Module 1 of 7
Positioning as deliberate loss
Choosing who to disappoint.
Most small businesses describe themselves in a way designed to exclude nobody, because excluding people feels like turning away money you have not got. The result is a sentence that could belong to any of two hundred competitors — quality work, competitive prices, customer focus — and which therefore gives a buyer no reason to choose you over the next one.
Positioning is the opposite move. It is deciding, on purpose, which buyers you are not for, so that the ones you are for recognise themselves instantly. The tutor who is specifically for students repeating a year after a disappointing result is choosing not to be for the confident high scorer, and gains something no generalist has: a parent who reads that sentence and thinks that is exactly us.
The test is simple and uncomfortable. If nobody reads your statement and thinks "that is not for me", you have not positioned anything. And the fear behind the reluctance is usually backwards: narrowing rarely reduces the work, because being the obvious choice for a smaller group beats being an acceptable option for a larger one, especially when you cannot outspend anybody on being seen.
If nobody reads it and thinks "that is not for me", you have not positioned anything. Being the obvious choice for fewer people beats being acceptable to everyone.