If you were to do a survey of executives, sales people, marketing and other market facing personnel within a company and ask them how they would describe a specific product to a potential prospect, I bet in the majority of cases, you would hear almost as many explanations as there were people interviewed. This really is a messaging nightmare that might be undermining the success of your product(s). This results in significant marketplace confusion, impacts revenue generation and reflects poorly on your product. We as Product Managers and Product Marketers like to blame the messenger for this problem, but the likely reality is that we are at fault. As PMs & PMMS, we must own the message and then enable the organization to take this message to the market. The starting point for doing this is a Powerful Messaging Platform. Key Takeaways: * Understand the key business drivers for developing a messaging platform * Discover the most important, but yet often overlooked, starting point for your messaging * Learn the five key components of a successful Messaging Platform * Understand how the Messaging Platform contributes to more success in the market.

1. Going from Messaging Nightmare to
Messaging Delight - How to Create a
Powerful Messaging Platform
Tom Evans
CompellingPM
@compellingpm
Copyright 2013. The Lûcrum Group, Inc. 1

2. Poll Question 1
Does your company have a standard/structured
approach to creating a marketing messages?
a) Yes, all new product marketing initiatives start
with a standard messaging platform.
b) Sometimes we create a messaging platform, but
this is not a standard.
c) No, we never create a messaging platform.
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3. Without a Messaging Platform
• Market facing personnel each have their unique
set of messages they use
• Product marketing is constantly putting out fires
and rushing to create messages on short notice
• Marketing creates messages with no input from
the product team
• Marketing and sales tools fail to motivate target
buyers
Confusion in the market place!
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4. What is a Messaging Platform?
A Messaging Platform serves as a reference to
all “market-facing” personnel in your
organization to ensure consistency & accuracy of
messaging for your product (or company).
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5. Poll Question 2
What is the most important starting point for a
messaging platform ?
a) Selecting the most critical product features to
communicate
b) Feedback from the sales team on what messages
work the best
c) Product positioning
d) Alignment with senior executives
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7. Messaging Platform Structure
Positioning
Key Messages / w Evidence
Tagline Talk Track
Product
Descriptions
FAQs
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8. Guides All Other Tools & Programs
MessagingPlatform
Marketing & Sales
Tools
Marketing
Campaigns
Public Relations
Product Demos
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9. Messaging Platform Structure
Positioning
Key Messages / w Evidence
Tagline Talk Track
Product
Descriptions
FAQs
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10. Positioning Decisions
1. Target Market(s)
2. Key Problems Solved
3. Most Important Value Proposition
– What we do for our customers
4. Key Points of Differentiation
– Why us
Copyright 2013. The Lûcrum Group, Inc.

11. Target Markets
• Messages must resonate with target audience
– Corollary: it will not (& shouldn’t) resonate with all
• Key Personas – Buyers, Influencers, Users
– What do they care about
– What language do they use
– Typical profile/characteristics
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12. Key Problems Solved
• What are the buyers motivations (per buyer
persona)?
– Need, pain, goal, challenge, ideals
– Personal & business
– Articulated & unarticulated
– What do they need to know to make a decision
– How will they evaluate & use your product?
Copyright 2013. The Lûcrum Group, Inc.

13. Value Proposition
• What we do for you!
• Benefits & value your customer will realize from
purchase and use of your product
• Relative to customer’s other viable alternatives
• Sources of value:
– Reference customers, industry expertise, internal processes,
partnerships, innovation, IP, delivery methods, geography, social,
business model, personnel, features, guarantees, brand promise, core
competencies, etc.
– Speaking to your customers
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14. Differentiation
• Why us!
• What makes your product stand out
• Meaningful value to the customer
• Sources of differentiation:
– Reference customers, industry expertise, internal processes, partnerships,
innovation, IP, delivery methods, geography, social, business model,
personnel, features, guarantees, brand promise, core competencies, etc.
– Speaking to your customers
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15. Positioning Statement
• For [target end user]
• Who wants/needs [compelling reason to buy]
• The [product name] is a [product category]
• That provides [key benefit].
• Unlike [main competitor (s)],
• The [product name] [key differentiation]
Copyright 2013. The Lûcrum Group, Inc.
Adapted from: Geoffrey Moore - Crossing the Chasm

16. Messaging Platform Structure
Positioning
Key Messages / w Evidence
Tagline Talk Track
Product
Descriptions
FAQs
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17. Key Messages
• Per target buyer persona
• 2 to 4 messages per persona
• In customer’s language
– Avoid meaningless words
– Not advertising language
• Support positioning
Copyright 2013. The Lûcrum Group, Inc.

18. Messages Are Benefit Statements
• Too many market messages are about features or
technology
• Changing to benefits
– Why is a feature important (so what?)
– What does it mean to the customer
– Use “So That”
• Example
– 4 inch Retina display
– “So that” you can view photo quality images and still
use it effectively with one hand
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19. Message Alignment
Strategic Increase plant profitability
Get new customers / Gain market share
Increase customer loyalty
Managerial Reduce maintenance costs
Responsive to customer orders
Focus staff on higher value activities
Reduce staffing costs
Operational Reduce Process Upsets
Reduce Time to handle process upsets
Faster transitions between grades
More time for process improvement
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20. Supporting Evidence
• You stated a message, but why should
someone believe the message?
– Reason to believe
• 2 to 4 points of evidence per message
• Sources
– Customer testimonials, unbiased testing,
distinguishing features, third party validation,
facts & statistics, etc.
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21. Exercise
Product Name: SmartCredit
Target Market
Small to Medium Size Credit Card Issuers
VP of Cards
 Must grow total outstanding balances from a reduced number of prospects
 Looking for promotion to top executive in cards or other line of business
 Wants to avoid all potential confrontation with Feds over marketing tactics
 Middle age, male, MBA, full career in credit card services
Key Problems Solved
Risk management platform
 Must grow portfolio size while maintaining portfolio risk.
 Must profitably compete against the top 10 card issuers for new cardholders.
 Low capital investment (can’t afford multi-million dollar investment)
Value Proposition
• Compete cost effectively and take market share from top 10 competitors
• Profitably grow outstanding balances without increasing delinquencies and write-offs
Differentiation
• No capital investment and quick implementation (less than 3 months).
Key Messages
• Achieves the same risk management power that the large competitors have.
• Delivered as a service with no custom development and capital investment.
• Allows you to quickly adapt new risk management strategies as market conditions change
Evidence
• Bank X increased portfolio size by 25% while reducing delinquencies by 10%
• No software to install, monthly subscription fees
• Bank Y was able to create and test new risk management strategies in less than a week (v. 3 months with
traditional systems)
• Bank Z was operational within 4 months of contract (v 18 months with major competitor)
Copyright 2013. The Lûcrum Group, Inc.

22. Poll Question 3
Who in your organization is responsible for
defining the market messages?
– Marketing Communications
– Executive Management
– Product Management
– Product Marketing
– Everyone
– No One
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23. Messaging Platform Structure
Positioning
Key Messages
Tagline Talk Track
Product
Descriptions
FAQs
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24. Tagline
• Succinctly communicates the essence of your
brand promise in a memorable way
• Creates a first impression
• No Tagline is better than a bad Tagline
• Memorable taglines
– Just Do It
– Because so much is riding on your tires
– 1000 songs in your pocket
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25. Talk Track
• Guides the initial conversation
• Leads to a longer conversation (sales
call/presentation)
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26. Developing Talk Track
1. Sales Opener (Elevator Speech) - 30 seconds to get
attention
– What your company/product does
– Key problem addressed for that target market
– Key benefits received
2. Talking Points - another 2 minutes to lead to longer
discussion
– Brief statement on how you do that
– Communicate key benefits (aligned with key messages)
– Provide evidence (case study, testimonial)
– Create a vision of success for them
– Ask for longer conversation
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27. Product Description
• Boiler plate product description
• Various lengths
– 50, 100, 150, 200, 250 words
• Use in press releases, news articles, SEO,
tradeshows, etc.
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28. FAQS
• Answers most common questions from
prospects/customers/press
• Can address questions on competition
• Keeps “market facing” personnel on message
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29. Summary
• Messaging platform ensures consistency of
message.
• Must be owned by Product Marketing (or
Product Management)
• Key element to feed all other marketing facing
tools and programs
• Validate with your target markets
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30. My Next Webinar
What is a Go-To-Market Strategy Anyway & How
Do I Create One?
TBD
http://www.aipmm.com/aipmm_webinars
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31. Upcoming Training
• Optimal Product Management & Product Marketing
– Sep 5 – 7 (Mexico City)
– Sep 9 – 11 (Austin)
– Oct 14 – 16 (Dallas)
• AIPMM Certifications
– Nov 5 – 6 (CPM – Austin)
– Nov 7 – 8 (CPMM – Austin)
More dates/locations - www.280group.com
Copyright 2013. The Lûcrum Group, Inc. 31

32. Free 1 Hour PM/PMM Consult
• First ten to submit information on form
• http://compellingpm.com/freeonehour/
• Please include background on topic or issue
• Must include company info (no Gmail)
Copyright 2013. The Lûcrum Group, Inc. 32

33. Thank You!
Tom Evans
CompellingPM
tevans@compellingpm.com
@compellingpm
www.compellingpm.com
Copyright 2013. The Lûcrum Group, Inc. 33