Do not confuse positioning with product strategy. Strategy is the multi-year plan for what to build. Positioning is a tactical exercise to win against current competitors with the product you have right now. Positioning evolves as your strategy progresses.
Don't dilute positioning to appeal to the entire buying committee. Focus on the value proposition for your internal champion. For other stakeholders like IT or security, your job is not to provide value but to handle their objections and prove you meet their requirements.
Teams get paralyzed trying to find a truly "unique" feature. A more practical approach is to identify "distinct" capabilities. A feature is distinct if the competitor in a specific deal doesn't have it, even if another competitor elsewhere does. This subtle language shift unlocks progress.
Companies assume different verticals require entirely different positioning. But if they're buying the same product, the underlying value is often the same (e.g., ensuring uptime for both retail and utilities). Differentiate with industry-specific examples, not a completely separate core positioning.
For companies with multiple products, the initial step isn't the positioning exercise itself. It's deciding what to position. This choice—company, lead "land" product, or full suite—depends on your sales motion (e.g., land-and-expand vs. platform sell) and must be made upfront.
Don't rely on LLMs for core positioning. They are trained on public data and can't know who your sales team actually competes against in deals or the nuanced "status quo" alternatives customers use. This internal, non-public context is the essential starting point for effective positioning.
Even a best-selling framework evolves. After working with hundreds more companies, Dunford identified new patterns and "sticky situations," refined confusing concepts, and added specific advice (e.g., for multi-product companies) that were missing from the first edition.
Don't roll out new positioning on your website first. Craft a sales pitch and have reps test it in live calls. This provides immediate, high-fidelity feedback on what resonates, what's confusing, and which comparisons customers make—insights you can't get from web analytics.