What are messaging and positioning, and what's your role in them?

Positioning explains how your product or company fits relative to the alternatives your audience already understands. Messaging turns that choice into language people can use. Your agency can help research, challenge, and express the idea; you supply the business knowledge and check that the promises are true.

A useful result makes the company easier to understand. It should help a founder, salesperson, or spokesperson explain the same basic idea without sounding rehearsed.

Start with the confusion you want to remove

Fictional example: A company describes itself as “an intelligent collaboration platform.” Prospects keep asking whether it replaces their project-management tool.

A clearer position might be: “Software that helps construction teams resolve questions between the office and the job site.” That tells a reader who it serves and what it helps them do. Whether it is the right position depends on the product and customer evidence.

The agency should help choose the meaningful distinction, not merely find more polished adjectives.

Recognize a useful messaging deliverable

Look for a clear explanation of the audience, the problem, the alternatives, and the reason to choose your approach. The main messages should have concrete support: an example, a product capability, a customer experience used with permission, or evidence the team can explain.

Ask the agency to show the language in a few relevant contexts, such as a company description, a founder answer, and a product explanation. A phrase that works on a slide may be awkward in conversation.

You should understand why the agency recommends the language and what it deliberately leaves out.

Give feedback on meaning before polishing words

Helpful feedback sounds like:

• “Customers use this for a different problem than the one this sentence describes.”
• “That claim is broader than our testing supports.”
• “This sounds like a replacement for a tool we integrate with.”
• “Here is how a customer described the benefit.”

That helps the agency fix the underlying idea. A long sequence of adjective changes often makes the writing less useful.

Let the agency push back when internal terminology is confusing. Equally, challenge language that is distinctive but untrue. Your strongest position must still fit the business.

Check the claims people will rely on

Product, performance, customer, financial, and security claims should be checked by someone who knows the facts. Get permission before using customer names, quotes, or results.

For U.S. promotional claims, the FTC's substantiation policy requires a reasonable basis for objective claims before publication. Regulated or otherwise high-risk claims may need specialist review.

Keep the final language and supporting material somewhere your team can use it. Revisit it when the product, audience, or evidence changes. Useful messaging should make everyday communication easier, rather than create another document nobody opens.

See reviewing without strangling for giving feedback on actual pitches and quotes.