Selected work/Case study 02
A founder-led creative community and technology venture needed to sell its first founding customers on a platform still being built. I turned a year of evolving material into one source of truth, and a document set built so that a stranger can understand it, a buyer can check it and a seller can run it.
01 · What was needed
The positioning problem is not solved by making the future bigger. It is solved by moving the sale into the present.
From the positioning work
02 · How I approached it
Around a hundred legacy documents were read and sorted into authority, source of language or retired. Founder working sessions and a decision questionnaire, itself audited before use, captured the founder’s intent first-hand. A sourced evidence review documented the market problem and set a ceiling on every market figure the copy could use.
A governing document set out what the offer is, what may be said and which source wins in a conflict, and a dated decision register carried later rulings forward. A terminology guide added a never-say list, each rule with its reason. Two dozen conflicts were each ruled on once and applied across the set. Where something wasn’t built yet: paint, don’t promise. Lead with intent; never invent mechanics.
Two brand systems: the client’s own for anything a buyer sees, mine for internal working documents. Approved wording was reused before anything new was drafted, and every change was logged with its before and after. AI-assisted throughout, with a person approving every word in the final set.
Five rounds of adversarial audit, including cross-model QA. The first full set alone produced 33 findings, each fixed or put to a ruling, then re-verified. Line-by-line review rounds then locked all seven documents. Next: founder sign-off, release, and the sales motion the playbook describes.
03 · What was created
A buyer reads five of them. The other nine are why those five hold up: in the first meeting, under due diligence, and in the hands of a seller who wasn’t in the room when the decisions were made.
Same prices, verbatim
Why the venture exists and who it serves, built from the founder’s own words.
Shows buyers the creative community they are helping to build, as it will meet the platform.
The first-meeting story: the problem, the model, the offer and the next step.
What the buyer receives now, what activates later and on what conditions. Home of the master price table.
Answers the hard questions in writing, before a buyer has to ask them.
Supplies the argument
The argument behind every buyer document: the category, the audiences, value propositions, evidence, permitted claims, and approved copy at every length.
Written for a capable stranger: ideal customer profile, sourcing, message architecture, qualification, eight evidence-based stages, CRM design and what never to promise.
The founding rulebook: what the offer is, what may be said, and which source wins when two disagree.
Settled terms, sanctioned wording and a never-say list, each rule with its reason.
Every ruling dated, every departure from approved wording logged, and a canonical text of each locked document.
Adversarial audits of the spine, the questionnaire and the finished set. Each finding fixed or ruled on, then re-verified.
Evidence before rulings
Working sessions, a decision questionnaire audited before use, and product and delivery discovery.
Documents the market problem with sourced, dated data, and sets a ceiling on every market figure the copy may use.
About a hundred earlier documents classified as authority, language source or retired; every risky claim logged and ruled on.
The spine governs every term, price & claim above
Clients are described anonymously while engagements are live. Named references on request, where clients agree.
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