Boy, if we only had a nickle for every time we asked a startup CEO about his competition and heard: “Really, no one. No one does what we do. We’re a breakthrough category - you know, like Google.”

Okay, we'll grant you your big vision. Where would we all be without big vision? In the dark ages. In caves. In the name of evolution, someone among us has to think big.

But while you are busy ensuring that your offering truly is breakthrough, your new savvy sales VP will say the first order of business is to find an enemy. If you don't define your competitive set while you craft your positioning, it’ll get defined for you when your sales team hits the streets. Better to be in front of it.

No matter how game changing your breakthough brand may be, we all still must compete in the marketplace, yes? Even if no one does what you do, with whom must you compete in order to penetrate the over-crowded awareness of your targeted customer? Who else will already be in the consideration set when you ask to be included?

Site typically begins by gathering key stakeholder input - interviews with key stakeholders and a review of existing business or marketing plans in order to develop the underpinnings for the brand, its offering, and its customers are determined. These are the brand attributes - the "rungs" of the company's "DNA".

The Company's -
• Core purpose - the reason the company exists beyond making money
• Core values - an enduring set of principles that reflect the brand's ethics
• Core ideology - a combination of core values and core purpose
• Core identity - the central, sustainable elements of the brand

The Brand's -
• Personality- a description of the brand in human terms
• Promise - a stated or implied pledge that creates customer expectations and employee responsibilities
• Essence - The brand promise distilled into the simplest terms
• Drive features - the attributes of the brand that are both important to customers and highly differentiated from the competition
  

A good brand position will consider and reflect how key stakeholders envision the brand. The following is a successful template for helping stakeholders to define their vision for the brand:

1. What is the brand’s mission?

2. Describe the company’s business vision.

3. What is the best “descriptor” for The brand? A descriptor is a term used with a brand name to describe the category in which the brand competes, such as “online bank”.

4. What about your marketplace provides you with inspiration?

5. What are your aspirations for the brand in relation to competing brands?

6. What do you think are the most essential components of the company’s “DNA”?

7. Which brands in your industry do you most admire and why?

8. Which brands in any industry do you most admire and why?

9. What business models (in your industry or others) would you like to emulate and why?