Update to Marketing Strategy & Planning

{
  "description": "Develop business and brand positioning, competitor differentiation, USP, value propositions, core messages and perceptual maps. Use for positioning strategy, positioning reviews, or the positioning stage of an integrated marketing plan. Route buyer-persona work to marketing-personas and PR or source-assessment work to marketing-pr-planning.",
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  "name": "marketing-positioning",
  "skill_md_contents": "---\nname: marketing-positioning\ndescription: \"Develop business and brand positioning, competitor differentiation, USP, value propositions, core messages and perceptual maps. Use for positioning strategy, positioning reviews, or the positioning stage of an integrated marketing plan. Route buyer-persona work to marketing-personas and PR or source-assessment work to marketing-pr-planning.\"\n---\n\n# Brand Positioning\n\nApply [Shared working rules](references/working-rules.md) before responding. This is the positioning skill in Marketing Strategy & Planning.\n\n## Start from the business\n\nIf the brief is missing, ask in the conversation language: \"What does your business offer, who is it for, and what do you believe makes it different?\" Accept a website, uploaded document or short explanation. Do not repeat questions already answered.\n\nExplain the relevant sequence briefly. The full guided workflow has two phases and nine steps. A review or narrow request needs only the relevant steps. Work for B2B or B2C, adapting the questions to the buying situation.\n\n## Phase 1: Customer value\n\n### 1. Analyze the offer\n\nIdentify the products or services, target users and buyers, buying context, delivery model, main functional benefit and available proof. Read supplied URLs/files rather than filling gaps from memory. Summarize what is known and invite corrections.\n\nUse [Jobs-to-be-Done](references/jobs-to-be-done.md) to identify the progress the customer seeks. Use [Value Proposition Canvas](references/value-proposition-canvas.md) when the relationship between offer and needs is unclear. Keep reported benefits separate from proven outcomes.\n\n### 2. Explore functional and emotional value\n\nAsk what should improve for customers practically and emotionally. Propose specific, plausible benefits connected to the buying situation: saved effort, reduced uncertainty, greater confidence, professional effectiveness or relevant social outcomes. Label proposed motivations as hypotheses; do not state them as researched psychology.\n\n### 3. Connect the offer to customer needs\n\nMap customer jobs, pains and desired gains to the offer's features, pain relievers, gain creators and evidence. Explain what the offer can support and what remains unproven. Prioritize a small number of meaningful benefits over a generic list of positive adjectives.\n\nCheckpoint: confirm the value logic before differentiating against competitors.\n\n## Phase 2: Differentiation and message\n\n### 4. Investigate the competitive frame\n\nAsk for up to three relevant competitors and their URLs if not already supplied. If the user wants you to find them, research alternatives in the chosen market and explain why they are comparable. Include substitutes or doing nothing when they shape the actual buying decision.\n\nFor each competitor, report the observed offer, target audience, claimed benefits, positioning language, visible proof, and source. Compare like-for-like. Identify potential gaps with a qualification: an unclaimed benefit is not necessarily an unmet demand or a defensible advantage.\n\n### 5. Test emotional and values-based differentiation\n\nCompare how the business and competitors communicate trust, identity, values and desired outcomes. Distinguish demonstrable practices from generic brand claims. Explain which differences matter to the target buyer and what proof would support them.\n\n### 6. Formulate the USP\n\nDraft a specific, defensible unique selling proposition based on capability, process, expertise, service model or other substantiated advantage. State the comparison scope. If uniqueness is not established, call it a differentiation hypothesis or a compelling selling proposition; do not manufacture exclusivity.\n\n### 7. Formulate the value proposition\n\nCombine the audience, problem or desired progress, functional and emotional benefits, relevant differentiation and reasons to believe. A UVP is the overall customer value proposition, not a synonym for emotional value alone. Preserve the emotional work from previous steps within that broader promise.\n\n### 8. Create the core message\n\nOffer two short, plain-language alternatives that convey the value and meaningful difference. Avoid unsupported superlatives. Ask which direction fits, incorporate feedback, and explain the selected message's fit with the audience, evidence and competitive frame. Translate naturally into the requested deliverable language.\n\nCheckpoint: confirm the message and any important strategic trade-off.\n\n### 9. Build the positioning map\n\nPropose two decision-relevant dimensions with clear endpoints. Prefer independent dimensions; explain trade-offs and avoid selecting axes simply to make the business appear superior. In guided mode, let the user select or refine the axes.\n\nPlot the business and the researched competitors in a four-quadrant map when suitable chart tools are available, with labels and a supporting evidence table. Otherwise use a clearly labeled comparison table. Treat coordinates derived from website evidence as qualitative estimates, explain the scale and uncertainty, and do not invent market research. If the axes or evidence are insufficient, describe the hypotheses and validation needed before plotting.\n\n## Final positioning brief\n\nInclude:\n- Audience, market and buying situation.\n- Customer jobs, functional benefits and emotional value.\n- Competitor observations and differentiation opportunities.\n- USP, value proposition, proof and selected core message.\n- Positioning map or comparison table with assumptions.\n- The strongest counterargument and a 0–10 heuristic feasibility rating.\n- A practical validation plan: target segment, hypothesis, interview/message test, outcome metric and decision criterion. Propose baselines or targets only as explicit assumptions.\n\nOffer a Word export of the substantive work. If the user wants to develop buyer personas or plan PR, continue with the respective companion skill and the existing brief. Do not advertise or link to the former separate GPTs.\n"
}