# Anti-Patterns: Brand Positioning

These approaches look like positioning but consistently fail to create differentiation or customer connection.

---

## 1. The Adjective Stuffing

**The Mistake:**
```
"We are an innovative, customer-centric, quality-focused,
cutting-edge, world-class solution provider delivering
best-in-class results through our passion for excellence."
```

**Why It's Wrong:**
- Every company claims these words
- None of it is memorable or differentiating
- Empty calories - sounds like something, says nothing
- Impossible to deliver or prove
- Customers ignore it entirely

**The Fix:**
```
Kill every adjective. What's left?

Before: "Innovative customer-centric CRM solution"
After: "CRM"

Now add ONE specific claim:
"CRM that closes deals 40% faster"
or
"CRM salespeople actually want to use"
or
"CRM with zero data entry"

One specific claim beats ten generic adjectives.
```

---

## 2. The Committee Positioning

**The Mistake:**
```
Positioning Review Meeting:

Marketing: "We need to emphasize innovation"
Sales: "Customers care about ease of use"
Product: "Our architecture is our differentiator"
CEO: "What about our heritage?"
Finance: "Include ROI messaging"

Result: "Innovative, easy-to-use platform with modern
architecture, trusted heritage, and proven ROI."
```

**Why It's Wrong:**
- Trying to please everyone pleases no one
- No prioritization = no positioning
- Internal politics override customer truth
- Diluted until meaningless
- Impossible to execute consistently

**The Fix:**
```
One person decides positioning. Period.

Input is valuable. Decision by committee is death.

Process:
1. Gather input from all stakeholders
2. Synthesize into 2-3 options
3. Test with customers
4. One decision-maker chooses
5. Everyone else commits

"Disagree and commit" beats "agree on mush"
```

---

## 3. The Feature Parade

**The Mistake:**
```
Our Platform Features:
- Real-time analytics
- AI-powered insights
- Cloud-native architecture
- Mobile-first design
- 99.9% uptime
- SOC 2 compliant
- REST API
- Single sign-on
- Custom workflows
- White-labeling

[No positioning, just a feature list]
```

**Why It's Wrong:**
- Features are not positioning
- Competitors have same features
- Customers don't know which matters
- No emotional connection
- Easily outdated as features change

**The Fix:**
```
Features support positioning; they don't create it.

Step 1: Define positioning first
"The CRM that eliminates data entry"

Step 2: Select features that PROVE the position
- AI auto-capture (supports "eliminates data entry")
- Voice notes (supports "eliminates data entry")
- Email parsing (supports "eliminates data entry")

Step 3: Cut features that don't support position
- White-labeling (irrelevant to position)
- Custom workflows (dilutes focus)

Everything supports the position or gets cut.
```

---

## 4. The Copycat Positioning

**The Mistake:**
```
Competitor: "We help teams collaborate better."
You: "We help teams collaborate better... and faster!"

Competitor: "The modern data stack."
You: "The next-generation modern data stack."

Competitor: "Where work happens."
You: "Where your best work happens."
```

**Why It's Wrong:**
- You're playing their game on their field
- "Me too, but slightly different" isn't positioning
- Reinforces their frame, not yours
- You'll always be "like them, but..."
- Never memorable on your own terms

**The Fix:**
```
Change the game, don't play theirs.

Competitor says: "We help teams collaborate better"

Wrong response: "We help teams collaborate better + more"

Right response: Change the frame entirely:
- "We help you work alone without feeling alone"
- "Collaboration is broken. We fix it."
- "The anti-meeting tool"

Find the angle they CAN'T follow you to.
Their strength becomes their prison.
```

---

## 5. The Aspiration-Reality Gap

**The Mistake:**
```
Positioning: "Delightfully simple"
Reality: 47-step onboarding, confusing UX

Positioning: "Enterprise-grade security"
Reality: Failed last security audit

Positioning: "24/7 white-glove support"
Reality: 48-hour response times

Positioning: "The premium choice"
Reality: Budget pricing, basic features
```

**Why It's Wrong:**
- Promises create expectations
- Reality destroys trust
- Word-of-mouth becomes negative
- Customers feel deceived
- Position becomes a joke internally

**The Fix:**
```
Position on truth, not aspiration.

Process:
1. List what you can actually deliver TODAY
2. Find the truth that's also differentiating
3. Make that your position
4. Use aspiration for internal roadmap, not external positioning

Test:
"If a customer calls us out on this claim,
can we defend it with evidence?"

If no → not ready to claim it.
```

---

## 6. The "We're Not Them" Positioning

**The Mistake:**
```
"We're not like those enterprise vendors..."
"Unlike our competitors, we don't..."
"We're not the typical..."
"Say goodbye to..."

[Entire positioning is about who you're not]
```

**Why It's Wrong:**
- Defines you by competitors (they're in control)
- Customers don't know what you ARE
- Negative positioning fades from memory
- No reason to choose you, just not choose them
- Comes across as bitter or weak

**The Fix:**
```
Enemy positioning has a structure:

Wrong: "We're not like Oracle"
Right: "Oracle is complexity. We are simplicity."

The pattern:
"[Enemy] is [negative]. We are [positive]."

You must define what you ARE,
with enemy as contrast, not definition.

Good: "We believe small is powerful.
      While others chase enterprise bloat,
      we obsess over keeping things simple."

The positive comes first. Enemy is context.
```

---

## 7. The Everything Positioning

**The Mistake:**
```
"Our platform is:
- Powerful enough for enterprise
- Simple enough for small business
- Technical enough for developers
- Intuitive enough for non-technical users
- Affordable for startups
- Feature-rich for mature companies"

[Trying to be all things to all people]
```

**Why It's Wrong:**
- Logical impossibility creates credibility gap
- No one believes you can be all these things
- Generic appeals to no one specifically
- Splits resources across incompatible goals
- Creates confused product roadmap

**The Fix:**
```
Pick ONE and commit:

- Enterprise OR SMB (not both)
- Technical OR non-technical (not both)
- Powerful OR simple (not both... usually)
- Affordable OR premium (not both)

Example:
"Built for developers. If you can't code,
this isn't for you. And that's okay."

The courage to exclude is positioning.
"For everyone" is for no one.
```

---

## 8. The Buzzword Bingo

**The Mistake:**
```
"Leveraging AI-powered machine learning and
blockchain-enabled distributed systems for
digital transformation at scale, we empower
organizations to synergize cross-functional
capabilities in the cloud-native ecosystem."
```

**Why It's Wrong:**
- Buzzwords signal empty thinking
- Nobody talks this way
- Creates immediate distrust
- Hides lack of clear value
- Impossible to remember or repeat

**The Fix:**
```
The "My Mom" Test:
Can you explain it to someone's mom?

Before: "AI-powered customer intelligence platform
         leveraging predictive analytics"

After: "We tell you which customers are about
        to cancel, before they do."

Simple, clear, specific, memorable.

Rules:
- No jargon that requires explanation
- If you remove buzzwords and nothing's left,
  you have nothing
- Would a customer say this to a friend?
```

---

## 9. The Moving Target

**The Mistake:**
```
2020: "The collaboration platform"
2021: "The remote work solution"
2022: "The productivity suite"
2023: "The AI-powered workspace"
2024: "The everything work app"

[New positioning every year based on trends]
```

**Why It's Wrong:**
- Customers never form clear impression
- Internal whiplash and confusion
- No compound brand equity
- Signals lack of conviction
- Marketing efforts don't accumulate

**The Fix:**
```
Strong positioning endures.

BMW: "Ultimate Driving Machine" since 1975
De Beers: "A Diamond is Forever" since 1947
Nike: "Just Do It" since 1988
M&M's: "Melts in Your Mouth" since 1954

Commitment:
- Choose positioning for 10+ years
- Change execution, not position
- Add to position, don't replace
- Defend through trends and fads

"If you change positioning often,
 you never had positioning."
```

---

## 10. The Inward-Out Positioning

**The Mistake:**
```
"Our positioning should highlight our
proprietary technology architecture and
the expertise of our engineering team..."

"We have 50 patents and our algorithm is
unique in the industry..."

"Our founder's background in..."

[Positioning based on what YOU care about]
```

**Why It's Wrong:**
- Customers don't care about your patents
- Inside-out thinking ignores customer needs
- Features and credentials aren't benefits
- "So what?" remains unanswered
- Self-congratulatory tone

**The Fix:**
```
Positioning must be Outside-In.

Start with: "What does the customer
desperately want to be true?"

Then: "What can we truthfully claim
that makes that true?"

Before (Inside-Out):
"50 patents in AI technology"

After (Outside-In):
"Answers any question in seconds"

Before (Inside-Out):
"Founded by Stanford PhDs"

After (Outside-In):
"Finally, software that's actually smart"

The customer is the hero, not you.
```
