What Is Brand Positioning?

(And How We Build One That Actually Supports Your Business)

Let’s start here: brand positioning is not your visual identity, it’s not an essence, and it’s not about internal personal preferences.

Brand positioning stems from your business model, it’s the way your business claims space both internally and externally. It’s how we define who your business is as an entity, who it serves, and how it shows up in the world.

And when done well, it gives you clarity you can actually use across leadership decisions, marketing, sales, and operations.

Brand Positioning Is Not Just a “Marketing Thing”

Most people assume that it's about copy and colors. It’s not.

In a strong business, brand positioning is used to:

• Make aligned decisions across services, pricing, and product development

• Identify your ideal clients (beyond target audiences and segments)

• Build language that resonates deeply, clearly, and accurately

• Clarify how you fit in the market and what that means in the competitive landscape

• Align your marketing, sales, ops, and leadership around the same reality

Articulating your brand positioning makes it possible to show up on purpose.

How We Build It: Positioning That Meets You Where You Are

You don’t need a 100-page deck or a brand refresh to do real positioning work. In fact, when I do this with you we don’t design it, we work in a doc using my framework to ensure we have a cohesive and interconnected strategy. 

Different people have differing ways to approach this work. I am a systems thinker with two decades of experience developing and implementing brand positioning across sectors and organizational size. I’ve had many clients come to me after having done brand work with agencies and freelancers alike, all with the same challenge: we spent so much money and time on this, and we like what was done. But it hasn’t done anything for the business and we’re still facing the same challenges they promised this would address. 

So in my practice, after we’ve got some advising underway, we will start with a Brand Strategy Workshop. 

This is where we uncover the strategic truth of your business. It’s not just what you do, but what it means and why you’re doing it. I run a very collaborative process that caters to your specific business model and needs. I don’t hand you a “persona” or a style guide. I reflect back what’s already strong, and clarify what’s unclear, and then we build something that will truly support how you work.

Together in this process we will articulate:

• Your positioning in the market and your brand ecosystem

• Key messaging and external lines that align with your values, strategy, and business goals

• Visual translation guidance for designers, writers, and internal teams

• An audit with insights on how your brand is showing up across your marketing and sales channels

• Recommendations that are relevant to your current and long-term needs

• A complete strategic toolkit you will actually use

This work meets you where you are. Early-stage or established. Scaling or evolving. We build what’s needed based on your current traction, your future goals, and the realities of your business.

Diving into what branding is and what all is involved can feel like a never ending vortex. Especially if you aren’t a subject matter expert in the area, it can feel overly conceptual and unclear how it relates to the business. 

If you are considering brand work, be sure to get quotes from various agency and IC options. This allows you to think through the different approaches to really see what is right for you and your business.

Here are things to think about as you consider your options:

1. Strategic Fit

Does their approach connect branding to your business model, market position, and internal decision-making? Or is it mostly about visuals and voice?

2. Framework & Process

Do they have a defined framework to structure the work (not a vibes-based process)? Can they adapt that structure to meet your specific stage and model?

3. Clarity of Deliverables

Do you know exactly what you’ll walk away with? Will the deliverables be usable by both leadership and downstream teams?

4. Brand Ecosystem Thinking

Do they understand how positioning connects across your messaging, visual identity, internal comms, hiring, partnerships, etc.?

5. Evidence of Impact

Can they speak clearly to how this work has impacted business outcomes for previous clients? Not just “looked nice” — actually supported traction, clarity, or growth?

6. Collaborative Fit

Do they collaborate in a way that reflects how you operate — especially if you're hands-on, scrappy, or juggling multiple priorities?

7. Support for Internal Use

Will you be able to use the brand positioning work in practice — to make decisions, train team members, and grow confidently? Or will it live in a doc?

8. Not Just Personas or Copy

Are they focused on deeper alignment rather than surface-level marketing tools? (E.g. do they push personas and tone-of-voice docs without anchoring them in strategy?)

9. Long-Term Usefulness

Is the work structured in a way that will still hold up as your business evolves?

10. Cost vs. Internal Lift

If it’s a lower cost, is the internal lift heavier (e.g. are you doing all the heavy thinking and they’re just formatting it)? Or does the cost reflect a truly strategic partnership?

How to Vet Brand Quotes With Strategy in Mind

It’s easy to confuse “having a brand” with being positioned. 

Here’s the difference:

A brand is something you have. A logo, a tagline, a tone.

Positioning is something you do. It shapes how you make decisions, how people understand your business, and how you grow. 

This is the difference between strategic brand work and disjointed brand work.

Here is a checklist to help you discern which option will work best for you:

• Do they tie brand positioning to your actual business model and operations, not just visuals or copy?

• Is there a clear framework they’re using to guide the process (not just a creative brainstorm)? And how do they ensure that framework shapes to different businesses (we need structure but it cannot be overly standardized… a fine balance!)

• Are the deliverables clear, actionable, and built to be used by you and your team? If so, great! How will it fit in and how will you use it moving forward?

• Do they understand how branding affects leadership decisions, sales, hiring, messaging, and ops—not just marketing?

• Can they speak to real client outcomes (not just “liked the work,” but specific traction and clarity that came after)?

• Will the collaboration reflect how you actually work (hands-on, evolving, multi-priority)? Even the best brand work will not last if it doesn’t fit into your workflows.

• Are they building something you’ll use in decisions, and how?

• Are they going deep enough (vs. delivering personas and tone-of-voice docs with no roots)?

• Will the work still be useful in 24-48 months as your business grows?

• Does the quote reflect the depth of partnership, or are you paying for pretty decks that lack strategy?

Positioning as a Leadership Tool: How Brand Work Gets Used

When done right, brand positioning doesn’t live in a deck or a doc. It lives in your decisions.

In my view, there is no point in spending time and money on this work if it’s not going to be fully integrated. If your current capacity or workflows are not yet able to fully incorporate strategic brand work, you can hire a designer and/or copywriter for your immediate needs. Then, when you are ready, we'll go from there.

Leaders use strategic brand work to:

• Say yes or no to opportunities that arise (revenue and otherwise)

• Hire, train, and build their team

• Streamline marketing and messaging across platforms

• Choose pricing, packaging, partnerships

• Communicate with clarity inside and outside their org

• Show up online without overthinking every post

• Have messaging that resonates and builds relationships

• Ensure the brand reaches its audience (because a wider net dilutes marketing dollars)

When using strategic brand positioning, you’ll stop asking “what should I say?” and start asking “what’s already true here?” A good brand doesn’t perform… it aligns and communicates clearly. 

Strategic Brand Positioning As Your Toolkit

This article kicks off a full breakdown of the strategy work I do with clients who want their brand to feel as clear, intentional, and grounded as the rest of their business. This work ensures that all internal and external communications across departments are accurate, clear, and speak to the specific audience successfully. 

In the workshop, we will articulate what you have already and identify what is needed. This way, I can scope out those pieces to follow so we do not duplicate work you already have done. And so that we don't have unexpected scope creep as we work!

Here is the full range of my deliverables:

1. Brand Strategy Workshop

2. Brand Strategy & Positioning

   1. ICP Definition

   2. Differentiation & Value Proposition

   3. Personification & Archetypes

   4. Voice & Tone

   5. Brand Pillars

   6. Key Messaging & External Line Exploration

   7. Strategic Implementation Guide (for copy & visual identity)

   8. Website Audit, Architecture, and/or Copy Refreshes

   9. Content Strategy & Guidelines (how this work translates across channels)

Each one connects to the others, but we’ll start wherever you are and build from there using your current goals and resources to help us prioritize.

There are a lot of misconceptions about this work. I hope this helps give you a better understanding of it. Please don’t hesitate to reach out if you have questions or would like to discuss how this relates to your current business needs!