Positioning for Growth – How to Make Complex Products Obviously Awesome We operate in markets that are insanely crowded, and struggle to reach customers that are overwhelmed with choices. Positioning is more important than ever yet most companies fail to strategically choose a market position for their products. In this talk April will show you how to assess your own positioning and what to do if it’s weak. She will walk you through a process for positioning around your strengths and how to strategically choose a market context that makes those strengths obvious to customers. Lastly she will show a series of examples of startups that unlocked rapid revenue growth through a strategic shift in positioning.

1. OBVIOUSLY AWESOME:
POSITIONING FOR GROWTH
April Dunford @aprildunford aprildunford.com

2. WHAT POSITIONING IS NOT
A TAG
LINE
MESSAGING
BRANDVISIONPOINT OF
VIEW
GTM
STRATEGY
“MARKETING”

3. MARKETING
+
SALES
POSITIONING

4. POSITIONING: A DEFINITION
POSITIONING defines how our
product is THE BEST IN THE
WORLD at providing SOMETHING
that a well-defined set of
CUSTOMERS cares a LOT about

5. POSITIONING ANWERS
FUNDAMENTAL QUESTIONS:
WHAT IS THIS?
WHY SHOULD I
CARE?

6. @aprildunford
POSITIONING IS LIKE
CONTEXT SETTING FOR PRODUCTS

7. @aprildunford

8. @aprildunford

9. @aprildunford

10. @aprildunford

11. A SHIFT IN
POSITIONING CAN
COMPLETELY
TRANSFORM
THE WAY WE SEE
A PRODUCT

12. Customers will use what they KNOW
to make sense of what they DON’T

13. Market
Categories
Trends
What is this?
Why should I
care?
Why now?

14. Market Categories help Customers FOCUS

15. Customers Use What They Know about the
Market to Understand Solutions

16. Market
Competitor
Price Features
Target
Customer
@aprildunford

17. Email
for
Lawyers
Outlook
Gmail
Cheap or
Free
Inbox,
Spam,
Calendar
Lawyers
@aprildunford

18. Team
Collab.
for
Lawyers
Slack-
ish
$$
File
sharing
++
Lawyers
@aprildunford

19. Position DELIBERATELY
HOW DO WE DO POSITIONING?
Follow a PROCESS2
1

20. 1: We need to position products
DELIBERATELY

21. What if I told you…your DATABASE
is not a DATABASE

22. 2: Follow a Positioning Process….

23. CRAP YOU LEARN IN MARKETING CLASS
THE TRADITIONAL POSITIONING STATEMENT
FOR ____(target market)____
___(our offering)___ IS A ___(market category)___
WHICH PROVIDES ___(benefit)___
UNLIKE ___(competitor)___

24. COMPONENTS OF POSITIONING
Positioning
Alternatives
Unique
Attributes
ValueCust.
Segments
Market
Category
@aprildunford

25. THE POSITIONING PROCESS
@aprildunford

26. I TOOK NOTES FOR YOU
@aprildunford

27. HOW A NICHE PLAY BECAME A UNICORN

28. Market
Categories
Trends
What is this?
Why should I
care?
Why now?

29. We confuse
“trends”
with
“markets”

30. CRM
Database
Network
AIMachine
Learning
AR/VR
BlockchainAccounting
Software
Group
Chat
Security
Systems Cloud
Market Categories:
Things you buy
Trends: Apply to
Markets

31. Buyers don’t
want to be
left BEHIND

32. Trends
Market
Context
Your
Solution
SPICY!

33. Trends
Market
Context
Your
Solution
@aprildunford

35. Trends
Market
Context
Your
Solution
@aprildunford

38. Trends
Market
Context
Your
Solution
@aprildunford

39. @aprildunford

40. @aprildunford

41. @aprildunford

42. Trends
Market
Context
Your
Solution
@aprildunford

43. Position DELIBERATELY
HOW DO WE DO POSITIONING?
Follow a PROCESS2
1
Layer on a TREND (carefully)3

44. THANKS!!
AprilDunford.com
April@AprilDunford.com
@aprildunford