Category First – Details, episodes & analysis

Josh hosted a live workshop to help folks get their positioning back on track. Topics included: 

• The Three Hard Positioning Problems everybody faces.
• The best tool to fix each one. 
• And why everything will fall into place when you master these tools.

Josh has written the positioning for over 100 companies including Uber, Qualtrics and Gainsight. And he’s the founder of Gold Front, the category design studio. 

Now let’s fix your positioning.

Josh shares the Gold Front Category Design Canvas, a tool that helps you ask and answer the essential questions for crafting great category strategy. Plus, there’s a Mario-themed mnemonic that makes the canvas easy to remember.

This is the actual tool we use to help tech companies design new categories. Did we mention it’s Mario-themed?

Josh tries to teach ChatGPT to be his strategist, which gets him thinking the future of knowledge work.

Later, he shares four “New World Skills” that will be in high demand as AI takes off.

Submit questions and subscribe to our newsletter here: categoryfirst.substack.com

We hate to break it to you, but your website probably sucks. (Even ours needs some TLC).

But don't stress, Josh will walk you through the 5 reasons why your website is not looking so good, and how to make it better.

Submit questions and subscribe to our newsletter here: categoryfirst.substack.com

Josh hosts a special Q&A episode with John Weeke, a Product Marketing Manager at Iron cloud, to talk about the differences between positioning and category strategy. Some highlights: 

• How positioning can sometimes lead to companies being only incrementally better than their competitors.
• Why you need different versions of your company's story, such as a more visionary story for a CEO presentation, or a more tactical story for sales strategy. 
• How ChatGPT and AI will lead to a flurry of new categories. 

Submit questions and subscribe to our newsletter here: categoryfirst.substack.com

Josh answers listener questions about category creation.

• Who are your biggest mentors and influences?
• You work for a lot of startups. Is business slow?
• Should my company design a category now for cheap? Or wait until we hopefully secure our next round of funding?
• My company offers a complex product with different use cases. Why do I need one strategic narrative?

Submit questions and subscribe to our newsletter here: categoryfirst.substack.com

​​Josh answers Patrick's questions about category creation.

• Why do we urge clients to stick to the "shift, gap, category idea" story structure?
• What do you disagree with or do differently than the book Play Bigger.
• What's the value of pushing B2B brands towards design that's so much different than they are used to?
• How's the Category First podcast going? What's the behind the scenes right now?

Submit questions and subscribe to our newsletter here: categoryfirst.substack.com

Josh answers listener questions about category creation. 

• How does Andy Raskin's idea of "the old way vs. the new way," when creating a strategic narrative, relate to category?
• There's a lot of chatter about companies creating their own media brands. Will this replace category creation? How do you see those two things working together? 
• My company is SEO crazy, but how do you do SEO for a category that doesn't exist yet?

Submit questions and subscribe to our newsletter here: categoryfirst.substack.com

Welcome to a new feature of the pod: Let's Write a Book. Josh and Ben talk through ideas for the first chapter of the Category First book, entitled “Strategy Is Thinking”.

Highlights include:

• Why "Strategy is thinking about what you do, before you do it" is such a powerful first principle to begin category creation from.
• When thinking is not actually thinking.
• Why all great category creators rebel against the status quo.
• And why, when changing the trajectory of your company, the CEO is your greatest point of leverage.

Did you know there's a newsletter too? Check it out at: categoryfirst.substack.com

ChatGPT-4 is out. How will AI change category design (and everything else under the Sun)? Josh shares "Three Stages of AI" as it relates to category creation. 

Submit questions and subscribe to our newsletter here: categoryfirst.substack.com