Aphorisms for Curious Marketers
Yes, moving the goalposts can be a trap.
But installing them with concrete isn’t what makes them useful.
The Death of Best
A classic positioning play is to call yourself “the best X.”
From broad: “the best CRM”
To narrow: “the best time tracking software for freelance programmers”
But in all cases it involves the seeker being explicit about the solution they are in search of.
The rise of personalization—accelerated by AI—means there is no longer a global best*. Or even a need to start with a specific solution in mind.
Every shopper is now building a personal contextual layer that adds another filter to the selection process (whether deliberately or just through the use of algorithmic tools).
As a basic example, a user may search for “best car” but their contextual layer can understand what they really mean is “what is the best mid-priced car for a family with elementary school age kids…etc & so on” based on the accumulated understanding from prior queries and tasks.
For humans, your brand is a story.
For algorithms, your brand is a list of attributes to be matched against.
Two sides of the same coin. Same core, different package.
*there was never a global best