Ask a prospect who else they considered apart from your product/company, and you learn something a positioning statement cannot tell you: the comparison they already have in mind. That comparison may be a direct competitor, but it may just as easily be a spreadsheet, an internal process, a shared inbox, an agency, or doing nothing.

The market category you choose shapes the assumptions buyers bring to your product. The alternatives they weigh tell you what those assumptions are being compared against. If you get either wrong, your product will be harder to understand even if the copy is accurate.

Imagine a company sells software that gives sales reps Legal-approved answers to routine contract questions. Call it contract management software and buyers may compare it with broad contract lifecycle platforms, judging it on feature coverage. Describe it as contract self-service for sales teams and the comparison may shift to the shared inbox, a spreadsheet of approved clauses, or the habit of pinging Legal on Slack. The product has not changed; the context and the standard it must meet have.

This is the first of three posts on positioning after you have gathered customer evidence. The earlier hiring series covers collecting that evidence; this series is about making decisions from it. The first step is to understand the frame before writing the copy.

Why the comparison comes first

April Dunford’s positioning framework works through five connected components: competitive alternatives, unique attributes, value and proof, target-market characteristics, and market category. The sequence matters. An attribute is only unique compared with an alternative; its value depends on whether the buyer cares about it; and the best category is the one that makes that value understandable to the right customers. Category is therefore not simply the first label to choose. It is a decision informed by the comparison and the value you can deliver (Dunford, *Obviously Awesome*).

Buyer research shows why being considered early matters. A Bain and Google survey of 1,208 B2B buyers, cited in LinkedIn’s B2B Institute report *Better, Bolder B2B Branding*, found that 86% began a purchase with a “Day One” list of brands in mind, and the brand ultimately chosen appeared on that list 92% of the time. This does not prove that a particular category label earns a place on the list. It does show that explaining yourself after buyers have started comparing options may be late.

There is a second problem with assuming you know the comparison. Clozd, a win-loss research vendor, compared CRM data from 1,000 competitive closed-lost deals with what buyers said in interviews. It reported that the competitor tagged in the CRM failed to match the buyer-identified competitor 65% of the time. Clozd also reported that recorded loss reasons were wrong or incomplete in 85% of cases. These are vendor-produced findings, not an independent industry census, but the comparison is useful: CRM fields can reflect a salesperson’s best guess rather than the buyer’s actual alternative.

If you think you are losing to an established competitor when buyers are actually staying with spreadsheets or choosing no decision, your messaging and roadmap may be solving the wrong problem. The point is not to distrust sales. It is to check internal assumptions against what buyers say they considered.

Three positioning frame strategies, three different fights

Once you understand the alternatives and the value you can deliver, you can test different category strategies. In her March 2026 episode “New Thinking on Market Categories,” Dunford discusses three broad options: compete head-to-head in an established category, focus on a subsegment where your strengths matter more, or create a new category. Each creates a different comparison and a different burden of proof.

1. Head-to-head: contract management software

Buyers may compare you with established platforms and expect breadth, reliability, integrations, and mature controls. A young product might be able to compete on some of these dimensions, but it risks being judged on the incumbent’s terms before buyers understand its particular strength.

2. A smaller pond: contract self-service for sales teams at mid-sized software companies

The comparison may shift toward the workaround the team uses today: asking Legal, searching old clauses, or waiting for an answer. The claim becomes more specific: routine questions get answered faster while Legal retains control over approved language. The risk is that the segment may be too small or the problem too infrequent to support the business.

3. A new game: a category of your own

A new category can give a product room to define the problem on its own terms, but buyers have to understand the problem before they can evaluate the solution. That requires education, time, and money. If the market does not recognize the need or does not feel urgency, the company may run out of runway before the category takes hold.

None of these options is right in every situation. The useful question is which one gives your product the best chance of being understood and chosen by the customers you can serve well.

However,

There is an important counterweight to the idea that every company needs a unique functional difference to grow. The Ehrenberg-Bass Institute and LinkedIn’s B2B Institute emphasize mental availability: a brand needs to come to mind in relevant buying situations and be easy to find. Their B2B work also examines category entry points, the situations or triggers that bring buyers into a category, and argues that lack of awareness can be a bigger obstacle than active rejection.

That research should not be reduced to “differentiation does not matter.” It is a reminder that a useful difference will not help much if buyers never think of you when the need arises. My practical reading for an early-stage founder is to connect the product to a real buying situation, choose a category that makes its value legible, and then make the difference memorable. That is an interpretation of the frameworks, not a direct finding that applies equally to every B2B market.

How to choose between frames

• Run each possible frame through three tests before committing to one.

• The comparison test: What would buyers use or do if your product did not exist? Under this frame, what would they compare you with, and can you win that comparison with evidence you can show today?

• The situation test: What event, pressure, or task causes this buyer to start looking for a solution? The frame should connect to a buying situation that exists now, not one you hope to create.

• The cost-of-education test: What does a buyer have to learn before the frame makes sense? If you must teach them both that the problem exists and that your category is the answer, account for the extra sales effort and time that may require.

• Choose the frame that holds up best across the three tests, write down why you chose it, and note what evidence would make you reconsider. That turns a later positioning change into a decision rather than drift.

Why a founder should care

The frame shapes the comparison buyers bring into sales calls, the evidence you need to provide, and the expectations they have of the product. A broad category can make breadth and reliability feel like table stakes; a narrower use case can make depth in one workflow more important than covering every feature. Those expectations affect what marketing says, what sales demonstrates, and what product prioritizes.

Changing the frame later is possible, but the change can reach the website, pitch deck, pricing page, sales enablement, and roadmap decisions built around the old story. Record the reasoning now so the team knows what it chose and what new evidence would justify changing it.

What to do this week

Write down two or three frames your product could sit in. For each one, name the alternatives buyers would compare you with, the situation that triggers the search, the proof you would need, and the amount of education the buyer would require. Then ask five recent customers or prospects what they considered before choosing. Do not ask them to approve your wording; ask what they actually compared you with and what they thought your product was for.

Here is the Positioning Score tool that can help you understand if your positioning works. If you want a second opinion on which frame fits your stage and market, get in touch and tell me what you are weighing.

Frequently Asked Questions About Positioning

1. What is a positioning frame?

A positioning frame is the category or context buyers use to understand your product and compare it with other options. It shapes which alternatives they consider, what they expect your product to do, and which differences matter. Choosing the right frame gives buyers a clearer way to understand why your product is relevant to them.

2. Why should you choose a positioning frame before writing marketing copy?

Because the frame influences how buyers interpret everything you say. If you start writing headlines and product descriptions before deciding what buyers should compare you with, you risk creating messaging that sounds good but leaves the product difficult to understand. Decide the frame first; then build the claim and messaging around it.

3. How do you choose the right positioning frame?

Start by understanding how your best-fit customers describe the problem, what they use today, and what alternatives they consider when deciding whether to buy. Then assess which frame makes your product’s value easiest to understand and gives buyers a meaningful reason to choose it. Validate your choice through customer conversations and competitive win/loss evidence rather than relying on internal assumptions alone.

4. What alternatives should you consider when positioning a product?

Look beyond direct competitors. Buyers may compare your product with an adjacent product category, an internal tool, a manual process, a spreadsheet, an agency, or doing nothing. The relevant alternative is what a buyer would realistically use or continue doing instead of choosing your product.

5. Should a company compete in an existing category or create a new one?

It depends on how buyers understand the problem and whether an existing category helps them recognize your product’s value. Competing in an established category can make the product easier to understand, but it may also place you alongside strong competitors. A narrower subcategory or a new category may help communicate a distinctive value proposition, but it can require more effort to educate buyers. The decision should follow customer evidence, not a desire to sound different.

6. What is the “Day One list,” and why does it matter?

The Day One list is the shortlist of brands a buyer already knows or considers when beginning a purchase. Research cited by LinkedIn’s B2B Institute found that 86% of surveyed B2B buyers started with a Day One list, and the brand ultimately chosen appeared on that list 92% of the time. The practical implication is that positioning is not only about persuading buyers once they are comparing products; it also matters whether they think of your brand early enough to consider it.

7. What is the difference between positioning and messaging?

Positioning defines the strategic choices behind how a product should be understood: the frame, the value it offers, the customers it serves, and the alternatives it beats. Messaging expresses those choices through headlines, website copy, sales decks, campaigns, and other communications. Messaging can change by audience or channel while the underlying positioning remains consistent.

8. How can you tell whether your positioning frame is working?

Look for evidence that buyers understand what your product is, recognize why it matters to them, and compare it with the alternatives you intended. Review customer interviews, win/loss feedback, sales-cycle patterns, and conversion data. If buyers consistently misunderstand the product or evaluate it against the wrong alternatives, revisit the frame before simply rewriting the copy.

9. Can positioning change as a company grows?

Yes. A new customer segment, a significant product change, a shift in buyer priorities, or a new competitive landscape can justify revisiting the frame. But a few difficult sales conversations do not automatically mean the positioning is wrong. Look for a repeatable pattern in the evidence before making a strategic change.