Podcast Summary: Positioning with April Dunford — "New Thinking on Market Categories" (March 19, 2026)

Main Theme & Purpose

In this episode, April Dunford explores how companies often overthink market category creation and why pragmatic positioning is critical for product success. Drawing from her experience with over 300 clients since the first edition of her book Obviously Awesome, April discusses the latest evolutions in her methodology, with a particular focus on selecting and defining market categories, and whether or not to create a new one.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Pitfall of Overthinking Market Categories

• Companies often approach positioning by prematurely wanting to create a new market category.
  • "Companies really overthink market category to the point where they actually want to do a positioning exercise. By starting with the market category, they'll say, 'look, we want to define a new market category, so help us do that.' Instead of saying, 'do we need to define a new market category?'" — April Dunford [00:00]
• Aspirational market categories rarely fit the actual product.
  • Chasing a new category can misalign with actual product capabilities, causing confusion both internally and in the market.

2. The Order of Steps in Positioning

• April outlines her updated positioning process, emphasizing the importance of:
  • Nailing down competitive alternatives
  • Articulating differentiated value (significantly expanded in her new book)
  • Defining the best-fit customer (less changed, but small companies often benefit from sharpening this)
  • Assessing or defining market category

3. The Real Job of Market Category

• Market category's role: To orient customers toward your unique value, not replace messaging or the sales journey.
  • "The job of a market category is to take a customer that doesn't know too much about your stuff and it points them in the direction of your value. That's it." — April Dunford [06:15]
• Rule #1: Do No Harm.
  • Bad market categories misdirect customer assumptions and complicate the sales process.
  • "The first rule of market categories is do no harm... The harm that a bad market category can do is it takes a customer that doesn't know too much about your stuff and it points them somewhere else away from your differentiated value." — [08:16]
• When a market category is working, leave it alone.
  • Evaluate whether the current label or category helps or hinders understanding of your differentiated value.
  • "In cases where we look at it and we say the existing market category works, we don't touch it." — [11:21]

4. How to Evaluate and Tweak Categories

• If the current category doesn't serve, options include:
  • Using an adjacent market category
  • Adding qualifiers (e.g., “for SMBs” or “for X industry”)
  • Shifting to a related but distinct category
  • As a last resort, creating an entirely new category with an “anchor concept” so customers aren't left without points of reference
  • "If none of that works because the thing is so new, so different, we're in a situation where we have to actually invent a new market category. In those cases, what we're looking for is what I would call an anchor concept." — [12:35]

5. Three Styles of Positioning and Category Choices

1. Head-to-Head
   • Competing directly with the market leader in the same category.
   • Risky unless you're already a strong #2 or the leader is showing weakness.
   • "This is not often a successful way to do positioning… This works great if you happen to be the market leader." — [15:08]
2. Big Fish, Small Pond
   • Segmenting a category and targeting an underserved niche where the leader is weak.
   • Most tech companies start this way, gradually expanding as they establish dominance.
   • Example: Salesforce entered at the SMB end where Siebel was absent.
   • "This big fish small pond is the vast majority of tech companies… It's the easiest way to get traction into a market." — [18:32]
3. Category Creation
   • Only necessary when what you do is truly new and no other category fits.
   • Involves first convincing the market they have a problem, then positioning your product as the answer.
   • High risk, long-term investment (often spans a decade), with potential for fast-followers to overtake after you educate the market.
   • “The scary part about category creation...is that sometimes it appears to work in the short term, but because it is such a long term investment...just as the market is starting to emerge...a fast follower can come in and just wipe you out.” — [27:00]

6. Should You Name Your Market Category?

• Sometimes you can just describe what you do without referencing a category, but risks include:
  • Customers or analysts placing you in an ill-fitting category
  • Internal misalignment, sales teams improvising and muddying market perception
  • "If you don't define this is the market category that we're in. The risk is that a couple of bad things might happen. The first one is customers will decide that you're in some other market category that you don't actually want to be in." — [31:51]

7. April’s Advice

• Don’t overthink categories; start by examining if your current one works and only consider adjacent or completely new categories if guided by necessity.
  • "In conclusion, I'd like to say don't overthink your market category." — [36:46]
• If you must create a new category, be aware of the significant long-term effort required.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On aspirational categories:
  "...you often end up with this sort of aspirational market category that doesn't actually match to the capabilities of the offerings that you actually have in market." — [02:20]
• On orienting customers:
  "A good market category sets off a set of assumptions about your product that are true." — [07:31]
• On the perils of ambiguity:
  "If you don't have a really tight, succinct answer for [what you are], what'll happen is everybody interacting with customers will answer that question in a different way, and it'll be very confusing to the market." — [32:46]
• On creating new categories:
  "If you are truly a new market category, it's because people don't even know they have the problem. So at the beginning, what you're doing is not selling your solution, you're not even selling the category, you're selling the problem." — [24:41]
• On practical category adjustment:
  "If the existing market category works, we don't touch it. That's it. The market category works. So we're not going to mess with it." — [11:21]

Key Timestamps

• 00:00 – Why companies overthink market categories; overview of the updated positioning process
• 06:15 – The real job of a market category ("points them in the direction of your value")
• 08:16 – The “Do No Harm” rule and what goes wrong with misleading categories
• 11:21 – How to decide whether to keep, adjust, or replace your market category
• 12:35 – Anchor concepts when inventing new categories
• 15:08 – Head-to-head positioning and when it makes sense
• 18:32 – Big fish, small pond: wedge strategies and the story of Salesforce vs. Siebel
• 24:41 – The challenge (and decade-long timeline) of new category creation
• 27:00 – The vulnerability to fast followers in category creation
• 31:51 – Why naming your category matters internally and externally
• 36:46 – April’s concluding advice: start simple and only embrace new categories when absolutely necessary

Overall Tone & Delivery

April’s tone is practical, direct, and slightly humorous, emphasizing pragmatic strategies over theory. She leverages concrete examples and anecdotes for clarity, remaining focused on actionable insights for founders, marketers, and business leaders.

Final Takeaways

• Examine the current market category before making changes
• Add qualifiers or move adjacent rather than inventing anew unless absolutely required
• Category creation is rare, risky, and needs deep commitment
• Always align category choice with true, differentiated value and best-fit customers

For more questions or deeper dives, April encourages listeners to reach out for future episode topics.