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How to get your positioning out of your head and onto the page

There’s a version of your positioning that’s sitting in your head right now.

It’s might feel crisp in there, but it hasn’t made it to the homepage yet. And that’s the problem. Like they say, “No plan survives first contact with the enemy.”, your enemy in this case is your assumptions.

You might have all the conviction in the world about what makes your product different, but getting your positioning out of your head and onto a page — in a way that actually converts — requires a specific kind of work that most founders never do. It requires asking: what does this actually do for the person on the other side of this sentence?

That sounds simple, but it’s not quite so.

Most positioning ends up as category noise because nobody does the work to answer the question above. It’s usually all about what the product does, rather than what it accomplishes for the right people. It’s describing the mechanism instead of the outcome, which means that the buyer — who’s trying to figure out if this solves their problem — reads six words and moves on.

I saw it happen in real time!

The other day, a founder reply-pitch-slapped me (yes, I just coined this) on an X post.

AI-slop comment + link to their product = the usual I typically ignore.

But not this time.

Instead, I thought: alright, let’s see if there’s something here.

So I checked their homepage.

“The best AI note-taking app for students and meetings. Record lectures and meetings with automatic transcription. Turn audio into organized notes, summaries, and study materials instantly.”

Dead on arrival. Every AI note-taking app says something like this. It’s the category floor — not a strong, differentiated position. It tells you what the product does without showing the target ICP why it matters.

So I asked him a simple question: what actually makes this different from everyone else in the category?

Surprisingly (or maybe not), his answer was way better than what the website said.

And keep in mind, I didn’t have to ask him to tell me about the specific moment a student uses this, what changes for them, what were they struggling with before, or what does their day look like after they start using it… These are all great questions I’d ask in a full interview with stakeholders and then customers.

But even still, this founder answered in specifics. Because those specifics live in his brain from days and months or even years of working for and with their ICP, immersed in their market and category.

And it was specific enough that I could see the actual product underneath the generic homepage copy.

So, here’s how I’d rework it — using just his own words:

Old:

The Best AI Note Taking App for Students & Meetings

Record lectures and meetings with automatic transcription. Turn audio into organized notes, summaries, and study materials instantly.

New:

Most AI note-takers capture meetings. This one helps you learn.

Turn lectures into notes, flashcards, and connected ideas — so you actually understand and remember.

Same product. Completely different narrative.

The first tells you what it does. The second tells you what it does for you — and it only works if you actually care about understanding a lecture, not just recording it. This is btw when understanding jobs to be done would come into place, but that’s for another email.

The old version leads with mechanism (transcription). The new version leads with the outcome (understanding). The mechanism is still there, in the subhead, but the headline now points somewhere that matters to the buyer.

More than a rewrite this is just a reframe.

The product didn’t change and neither did the story. But suddenly, it’s not “another AI tool” — it’s “the one that actually helps you learn.”

Boom. 🎤⬇️

Why does this keep happening? Why can’t founders — and sometimes their teams — see that they’re missing out on opening their prospects mind and eyes to the right solution?

There are mainly three reasons positioning stays buried:

1. Committee copy. When marketing teams write positioning, the result is usually the average of everyone’s input. The average of everyone’s input is safe. Safe is generic.

2. Category defaults. You look at what everyone else in the category says, and you write something adjacent = invisible. You optimized for credibility instead of distinctiveness.

3. The product-is-the-positioning trap. Founders know their product inside out, so they describe it. But buyers don’t buy products — they buy outcomes. Or better, they hire your product to get an outcome. When you describe the product, you’re making the buyer do the translation into “what’s in it for me.” You’re making them work, and trust me, they won’t.

How to un*#ck your brain

One good question asked in the right direction can cut through all of it.

Not “what does your product do?”

The question is: “What or who does your customer become?”

Or, if that’s too abstract: “What were they trying to do before they found you, and what’s different after?”

Keep asking “so what?” on the answer until you hit the thing that only you can claim — or the buyer problem only you solve in a way that matters. The answer is usually in there. It’s just waiting to be excavated from under all the “AI-powered” and “seamless” and “game-changing” based crap.

The test

Open your homepage. Read the headline out loud. Then ask yourself:

• Does this tell me who this is for specifically enough that I could almost see myself as that person?
• Does this tell me what changes for them?
• Does this make a claim that only this product could make?

If you can answer yes to all three, your positioning is probably working.

If you’re reading it and it sounds like it could be any product in your category, that’s your red flag telling you it’a probably still in your head.

A free positioning scorecard

I built a quick scorecard that walks you through the signals telling you if your positioning and messaging are working. Takes about five minutes to work through and at the end you get clear results and actionable steps. All free.

​Take the Message-Market Fit scorecard →​

Hopefully it helps you get outside of your own head and into your customers’.

DISCOVERY

In defense of AI writing

I loved this take on why and when AI writing can work. A big part of it is knowing what it's good for and what it's not. Being able to compartmentalize your use cases while still bringing forth your own voice and thinking.

If you're tired of the non-stop tech bubble...

Chris Silvestri @SilvestriChris Epic 😂 https://twitter.com/siliconmania/status/2047113267068248156 Silicon Mania @siliconmania last week in tech was based. 8:11 AM • Apr 23, 2026 0 Retweets 1 Likes

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The best use of AI I've seen so far

If you still haven't landed on this Youtube channel, stop now and watch. This is what AI should be used for. How do you travel back in time and teach history, while making it fun and gen-z ready even? Absolutely love this. Also a telling sign of what full AI movies could look like.

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btw, here's an interview with the creator. Yes it's a guy, and the woman in the videos is completely AI-made.

RESONANCE

@seanwes

Have a great weekend!

Cheers,

Chris

Chris Silvestri Founder & conversion alchemist

🙌🏻 Let’s be friends (unless you’re a stalker)​

When you're ready, here's a few ways I can help

Not sure where to start? Take our free message-market fit scorecard.​