obviously-awesome

# Product Positioning Framework

April Dunford's "Obviously Awesome" methodology: a structured, repeatable process for defining how your product is the best in the world at delivering something a well-defined set of customers cares a lot about. Positioning determines what customers compare you to, which features they notice, and ultimately whether they buy.

## Core Principle

**Positioning is not messaging. Positioning is context.**

Positioning defines the context within which customers evaluate your product -- what category they place you in, what alternatives they compare you against, and how they judge your value. Customers always evaluate relative to alternatives; there is no absolute product perception -- a product that seems expensive in one context seems cheap in another. Deliberately choose the context that makes your unique strengths obvious: get it right and messaging, sales, and pricing become dramatically easier; get it wrong and no amount of clever copywriting will save you.

## Scoring

**Goal: 10/10.** Rate any product's positioning 0-10 using the bands below, and always state the current score with the specific improvements needed to reach 10/10.

| Score | Description |
|-------|-------------|
| 0-2 | No clear positioning; customers can't explain what the product is or who it's for |
| 3-4 | Vague: category unclear, differentiation weak, target customer is "everyone" |
| 5-6 | Partial: some components clear, others missing; team members describe the product differently |
| 7-8 | Strong: all five components defined, team aligned, customers generally understand the value |
| 9-10 | Exceptional: every component reinforces the others; customers immediately get what it is, why it's different, and why they should care |

## The 10 Positioning Components

| Component | Description | Example |
|-----------|-------------|---------|
| Competitive Alternatives | What customers would use if you didn't exist | Spreadsheets, consultants, doing nothing |
| Unique Attributes | Capabilities only your product has | Real-time collaboration on financial models |
| Value Themes | Benefits customers get from unique attributes | Save 10 hours/week on financial reporting |
| Best-Fit Customers | Who cares most about your value | Mid-market CFOs managing 3+ business units |
| Market Category | The market you describe yourself as part of | FP&A software |
| Relevant Trends | Dynamics that make positioning resonate now | Remote finance teams need real-time collaboration |
| Positioning Statement | Internal one-line summary for team alignment | "For mid-market CFOs, the FP&A platform built for real-time collaboration" |
| Sales Narrative | Positioning as a compelling sales story | Problem -> old way -> new way -> your solution -> proof |
| Messaging | External language derived from positioning | "Financial planning that keeps up with your business" |
| Content Strategy | What content positioning tells you to create | Thought leadership on collaborative finance |

## The 5-Step Positioning Process

### Step 1: Identify Your Competitive Alternatives

**Core concept:** Understand what your best customers would do if your product vanished tomorrow -- not just direct competitors, but any way they solve the problem today: manual processes, spreadsheets, hiring someone, or doing nothing.

**Why it works:** Customers always evaluate products relative to alternatives, so "differentiated" only has meaning against the real alternatives in your customer's mind.

**Key insights:**
- Ask existing happy customers, not prospects -- they can tell you what they actually switched from
- The most common alternative is often not a product -- it's a spreadsheet, a manual process, or the status quo
- "Do nothing" is your biggest competitor in many markets
- Group similar alternatives ("general-purpose spreadsheets" rather than Excel, Sheets, Numbers)
- Different customer segments may have different alternatives

**Product applications:**

| Context | Application | Example |
|---------|-------------|---------|
| New product launch | Interview early adopters on what they used before | "70% used spreadsheets, 20% a generic PM tool, 10% hired contractors" |
| Repositioning | Survey churned and retained customers | Retained customers compared you to consultants, not software |
| Competitive analysis | Map alternatives by segment | Enterprise compares to Salesforce; SMBs to spreadsheets |

**Copy patterns:**
- "Unlike [competitive alternative], [product] does [unique thing]"
- "Stop using [painful alternative] for [job]"
- "You've outgrown [alternative]. Here's what comes next."

**Ethical boundary:** Base alternatives on actual customer research, never assumptions or wishful thinking.

See: [Competitive Alternatives Analysis](references/competitive-alternatives.md) for interview scripts, clustering, and "do nothing" analysis.

### Step 2: Identify Your Unique Attributes

**Core concept:** List every attribute -- feature, capability, company characteristic, or approach -- that you have and your competitive alternatives don't. They must be both unique AND true.

**Why it works:** Unique attributes are the raw material of differentiation: if it isn't unique it can't differentiate you, and if it isn't true you'll lose trust.

**Key insights:**
- Look beyond features: architecture, business model, team expertise, integrations, community
- "Better" is not unique -- "10% faster" doesn't qualify; "a fundamentally different algorithm enabling real-time processing" might
- Every attribute must survive the "only we" test: "Only we [attribute]"
- Attributes are facts about your product; benefits are what customers get from them -- don't confuse the two
- Cluster related attributes into groups (they become value themes in Step 3)

**Product applications:**

| Context | Application | Example |
|---------|-------------|---------|
| Feature launch | Check if it creates a unique attribute | "The only PM tool with built-in time-zone-aware s