How to differentiate your B2B startup in 15 minutes

Differentiation is what every startups ultimately crave.

It’s on the lips of everyone, from VC to founders to marketers.

“Don’t be better, be different”

But often, we think that differentiation means to create something that don’t exist yet. And that’s not the case folks.

What you need sometimes is just to be contrarian, because it’s different enough from the sea of sameness that we’re experiencing in B2B.

This is funny because all of our lives, we’re trying to be “better” or the best. That’s why there’s so many startups saying that they are the #1 or best {insert software category}.

I can tell you that I’m the best boxer, but when you discover that I’ve been doing it just for 3 months, and I haven’t done any sparring, you’ll be quick to guess that I’m full of 💩

The same effect happens when I take a look at lousy websites where they social proof are clearly built from their network, and they are way too small to reflect what market leaders are doing.

So stop lying to yourself and your place in your market, whether you’re the best, or the easiest, or the coolest.

👉 Be different instead, and start with your messaging

I’m going to show you how to differentiate your startup within 15 minutes.

Without having to wait 2 months for core feature updates to be done on the roadmap.

Let’s dig in 👇

Differentiation starts with positioning

I will die on this hill.

You can’t just create new tech, and not having a positioning strategy, especially with AI were everyone can jump on Cursor and start building SaaS

Your positioning means:

ICP + Differentiation

Keep in mind that there’s never a right position, like there’s never a right roadmap

You can choose to ignore this, but this is making your go-to-market even more challenging because you can’t win against your market leaders, and you are only relying on unscalable traction channels.

The best way to start is to understand that there’s different layers of positioning:

Three layers of positioning

There’s three ways on how you can approach your positioning and use that to differentiate.

Strategic, Brand, and Competitive

Differentiation is the benefit we want and positioning is the feature.

Your capability is the layer you’ll choose 👇

1. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝘁𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗴𝗶𝗰 𝗣𝗼𝘀𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻

The strategic position is the way you’re approaching your positioning as a business strategy. It goes hand in hand with your product roadmap and business objectives.

Remember, GTM inconsistency happens by isolating these three pillars:

➡️ business strategy (the “where”)

➡️ product strategy (the “what”)

➡️ positioning strategy (the “how”)

Think of this as the “secret position.” It's the core decisions you make - at this stage, you don't even need to act on them.

• The category you choose to play in (e.g., Sales CRM vs. Operation CRM or Data Warehouse vs. Business Intelligence Software)

• The target audience you aim for (e.g., Small PMM Teams vs. Series A Founders)

• Who do you consider competitors (Market leaders vs. DIY with Google Sheets)

• How do you plan to win against them (Generalist approach vs Specialist approach)

2. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗕𝗿𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗣𝗼𝘀𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻

Brand is strongly related to product marketing, our job is attention.

Brand is emotion, not what we say but how we make people feel.

This is the perception of your company in the buyer's eye.

How your brand feels to others (e.g., “feels expensive,” “feels scrappy”, "feels enterprise").

You are trying to shape what buyers think when they interact with your brand

This is what we’ve been doing with We’re Not Marketers

• We use humour to play on the pains of PMMs with spicy memes

• We’re using skeletons to show that we’re “dead inside”

• People recognize our brand, voice, and tone

And that’s how we’re positioning it in a way to get sponsored throughout different seasons.

3. 𝗖𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗲𝘁𝗶𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗣𝗼𝘀𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻

This one is a must in crowded markets (cough, cough, martech anyone?)

This is about the problem you solve and how your approach compares to the other options a buyer has

The other paths your buyers might choose, the alternatives in mind.

• What makes you comparable?

• What makes you different?

• For which ICP are you the best choice?

This is where your differentiation comes in.

These layers are important, but you know what is “importanter”?

Understanding that new features or capabilities aren’t your only way to be unique

Capabilities aren’t your only weapon

There’s a misconception, mainly across technologists, that the best way to win is to have the amazing new technology or features.

This isn’t true anymore.

Your differentiation doesn’t always need to stand on new tech.

There’s a concept explaining by Jon Itkin, we’re having him on our podcast this season, called advantage stacking.

He’s explaining the four C framework that help you come up with a positioning statement on how you differentiate.

Capabilities: What your product features help people to, whether it’s something new, something more or something better.

Credibility: Why buyers should believe what you say.

Convenience: How much easier are you to buy?

Cost: Do you deliver greater value relative to cost?

This is basically increasing the difficulty for others to copy, and staying different by doing it.

So you can lean on unique aspects other than putting MORE FEATURES on the roadmap.

P.S. If you’re not following Jon on LinkedIn, his stuff on positioning is criminally underrated.

Bring market context with AI research

Now, you want to differentiate your messaging, but you’re not sure where to start?

I gotchu, let’s create a prompt together for a deep research AI.

I’ve got everything I need after my friend Elliott Rayner did this post on how to prompt deep research content:

Here’s one you can start using with any AI Deep Research function:

—

🟢 Goal: We need 5 differentiated positioning statements for our startup {Startup}, aimed at {ICP} who face {Pains} and want to achieve {Goals}. Each statement must follow the format: “{ICP} + {Differentiation}.” We will draw on the Four C framework—Capabilities, Credibility, Convenience, Cost—to highlight unique value. Each statement should reference one of the three positioning layers (strategic, brand, or competitive).

🔵 Format: 

• Provide exactly 5 differentiation statements in the form “{ICP} + {Differentiation}.”

• Each statement references strategic, brand, or competitive positioning.

• Include brief Four C analysis below each statement (1 bullet per C) focusing on the biggest highlight.

• Avoid superlatives, jargon, fluff, unrealistic claims, or empty adjectives. Keep language tight and impactful.

🔴 Warnings: Example of desired format Positioning (Brand Layer): “Dark web monitoring for US fintechs targeting Gen Z + instant threat alerts.”

• Capabilities (C1): Real-time alerts for suspicious activities.

• Credibility (C2): Used by leading neobanks for secure compliance.

• Convenience (C3): One dashboard to track all potential breaches.

• Cost (C4): Subscription scales as fintech grows.

⚫ Context: 

This research feeds into our larger differentiation initiative to capture attention in a competitive market. Our POV is {POV}—we believe {Key Belief or Approach}.

Please deliver 5 statements with this precise structure and style.

—

Copying this will then ask you to fill in the gaps in brackets.

You can access the specific reply it gave me with the startup Journey.

“Get the chat”

Get 5 positioning statements to pitch with AI

Now, you should have 5 differentiation statements related to your startup, this is your positioning strategy.

The goal of this is to get different ideas and angle you might have not thought about.

And now you can validate some of these elements with analysing market segments and doubling down on what sounds good.

Here’s a few examples:

Dark web monitoring for fintech in the US targeting gen z consumer (specific so more emotion)

Pay only per copy, with a copywriting agency that ship so fast you think we use AI. Copy so good you know we didn’t. (cost and convenience)

Focus on the mental health and employee retention in tech sales (credibility and capability)

Start differentiating your messaging now

This is the part where I self-promote 🤓

I sell a 2-week Message Market Fit Sprint™—a structured, repeatable process that pressure-tests your messaging with real ICPs across outbound, paid, and landing pages to show what actually drives the pipeline, and what falls flat.

You’ll find out in 2 weeks if your positioning is a growth lever… or a silent pipeline killer. No more guessing. No more “we think it’ll work” launches.

Book an audit to find your messaging gap and if your messaging is differentiated.

That’s all folks, salut 👋