative is done. Fix: decide the mix before briefing creative.
- Calling a hypothesis a finding. Fix: label it, date it and schedule the test.
References
- Positioning and marketing-mix toolkit: read when writing the statement, running the tests, mapping perceptions or setting the mix.
- Customer insight and value-theme method: read when building the evidence base or choosing message themes.
- Foundation sheet and worked example: read when filling the one-page hand-off sheet or showing the method on a labelled scenario.
- Agency positioning: read when the position is the agency's own (neighbour route).
- Traction channel bullseye: read when positioning is agreed and channel choice is next.
- Creative brief and big idea: read when handing the message sheet to creative.
- Legal and market release gate: read before releasing comparative or superiority claims.
- Anti-AI slop production gate: read when drafting the statement and message sheet.
Acknowledgement: Shared by Peter Bamuhigire, techguypeter.com.