For almost everyone at the start, the answer is the existing category. April Dunford's own count is that around 90 percent of recently public tech companies positioned inside a market that already existed, and creating demand for a word nobody is searching for is a multi year, capital heavy job. Start in the category your buyer already budgets for, win a specific slice of it, then redraw the lines once you have money and momentum. Category creation is a thing you earn, not a thing you announce.
4 hand-picked resources, 1 India-specific, 4 link-checked. Pick how you want to dig in.
Why we picked it The clearest short explanation of why market category is one of five interdependent positioning pieces, with a real repositioning story attached. It is also where Dunford makes the case that most companies should not invent a category.
From aprildunford.com by April Dunford 12 min read
Open aprildunford.com →Why we picked it Deals with the four places positioning work actually stalls, including teams that cannot agree on their competitive alternatives. Useful once you have tried positioning and it went nowhere.
From Lenny's Newsletter by April Dunford 18 min read
Open lennysnewsletter.com →Why we picked it The book that gave the discipline its vocabulary (category king, lightning strike, point of view). Read it as the ambitious end of the spectrum, not as a default plan.
From HarperBusiness by Al Ramadan, Dave Peterson, Christopher Lochhead, Kevin Maney 272 pages
Open amazon.com →Why we picked it The founder's own account of entering an existing category (help desk) against Zendesk rather than inventing a new one, and winning on price and simplicity for SMBs. The clearest India example of segment choice beating category invention.
From Freshworks by Girish Mathrubootham 9 min read
Open freshworks.com →How category design reads from a different seat.
The same ground, over in Brand, web & content, our Starting Up track.
The same ground, over in Find your idea & build the brand, our D2C track.
