# Messaging & Positioning

> Say what your product does in words developers trust, test it, and get every team telling the same story.

A Heavybit skill in marketing and launch, from The Developer Marketing Guide.

HTML version: https://www.devmarketingguide.com/skills/messaging-positioning/

Developers tune out vague claims, so positioning has to say plainly what the product does and why it beats the alternative. This skill walks through writing a positioning statement, choosing messaging pillars, testing messages with the developers you want to reach, and getting sales, marketing and product to tell the same story. It draws on practitioners from Algolia, Netlify, PagerDuty and others.

Draws from: Betty Junod, Mike Smith, Julian Dunn, Indy Sen, Justin Warren, Tiffany Spencer, Ashley McLelland, Andy Raskin, Dana Oshiro

## Use it when you're

- Defining your messaging pillars
- Writing or rewriting a positioning statement
- Testing messages with the developers you sell to
- Separating yourself from close competitors
- Paying down messaging debt after a pivot or a new product
- Rolling new positioning out across sales, marketing and product

## Try it with your agent

Connect Crucible, then describe your situation. For example:

> Use the Messaging & Positioning skill to write a positioning statement for our product and test it against our two closest competitors.

> Use the Messaging & Positioning skill to find where our homepage and our sales deck tell different stories.

MCP endpoint: https://crucible.heavybit.com/mcp?utm_source=devmarketingguide&utm_medium=markdown&utm_content=messaging-positioning

## The talks and articles behind it

This skill was built from these pieces in the Heavybit Library. All of them are free to read or watch if you want the source material yourself.

- [Dear Founders: Start with Messaging](https://www.heavybit.com/library/article/messaging-framework?utm_source=devmarketingguide&utm_medium=markdown&utm_content=messaging-positioning) (Article, 2022)
- [Messaging to the User vs the Buyer: Is There A Difference?](https://www.heavybit.com/library/article/messaging-to-the-user-vs-the-buyer-is-there-a-difference?utm_source=devmarketingguide&utm_medium=markdown&utm_content=messaging-positioning) (Article, 2021)
- [Early Stage Positioning for B2B Startups with Justin Warren](https://www.heavybit.com/library/video/early-stage-positioning-for-b2b-startups-with-justin-warren?utm_source=devmarketingguide&utm_medium=markdown&utm_content=messaging-positioning) (Video, 2020)
- [Messaging as The One Source of Truth](https://www.heavybit.com/library/video/messaging-as-the-one-source-of-truth?utm_source=devmarketingguide&utm_medium=markdown&utm_content=messaging-positioning) (Video, 2019)
- [Asking for Messaging Feedback](https://www.heavybit.com/library/article/asking-for-messaging-feedback?utm_source=devmarketingguide&utm_medium=markdown&utm_content=messaging-positioning) (Article, 2019)
- [The SCQA Framework in Action](https://www.heavybit.com/library/article/the-scqa-framework-in-action?utm_source=devmarketingguide&utm_medium=markdown&utm_content=messaging-positioning) (Article, 2019)
- [Jedi Product Pitches with Andy Raskin](https://www.heavybit.com/library/article/jedi-product-pitches-with-andy-raskin?utm_source=devmarketingguide&utm_medium=markdown&utm_content=messaging-positioning) (Article, 2017)
- [Building a Better Core Pitch](https://www.heavybit.com/library/video/building-a-better-core-pitch?utm_source=devmarketingguide&utm_medium=markdown&utm_content=messaging-positioning) (Video, 2016)
- [Getting to a Messaging Framework and Value Prop](https://www.heavybit.com/library/video/getting-to-a-messaging-framework-and-value-prop?utm_source=devmarketingguide&utm_medium=markdown&utm_content=messaging-positioning) (Video, 2015)

## More in this collection

- [Product Marketing for Developers](https://www.devmarketingguide.com/skills/product-marketing-developers.md)
- [Content Marketing Strategy](https://www.devmarketingguide.com/skills/content-marketing-strategy.md)