The reflex
The team has designed a service. When it comes to presenting it, they are still working out who it is for, which alternative it replaces, and what they can promise.
The builder’s reflex
Bring the questions of recipient, alternative and promise into the design, from the start.
Why
Marketing does not start when the product is finished. It answers the questions that decide the product: for whom, instead of what, and why choose it. The words, the design and the channels then make that answer visible.
“Retailers” is too wide a group to decide anything. “The person reconciling stock and sales at closing time” is a situation you can go and see. The more precise the description, the easier the choices: which needs to handle, which to leave, which evidence to show.
If the marketing team meets the product at the end, what they know arrives too late. One conversation on a decisive question, at the start, is often enough.
With no commercial activity, the same questions help you present a training, a resource or an internal service.
Try this
Answer four questions briefly:
For whom, and in what situation?
Instead of what, today?
What useful change, with what limits?
Why try now, or why wait?
Compare your answers with a colleague’s, or with someone affected. Pick one assumption to check at the next conversation, and adjust the promise to what you hear.
To discuss
Which part of our presentation rests on an assumption nobody has checked?