The Positioning Audit Prompt: Find the Angle No Competitor Owns
Most founders list features as differentiation. This prompt forces you to think like a buyer and find the positioning gap no competitor has claimed.
The decision: How do I win the comparison?
When to use this: You know who you're selling to but you're not sure how buyers perceive you versus the alternatives. You want to find the angle that makes you the obvious choice.
The Prompt
You are a positioning strategist. Your job is to think like a buyer comparing SaaS tools, not like a founder who built one.
I'm building:
Product: [NAME]
What it does: [1-2 sentence description]
My target buyer: [job title, company type, company size — use output from ICP Validation if you've run it]
My main claim / current tagline: [what you currently say you do]
My known competitors (direct or indirect):
- [Competitor 1]: [what they do / their main claim]
- [Competitor 2]: [what they do / their main claim]
- [Competitor 3 — optional]
- Status quo / doing nothing: [how buyers currently solve this without a tool]
Analyse my positioning from the buyer's perspective. Give me exactly these sections:
1. HOW BUYERS MENTALLY CATEGORISE ME
What category does a buyer put me in when they first hear my pitch? Is that the category I want to be in?
2. MY ACTUAL DIFFERENTIATORS (vs. perceived)
Which of my claimed advantages would buyers actually believe vs. dismiss as marketing?
3. COMPETITORS BUYERS WILL COMPARE ME TO THAT I HAVEN'T MENTIONED
Other tools or approaches buyers in this category typically evaluate.
4. WHERE I BLEND IN
The parts of my positioning that sound identical to competitors. Specific language that buyers have heard before and will discount.
5. WHERE I STAND OUT
Angles that are genuinely differentiated — things competitors don't claim or can't claim.
6. THE GAP NOBODY OWNS
A positioning angle in this category that no current player has claimed, that I could potentially own.
7. THE ONE-SENTENCE REFRAME
A revised positioning statement that leads with my genuine differentiator and speaks to what buyers in this category actually care about most.
How to interpret the output
"How buyers categorise me" is the most important section. If buyers put you in the wrong category, your differentiators don't matter — they're evaluating you against the wrong competitors. Repositioning the category is the highest-leverage move in early-stage GTM.
"Where I blend in" will sting. These are the phrases you probably like ("powerful," "easy to use," "built for founders") that buyers have learned to ignore. Cut them.
"The gap nobody owns" is your content strategy. The empty answer spaces from the positioning audit become your SEO articles, your r/SaaS posts, your HN comments. Own the gap in content before you own it in product.
Common mistakes
Listing features as differentiators. "We have X integration" is not a positioning angle — it's a feature. Positioning is about the mental slot you occupy, not the capabilities you have.
Treating "simpler than X" as a position. Every challenger says they're simpler. It's the default positioning for any new entrant. You need a specific axis of simplicity tied to what your buyer actually finds painful about the incumbent.
Ignoring the status quo as a competitor. For most early-stage tools, the biggest competitor is not another SaaS — it's "we do this in a spreadsheet" or "we don't do this at all." Your positioning needs to win against inertia first.
What to do next
- Take the "one-sentence reframe" and test it as your hero headline
- Use the "gap nobody owns" as the framing for your cold outreach
- Re-run this prompt after you've refined your copy to see if your messaging is landing the repositioning
For simulated buyer conversations comparing you to competitors, use RightPositioning.