Book Recap: "Obviously Awesome" by April Dunford

April Dunford's "Obviously Awesome" is a compelling guide to the art and science of positioning—a crucial yet often misunderstood aspect of marketing that can make or break a product. Drawing on her experience in the tech industry, Dunford delivers a pragmatic and often humorous guide to positioning for B2B SaaS products. While the book provides a well thought out framework for positioning a product, it lacks some of the granular details necessary for practical implementation. Nonetheless, it is a worthwhile read and a great place to start for those looking to get a handle on how to better position products.

Good positioning helps teams understand who they are so they can do it on purpose.

The Power of Positioning

Dunford defines positioning as "the deliberate act of defining how you are the best at something that the market values highly." Great positioning, she asserts, supercharges all marketing and sales efforts because it helps prospects quickly figure out what's important by providing the appropriate frame of reference. The key takeaway here is that positioning is about context-setting—without which, products are hard to understand and sell. Here, the

old adage that a confused mind says "No" comes to mind.

How to Know You Might Have a Positioning Problem

There are many signs that a company might need to refresh their positioning.

• Your customers love you but new prospects can't figure out what you're selling.

• Your company has long sales cycles and low close rates.

• You have high churn.

• You're under price pressure.

The root cause of all of these problems boils down to context setting. Yet often, leaders get hung up by their positioning baggage. They find it hard to move on from the market in which they originally started and instead default to the status quo. Yet, products and markets are dynamic and as the landscape for a product changes, companies must continually evaluate their positioning and adapt to market shifts.

The 5 Components of Effective Positioning

Challenging the status quo, Dunford hilariously rails against a widely propagated fill-in-the-blank formula often used to create a positioning statement. Her primary argument against this tired template is that it assumes we know the best answers to fill in the blanks with and that it simply reinforces the status quo, rather than challenging preexisting assumptions. Further damning this formula to irrelevancy is that it doesn't help teams figure out what to do next.

April Dunford strongly recommends that you don't use this Mad Libs style positioning statement.

Instead, she proposes breaking down positioning into five components (plus one bonus) that work together to define effective positioning. By identifying these components, companies can realize a much more robust and relevant form of positioning than they would achieve by filling in the blanks on a generic positioning template. Dunford puts these elements together on a positioning canvas that you can download by subscribing to her newsletter.

1. Competitive Alternatives: Understanding what customers compare your product to, including non-obvious alternatives like spreadsheets or manual processes.

2. Unique Attributes: Identifying what features you have that no other solution has.

3. Value: Translating unique attributes into meaningful benefits for the customer.

4. Target Market Characteristics: Pinpointing high-probability targets based on specific characteristics beyond just industry or company size. Think about getting specific and identifying a niche. Who are your best-fit customers?

5. Market Category: Choosing a category that sets the right frame of reference for your product. This step is a bit more complicated because it requires you to understand the maturity of the markets you are considering, as well as the strengths of your competitors.

6. Relevant Trends (Bonus) - Highlighting emerging trends that can make you more relevant to your customers.

One of the things that Dunford stresses throughout the book is how many of the insights that drive this process come from customer insights. For those who don't have a good grasp on Jobs To Be Done theory or experience interviewing customers, there may be a gap between what this book promises and what they are able to deliver. This is one of my biggest criticisms of the book and perhaps in future editions the author can provide additional resources or recommended reading to help fill this gap.

The Ten-Step Positioning Process

Dunford provides a ten-step process for effective positioning, each step logically building on the previous one. This process is comprehensive and designed to be implemented by cross-functional teams. In the book, a chapter is dedicated to each step and is filled with many useful anecdotes and examples.

1. Understand the Customers Who Love Your Product: Identify your happiest customers and focus on why they love your product.

2. Form a Positioning Team: Involve high-level leaders and cross-functional team members in positioning discussions.

3. Align Your Positioning and Let Go of Your Positioning Baggage: Educate your team on positioning concepts and be open to new ideas.

4. List Your True Competitive Alternatives: Understand what customers would use if your product didn’t exist.

5. Isolate Your Unique Attributes or Features: Identify capabilities that set your product apart.

6. Map the Attributes to Value Themes: Translate features into benefits and then into value themes.

7. Determine Who Cares a Lot: Identify and segment customers who care most about the value you provide.

8. Find a Market Frame of Reference That Puts Your Strengths at the Center and Determine How to Position in It: Dunford admits that this step is tricky and requires careful analysis. She suggests three high-level approaches companies can use, which are to go head-to-head with a category leader in an established market, slice off a subsegment of an existing market, or create a new category.

9. Layer on a Trend: Use relevant trends to make your product more urgent and relevant to customers.

10. Capture Your Positioning so It Can Be Shared: Use a positioning canvas to document and share your positioning.

Putting Positioning into Play

After establishing a solid positioning strategy, the next question is "now what?" Dunford emphasizes crafting a "sales story" that aligns with the new positioning. While she provides a barebones outline for what this might look like, the reader will have to buy her follow up book "Sales Pitch" to get detailed instructions and examples on how to develop each section. The Sales Pitch Storyboard framework comes free along with the positioning canvas for newsletter subscribers.

Only after filling out the positioning canvas and aligning on the sales strategy does Dunford recommend that you start on messaging. She suggests starting with a messaging document that the marketing team can then use as a guide for creating collateral. She also suggests that with the change in positioning, product teams may also need to adjust pricing and look at their product roadmap. A shift in positioning often means a shift in business strategy and adjustments will need to be made throughout the organization to bring about alignment.

Key Takeaways

Dunford concludes with five key takeaways that encapsulate the essence of effective positioning:

1. Any product can be positioned in multiple markets.

2. Great positioning rarely happens by default; it requires deliberate effort.

3. Understanding what your best customers see as true alternatives to your solution is crucial for identifying differentiators.

4. Position your product in a market that makes your strengths obvious to your target customers.

5. Use trends to enhance your product's appeal, but with caution to avoid diluting your core message.

Final Thoughts

"Obviously Awesome" is an insightful and engaging book that offers a robust framework for understanding and developing effective positioning strategies. Dunford’s experience and humor make complex concepts accessible. However, the book's high-level approach can sometimes feel like a precursor to more detailed consulting services. A more comprehensive version of the book would fill in the gaps with practical, actionable steps for each stage of the positioning process. For example more detailed instructions on facilitating positioning conversations and conducting research would be helpful. Additionally, Dunford's methodologies are more about executing a positioning pivot than starting from scratch. Only companies who already have a robust customer base will be able to fully take advantage of the ten-step positioning process outlined in the book. Despite these critiques, "Obviously Awesome" is a valuable resource for anyone involved in the marketing, sales, or product development of a B2B SaaS, providing a clear roadmap to stand out in crowded markets.