Build and they will come is not a strategy, it’s a prayer. – Steve Blank
When Alison first introduced me to “branding” and “positioning” (B&P), I was more than a little skeptical. My initial thoughts on these concepts revolved around putting products in pretty packaging and giving them cool sounding names to make consumers buy more canned soup or switch to a new brand of light bulbs. The thought of bringing foundational branding and positioning concepts to the world of tech startups seemed fruitless, if not a downright waste of time. Simply stated, I was (very) wrong…
After clearing my mind of this misconceived notion of B&P, I learned that these concepts are just as much, if not more, about the customers and consumers of products as they are about the products themselves. As silly as it sounds, entrepreneurs often focus on their product almost to the exclusion of the product users and the ways in which they may engage with the product. My early lessons on B&P have taught me something quite simple: successful companies and the products they deliver must reach and resonate with users on a very fundamental level. This often-overlooked idea is at the heart of both B&P and the companies we most admire.
B&P are the simple, foundational elements upon which the DNA of a company (its core strategy) is built. This DNAcontains the genetic instructions that inform the development and functioning of a company’s products and their features. For example, BMW’s core strategy is to build The Ultimate Driving Machine. Each new feature focuses on the enhancement of customers’ driving experience. In the same way, Facebook is about the seamless, automated sharing of information with one’s inner circle. Each new feature seeks to allow users to do so with the least effort. The more narrow and focused a company is in defining its core strategy, and the extent to which that core strategy touches its customers’ core values and psychological needs, the more likely it is to deliver products that are broadly adopted and gain that all elusive traction.
For the branding disbelievers who view branding specialists as snake oil salespeople and gurus of technobabble, think back to the customer development model. At their core, B&P and the customer development model are about relying upon proven hypotheses. As a company founder, one must be able to clearly and succinctly articulate the core fundamental customer needs their product addresses and the way in which the product addresses it. B&P provides a neat discovery framework for better understanding this and should provide the brightest startup founders with the impetus for incorporating this filter at the earliest stage of project development – the idea stage.
When Alison and I first discussed my writing a piece for From the StartUp, I was both excited to spread the gospel to my startup cohorts and apprehensive about the prospect of betraying my B&P ignorance. Since then, I have come to realize that it is not necessary for a company founder to become an expert on B&P. However, it is essential to understand the role they play in the development of an idea and a successful company. When correctly used as an idea and feature list filter, B&P is a powerful tool in the startup entrepreneur’s toolkit.