Obviously Awesome
How to Nail Product Positioning so Customers Get It, Buy It, Love It
You know your product is awesome—but does anybody else? Forget everything you thought you knew about positioning. Successfully connecting your product with consumers isn’t a matter of following trends, comparing yourself to the competition, or trying to attract the widest customer base.
So what is it? April Dunford, positioning guru and tech exec, is here to enlighten you.
Her new book, Obviously Awesome, shows you how to find your product’s “secret sauce”—and then sell that sauce to those who crave it. Having spent years as a start-up executive (with sixteen product launches under her belt) and a consultant (who’s worked on dozens more), Dunford speaks with authority about breaking through the noise of a crowded market.
Punctuated with witty anecdotes and compelling case studies, Dunford’s book is at once entertaining and illuminating. Among the invaluable lessons you’ll learn are:
- The Five (Plus One) Components of Effective Positioning
- How to instantly connect the right audience to your offering’s value
- How to choose the best market for your products
- How to use three distinct styles of positioning to your advantage
- How to leverage market trends to help buyers understand why making a purchase is important right now
Whether you’re an entrepreneur, marketer, or salesperson struggling to bring inventive products to market, Dunford’s insights will help you find your awesome, so that your customers can too.
Reviews
“April Dunford is the master at positioning and bringing B2B tech to market. Obviously Awesome pulls together two decades of her experience into a brilliant step-by-step book that actually shows us how to do positioning, rather than just talking about it—with great examples and a few chuckles along the way.”
“In this valuable book, April Dunford proves that products can be transformed by changing their context. Obviously Awesome is a must-read for any founder, marketer, or salesperson struggling to make their product stand out in crowded markets. We spend a lot of time talking about product and engineering, and not enough time thinking about marketing and positioning—this book can help change that.”
“Three years ago, April Dunford contributed invaluable work for Redgate, helping us position our company around a reframed area with more growth opportunities and a bigger mission than we had before. Since then our revenues have grown substantially, in part due to our better positioning. In her new book, Obviously Awesome, she provides an easy-to-understand framework for you to do your own positioning work. If you run through her 10-Step Positioning Process and give yourself the chance to allow the scales to fall from your eyes, you’ll improve your positioning and ultimately, your product.”
“April Dunford is the thought leader across the country and beyond when it comes to marketing and positioning for start-ups. She has an uncanny ability to see well ahead on how tech companies will be perceived by their users and customers, and has incredible insights for founders as they launch and scale their start-ups.”
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“Great positioning is an unbeatable advantage. But you’re probably doing it wrong. This book fixes that, offering a clear road map that businesses of any size can use to find and communicate their unique advantages on their own terms.”
“Positioning. Is. Hard. Really hard. But April Dunford gets it better than anyone I know. Candid, deeply knowledgeable, and—just as she is onstage—obviously hilarious. April is a master storyteller, and if you liked her keynote talk, you are going to love this book.”
“April Dunford’s two decades of marketing leadership in large companies and small give her a unique perspective on positioning. This how-to guide is a must-read. Before you spend a dollar on sales and marketing, read April’s book on positioning.”
“Obviously Awesome is the playbook for making your market category work for you instead of against you. If your product is hard for customers to figure out, this book is for you.”
“April Dunford may know more about product positioning than any person alive and her deep, practical experience shines in this book. Witty, thoughtful, and genuinely useful, Obviously Awesome is the must-read bible on positioning. If your product is hard for customers to figure out, this book is for you.”
“Sometimes you need a smart, experienced outsider to help you see things in your business in a different light. April Dunford is that person.”
“Having an experienced outsider work with you can be really valuable to help you see your business from a new perspective. April Dunford helped us navigate our complex industry landscape and clarify the core of our positioning.”
“April Dunford’s product positioning knowledge and experience are voluminous and she has an unparalleled ability to apply them. Before working with her, we really struggled to quickly and simply articulate our value proposition to customers and often left them confused. When we went through her positioning workshop, she was able to help us home in on a place in the landscape and a value to customers that made sense to people immediately. She’s distilled the elements of the workshop into this book clearly and simply, making it possible for product marketers and entrepreneurs alike to take themselves through the key steps to successfully positioning your product or company. Highly recommended!”
“April Dunford’s deep experience working with start-ups shines in this treasure trove of strategic marketing goodness.”
“April Dunford has decades of practical and value-driven experience leading teams at early stage companies. There are few go-to-market professionals that have proven scale-up success across multiple organizations. If you are a start-up looking for assistance to accelerate your business and learn from someone who has really been there and done that, April’s your gal.”
“Obviously Awesome is a tremendously valuable guide for marketers at companies of all sizes. April Dunford knows better than just about anyone how much companies struggle to understand the relationship between their product and the context through which their product is viewed by the outside world. This book is perfect for founders, marketers, or salespeople who need to move beyond the basic process of writing down a positioning statement and actually doing the work to make their product stand out in crowded markets.”
“You won’t meet anyone who understands the art of positioning as deeply as April Dunford. I wish that every founder I worked with would read this. I have no doubt that Obviously Awesome will quickly become the de facto reference text on positioning. (Bonus: I literally laughed out loud.)”
“April Dunford’s trademark wit and entertaining style make Obviously Awesome easily the best business book of the year. If you want your customer acquisition costs to go down, sales to close faster, and your customers to stick around longer, you need to position your products to be ‘obviously awesome’ too. Move over, Eric Ries and Steve Blank, there’s a new must-read book in town for start-up founders and executives.”
“This is marketing mojo in a box. We finally have a book on positioning that is prescriptive and not just descriptive, and April’s process really works. Buy the book. Read the book. Use the book.”
“April Dunford wisely reminds us that sexy marketing tactics and technologies are, ultimately, at the mercy of the product’s positioning. In stepping us through the process to deliver obviously awesome positioning, April gives us a beautiful gift: the ability to align the entire company’s efforts behind a winning strategy.”
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$18.95 CAD • $15.95 USD
Published May 14, 2019
Paperback, ebook