write-a-positioning-statement

name	write-a-positioning-statement
category	write
description	Write and test a positioning statement grounded in audience evidence and credible difference. Use when a product, service, project, or program needs a clear category, value, alternative, and proof.

write-a-positioning-statement

Make a strategic choice about who this is for and why it matters. The internal statement can be plain; it is not automatically public copy.

Procedure

1. Gather the audience definition, problem evidence, product behavior, alternatives, constraints, and proof.
2. Name the specific situation and audience whose choice the positioning should influence.
3. Describe the category or frame the audience already understands.
4. State the valuable outcome in audience language, not a list of features.
5. Identify the real alternative, including manual work, delay, or doing nothing.
6. Select a difference the product can sustain and evidence.
7. Draft: For [audience in situation], [offering] is the [category] that [value], unlike [alternative], because [credible proof].
8. Challenge every phrase for ambiguity, exclusion, unsupported superiority, and competitive imitation.
9. Test comprehension and relevance with representative people without coaching them.
10. Record the approved version, proof dependencies, audiences not served, and review triggers.

Guardrails

• Do not use “best,” “only,” or outcome claims without current support.
• Avoid defining the audience only by age, title, or aspiration.
• Keep future roadmap items out of present-tense proof.
• Route regulated, comparative, financial, health, or environmental claims through authorized review.

Done

• The positioning statement names audience, situation, category, value, alternative, and proof
• Evidence verifies the chosen difference
• Representative readers can explain the intended meaning accurately
• Unsupported claims and excluded audiences are recorded