The art of building legendary brands | Arielle Jackson (Google, Square, First Round Capital)

1. 0:00 – 4:04

   About our guest Arielle Jackson

   1. AJArielle Jackson0:00

      ... so over time, a word can come to mean something that is beyond what that actual word means. Like, Disney means magic today, you know? Volvo means safety. Those names are not good. Like, (laughs) if I just put it in a spreadsheet or one of those lists, no one would pick it. So that's kind of what I mean that, like, the name is just part of the overall marketing or the overall brand, and a bad name with a really great company, with great company strategy, great marketing is gonna be great over time. And, um, a, a good name is just gonna help you, but I don't think a bad name is gonna kill a good company.

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky0:40

      (instrumental music) Ariel Jackson spent nine years at Google, where she helped grow Gmail in its early days, taking it from just a side project to a product that is now used by hundreds of millions of people all over the world. Then she went on to Square, where she was one of the first marketers and helped launch and scale the growth of Square Reader. She's also worked with over 100 early stage companies, helping them nail their brand and marketing efforts, including Patreon, Loom, Front, Eero, Maven, Sprig, just to name a few. These days, she teaches a super popular course on startup brand strategy, and she's a marketer in residence at First Round Capital. In our chat, we cover primarily three things, naming strategies for your startup or your product, a framework for developing your brand that includes your purpose, your positioning, and your personality, and also getting PR for your startup. I can't wait for you to listen to this conversation with Ariel. And so with that I bring you Ariel Jackson. Hey, Ashley, head of marketing at Flatfile. How many B2B SaaS companies would you estimate need to import CSV files from their customers?

   3. NANarrator1:49

      At least 40%.

   4. LRLenny Rachitsky1:50

      And how many of them screw that up, and what happens when they do?

   5. NANarrator1:54

      Well, based on our data, about a third of people will consider switching to another company after just one bad experience during onboarding. So if your CSV importer doesn't work right, which is super common considering customer files are chock-full of unexpected data and formatting, they'll leave.

   6. LRLenny Rachitsky2:13

      I am 0% surprised to hear that. I've consistently seen that improving onboarding is one of the highest leverage opportunities for both sign-up conversion and increasing long-term retention. Getting people to your aha moment more quickly and reliably is so incredibly important.

   7. NANarrator2:28

      Totally. It's incredible to see how our customers like Square, Spotify, and Zuora are able to grow their businesses on top of Flatfile. It's because flawless data onboarding acts like a catalyst to get them and their customers where they need to go faster.

   8. LRLenny Rachitsky2:44

      If you'd like to learn more or get started, check out Flatfile at flatfile.com/lenny. This episode is brought to you by Unit. What do Gusto, Uber, Shopify, and AngelList all have in common? They've all decided to build banking into their product. According to AngelList head of product, "Banking makes every single feature more interesting. With it, our platform functions as financial mission control for our customers. Without it, we're just another software tool in a big, messy stack." Embedding banking into your product not only adds differentiation, but also helps you acquire, retain, and monetize your customers. Unit is the market leader in banking as a service, combining multiple bank partners with a developer-friendly API to empower companies of all sizes to launch accounts, cards, payments, and lending in just a few weeks. Unit is trusted by leading brands such as AngelList, HighBeam, Invoice2Go, and Roofstock. To hear more about how Unit enables companies like yours to build banking, visit unit.co/lenny to request a demo or to try their free sandbox. That's unit.co/lenny. Welcome to the podcast, Ariel.

   9. AJArielle Jackson4:01

      Thanks so much for having me. It's great to be here.

   10. LRLenny Rachitsky4:03

       It's

2. 4:04 – 12:32

   From making jewelry as a side hustle to launching products for Square: Arielle’s background

   1. LRLenny Rachitsky4:04

      absolutely my pleasure. I've read so much of your writing online. You've done a lot of writing, which I found really helpful, and so I'm really jazzed to be digging into all kinds of really good stuff. Before we get into some of the, the meat, just a couple questions that I had in my mind. You've worked with so many amazing companies, uh, Google, Square, Loom, Patreon, Front, so many others, uh, I'm not, I don't wanna keep going.

   2. AJArielle Jackson4:29

      (laughs)

   3. LRLenny Rachitsky4:30

      What's been, um, either your favorite or, or most unusual project that you've worked on?

   4. AJArielle Jackson4:35

      Gosh, it's like asking me to choose, like, my favorite son. I'm like, gosh, I can't really, like, pick one.

   5. LRLenny Rachitsky4:40

      That'll be the next question.

   6. AJArielle Jackson4:41

      I would probably say that my favorite project, and this is 'cause I get reminded of it, like, on a daily basis, was working at, on the Square stand at Square. It was the first time I ever worked on hardware, and I joined Square when it was, like, 140 people. We had no marketing function. We had a couple marketing people. We had no product managers, and the hardware team was running the show on launching this new product that was supposed to get us upmarket into brick and mortar, and anyway, I, I was running, like, event marketing at the time and giving away a bunch of those readers that you stick into a phone for free and having a lot of, like, you know, small merchants use us. And I, like, volunteered to run the launch of this product, like, as a product marketer for the first time, and it was just so fun, like, going, doing everything from, like, positioning it, figuring out how we were gonna talk about this beautiful new piece of hardware that would turn your iPad into a real point of sale. We had people fly around the country and get, like, cool coffee shops and brick and mortar businesses seated it, seating it so that they would all use it, or we had, I think, 15 metro areas covered with, like, the coolest coffee shops and donut shops and everything at launch. And, um, you know, there was a lot of "fake it till you make it." I was, like, negotiating a deal with Best Buy and the Apple Store. I'd never done anything like that before. Designing packaging was really awesome. There was just so much to it, like, launching a physical product and, and at the time, it was at a, like, a pretty high price point for a company that had always had, like, one free product, and helping that company go upmarket. I remember I was...... 30 something weeks pregnant when we launched. (laughs)

   7. LRLenny Rachitsky6:12

      Oh my God.

   8. AJArielle Jackson6:13

      W- w- we got all the Blue Bottle stores to use it, and we had this launch event where Jack and our head of hardware, Jesse, unveiled this product at the Blue Bottle in Mint Plaza, and I was, like, super pregnant and super proud, and I, I still, I still get kind of excited every time I pay on one of those, which is all the time.

   9. LRLenny Rachitsky6:30

      Super pregnant and super proud. (laughs)

   10. AJArielle Jackson6:32

       (laughs)

   11. LRLenny Rachitsky6:33

       I love it. And that product that was, like, the POS stand that, like, the iPad thing that you kinda swivel and sign.

   12. AJArielle Jackson6:39

       Yeah, and there's been new versions of it since, you know? There's a c- a contactless version of it and, um, there's one with an integrated screen that I think is Android-based which is, you know, you don't have to have an iPad, but that product's still around. Like, I still pay on that original Square stand all the time. I drink a lot of coffee like those-

   13. LRLenny Rachitsky6:56

       (laughs)

   14. AJArielle Jackson6:56

       ... independent coffee shops around LA, so they're all still using it. (laughs)

   15. LRLenny Rachitsky6:59

       If you recall, what was kind of the... We're gonna talk about positioning a bunch, but while we're on the topic, what was the positioning of that product while we're talking about it?

   16. AJArielle Jackson7:07

       Yeah, so at the time, Square was mostly used by, like, farmer's market vendors and, um, event vendors. Like, I made jewelry in a past life and that's how I got to Square, was, like, being one of those vendors.

   17. LRLenny Rachitsky7:20

       Hm.

   18. AJArielle Jackson7:20

       Um, and, uh, the, the positioning was really that it was for brick and mortar businesses, particularly quick serve coffee, you know, donuts, sandwich shops, that kind of, uh, quick serve brick and mortars, and it was up against your ugly old point of sale, you know, your cash register effectively. That w- that was our foil. And the benefit was turn your iPad into a point of sale, and the differentiator was about one unified experience that, you know, you're, you can do, you can do everything you can on your cash register and more, and it l- you'd be proud to have it out on your counter.

   19. LRLenny Rachitsky8:01

       So you said that you were creating jewelry and that's how you got into s- to Square to work on this product? Uh, I need to hear more about that. (laughs)

   20. AJArielle Jackson8:08

       Yeah, sure. So, um, I was working at Google before Square, and I'd always had this hobby of making jewelry, and I used to sell it, my jewelry, in a few different, like, boutiques around San Francisco and LA. It was, like, a very small side hustle, but it was, like, my creative outlet, and I sold at craft fairs around, like, Hanukkah, Christmastime. So I used to sell and just take cash, and then I got a Square Reader and I sold at a craft fair that year and it was awesome. Like, that Square Reader, it helped people buy more, it helped me sort of look cool. It was just really great to accept credit cards. I'd never done it before. I used to take PayPal invoices and, like, be on my computer and, like, send someone an invoice and then get it. It was painful. All the reasons that people use Square, you know, it was, it, I experienced it. And, um, two people I knew from Google, Megan Quinn and Kyle Zink had gone to Square from Google, and so after I had that experience, I think I sent them both an email just being like, "This thing's fucking awesome." You know, I s- I make jewelry, it was great. I sold, you know, I think it was, like, 50% more than I did last year 'cause I accepted credit cards. And I can't remember which of them wrote back first, but they were like, "Come interview." And so that was basically how I ended up at Square.

   21. LRLenny Rachitsky9:27

       Wow. I, I bet that helped you a lot through the interview, actual personal experience.

   22. AJArielle Jackson9:32

       (laughs) Having been a, a merchant? I think it helped me-

   23. LRLenny Rachitsky9:34

       Yeah.

   24. AJArielle Jackson9:34

       ... understand the, the small merchant that-

   25. LRLenny Rachitsky9:36

       Mm-hmm.

   26. AJArielle Jackson9:36

       ... initially we were marketing to.

   27. LRLenny Rachitsky9:38

       And so today you are marketing expert at, in residence at First Round Capital. I was gonna ask what, what does that mean and what is it that you do, uh, day-to-day these days?

   28. AJArielle Jackson9:51

       Sure. So after I left Square, I went to a tiny startup that was seven people. They were funded by First Round, and I helped them with everything that a tiny startup that's trying to grow needs.

   29. LRLenny Rachitsky10:04

       What startup was that?

   30. AJArielle Jackson10:06

       It was called Cover. They were acquired by Twitter.
3. 12:32 – 19:17

   What makes a good name for a product or a startup

   1. LRLenny Rachitsky12:32

      So for founders trying to come up with a name for their company or their product, two questions: What makes a good name for a product or a startup? And then just, like, how do you come up with a great name?

   2. AJArielle Jackson12:44

      I love naming. I think I've named just over 30 companies at this point. Um, and actually when I mentioned how I got into consulting when I emailed some friends and, you know, asked them if they needed marketing help, I think I'm allowed to talk about this one. So one of those companies was some friends from Google, Adrian and Carl. They had left Google, gone to Facebook, and then started a company. It's now called Seesaw. It's an ed tech company. That was the first company I named post-Google, Square, all of that.

   3. LRLenny Rachitsky13:09

      That's an awesome name.

   4. AJArielle Jackson13:10

      Um, it is awesome name, and I'll use it as an example. So Seesaw is a ed tech company. They had a really bad name before that, and we did this whole naming process and ended with that name. And why I think that's a good name is when I say it's an ed... When I say Seesaw, you don't really know what it is, but when I tell you, "Oh, it's this ed tech company, and it's an iPad app, and it helps you," you know, the work that elementary school students do go between the teacher, the parents, and the student. And you're like, "Oh, well Seesaw makes sense for elementary school." It's something that goes back and forth, it has that sort of nostalgic feel, and it makes sense that it's an ed tech company. And I personally tend to like those kinds of names that are suggestive or evocative, where when I tell you what the company does you're like, "Oh, that makes sense." But it's not that what the name is tells you exactly what the company does. Um, so that's an example I think of a, of a good name. Like, I don't know, um, during COVID and my son's school was closed, well, my older son's school was closed, and they all used Seesaw. And I got to tell my son, you know, "Oh, that's my friend's company, and we named it, you know, back in the day." And he was like, "Oh, that's cool. That name makes sense." That's what, that's the reaction you want. It also has a little bit of emotion to it. It has some nostalgia. Uh, it's fun to say. It's short. It's memorable. I think all of those things make a good name. Um, another, another company that has a good name that you and I have both worked with is Maven. So they're a first round company. Gagan has talked about this publicly. We named that company together. Maven is a Yiddish word that means one who understands.

   5. LRLenny Rachitsky14:50

      Wow.

   6. AJArielle Jackson14:50

      And it means specifically one who understands because they've done something. They've acquired the skills or knowledge over time. And I just think that's such a cool name for a platform that allows, you know, ex-operators or current operators to teach their skills to other people through cohort-based classes. Like, you wanna be a Maven, the instructors are Mavens. It's short. It's easy to say. When I tell you what that company does, that name makes perfect sense. So I tend to like those kinds of names myself, but I also, I don't know, I like, I like other kinds of names for other kinds of products too. I think it really comes down to what is your product, what is your company, what is the name trying to achieve, and really getting clear with those criteria. So we can talk about the criteria that always apply, the criteria you might add, and a process to get there.

   7. LRLenny Rachitsky15:38

      That sounds great. Yeah, I- I'm really curious about a process. If one exists, that'd be really cool. So another question in my mind is just like some names are just like nonsense words like Yahoo and, I don't know-

   8. AJArielle Jackson15:47

      Mm-hmm.

   9. LRLenny Rachitsky15:47

      ... Google, I guess.

   10. AJArielle Jackson15:48

       Yeah.

   11. LRLenny Rachitsky15:48

       What's your take on, on, on that as a name, that approach?

   12. AJArielle Jackson15:51

       Yeah. So words like that that are empty vessels, they really don't mean anything. They actually, if you think about the name Yahoo, it's actually like really silly. It's like Yahoo. I always hear it like that, you know? Um, Google has a meaning for people in the know with the one followed by as many zeros. It's like a big number, and it's a misspelling of that. So that one's a little less silly to me than Yahoo. My take on empty vessel names is they can be really memorable, and they can be evocative of the emotion. But you have to do a lot more wor- marketing work over time to make it mean something. So if I say Yahoo today, like, we know it's that search engine we used before we all switched to Google, and we have, you know, the purple color in our head, and we think about what it meant at the time that we might have used it. But it took a lot of marketing dollars and a lot of time for that word to mean that. So they're, they're doable. I worked on a company, Eero, that has kind of what is almost an empty vessel name. Um, Eero is for Eero Saarinen, who was a designer. Um, he's, he did like these really beautiful buildings, architectural buildings, and then also some tables. Like, you can get a Saarinen table at Design Within Reach. But that name, nobody knows that unless you're in the design community. And so that name is effectively an empty vessel, and they had to, you know, spend a lot and, and be consistent about making that name mean a wifi system.

   13. LRLenny Rachitsky17:17

       I want to get to the process, but another question is why is it important for the name to kind of connect to the company and what they do? Is that just like it feels nice to people or, or is there some kind of a bigger reason?

   14. AJArielle Jackson17:29

       Yeah. So it doesn't have to, and in examples like Eero and Yahoo it doesn't. Even if you think about like Apple, it doesn't. Apple has nothing to do with Apple Computers. It's a word we all know. There's a lot of words where there's no meaning behind it. If there is a meaning behind your name, your, your name is doing a little bit more of your marketing work for you. So if your name is Internet Explorer, RIP, I know exactly what you do. If your name is Chrome and you're a designer on the web, you kind of might be like, "Oh, that makes sense. That's the area around the browsing window." If your name is Firefox, I have no idea what you did. You just took two words and put them together and made something up, and now you have to spend and you have to be consistent over time in making that word mean something for people. But all three of those browsers were successful at a time, and I don't think the name had anything to do with Internet Explorer's demise.

   15. LRLenny Rachitsky18:25

       Got it. So it's kind of like ideally you can find an easy mode...... if that doesn't work, then you go hard mode where you come up with your own empty vessel name, and then you just have to do a lot of work.

   16. AJArielle Jackson18:33

       That's my personal preference.

   17. LRLenny Rachitsky18:35

       Okay, cool. That makes sense. (laughs)

   18. AJArielle Jackson18:36

       I mean, my personal preference is if you think about there's descriptive names, the Internet Explorer. There's suggestive names like Chrome. Then there's evocative names, which I would say like Seesaw and Maven fit into there, where they're not, they're like in between suggestive and evocative. And then there's empty vessel names or fanciful names. There's a spectrum, and when you do your brainstorm, we talked about it like this in the process, you wanna think across all of them, but you might have in your naming brief, "We want a suggestive name," or, "We want a descriptive name." You might go into it with that. And so you know, there's, there's times and places for all of those names across the spectrum. My personal bias is I tend to like suggestive names.

   19. LRLenny Rachitsky19:16

       Makes

4. 19:17 – 24:59

   How to come up with a great name

   1. LRLenny Rachitsky19:17

      sense. Okay, let's get into it. How, what should, what should teams do when they're trying to name some?

   2. AJArielle Jackson19:22

      Yeah, so the first thing is to do your product positioning. I really believe that positioning dictates so much of your marketing and should always be the first thing you do. I had a, a, a student in my last class that I taught through Maven, I teach a class on brand strategy, and he was a, I think a second or third-time founder who had never taken a class on brand strategy. He worked really hard. He was awesome. Anyway, in the, at the end of the class, you know, kind of do this closing thing, and he goes, "I'll never write a line of code without doing positioning first." And that was like music to my ears, you know? That, that, that's like, I think positioning comes first. But in any case, um, you do that first, and we'll talk about that in a little bit, and then you write a naming brief, and it, it's really simple. It's like, what are you naming? Are you naming a company or are you naming the product? Are you naming both? Usually, if you're an early stage company, you're, you're naming both, and they're gonna have one name because it, you don't want people to have to remember two things. What do you want the name to communicate? So in that example of like Seesaw, we wanted it to communicate, you know, young childhood. In the example of Eero, we wanted it to communicate design, being design-forward. It can be whatever you want it to communicate. What do you want to avoid? You know, we, we, we don't want it to sound like this competitor, or we hate this word, or it needs, you know, whatever you wanna avoid. What are the names of competitive and related products? And then are there other considerations? Like I worked with a company, another first round company, that was operating in China, and one of the considerations was this has to be pronounceable for a native Chinese speaker. Like, that's a very valid additional consideration. And then there are seven criteria for names that always apply in my opinion, and you could add additional ones, like that Chinese-speaking one would be an additional one. The seven are trademark, which is kinda obvious. Like, can you use this? Are you violating someone else's trademark? And the second step with trademark is, do you need to proactively protect the name? Domain availability, so everyone gets hung up on getting a dot-com, like maven.com, got maven.com. It was a long and arduous process that Gagan wrote about on Twitter. But these days, like, you don't necessarily need the dot-com. Square operated on Square Up for very, very long time. Lots of companies are operating on variants of a dot-com. So, uh, domain name availability. Distinctiveness, is it memorable? Is it sound like someone else's name? That's, I think, one of the most important ones. Just is it different and distinctive? Is it timeless? So there's a lot of naming trends. Like, if you tell me Optimizely, I could tell you, like, what year was the company formed when it ends in L-Y.

   3. LRLenny Rachitsky22:09

      (laughs) True, true.

   4. AJArielle Jackson22:09

      If you tell me a word like Flickr, I can tell you what year it was because that was the naming trend to remove vowels. So, I generally stay away from naming trends 'cause I just, I, I want your company name not to sound dated in 10 or 20 years. The last one is, it's kinda related to that, what we talked about in the brief, what do you want the name to communicate, which is, um, is the name reflective of your key messaging, or does it somehow suggest an emotion or feeling that you're trying to convey? And then sound and ease of pronunciation, like, is it fun to say? Is it easy to say? Is, how is it to spell? We almost named a first round company a while ago Lattice, which is now a different company that's doing quite well. But, uh, we didn't name it that because this was a company that was, like, B2B sales was gonna be like their main channel. So, they're gonna be, like, people on the phone being like, "Hey, I'm calling from Lattice." And we went through this exercise, and we were like, "Lettuce?" It's not so easy to say and spell, so we actually didn't name the company that and went with something else, but, uh, there's a company now doing quite well.

   5. LRLenny Rachitsky23:16

      Do you think that was the right move?

   6. AJArielle Jackson23:18

      I don't know. I always say a good name is only gonna help you, but a bad name won't hurt a good company.

   7. LRLenny Rachitsky23:23

      Hmm.

   8. AJArielle Jackson23:23

      So I don't really feel.

   9. LRLenny Rachitsky23:25

      Interesting. Good to know.

   10. AJArielle Jackson23:26

       Yeah.

   11. LRLenny Rachitsky23:27

       Uh, yeah, keep it up.

   12. AJArielle Jackson23:27

       And then the last one, the last one, uh, last two are appearance. So, there are some names that just, like, lend themselves really nicely to visual design, and, you know, they have to do with, like, how tall the letters are and is there symmetry, and, like, if you give this to designers, making a logo just like so awesome and cool and fun. And then length, so a lot of people want, you know, they want a name like Square and Stripe and these one-syllable names, but a two-syllable or even a three-syllable name can often be more memorable.

   13. LRLenny Rachitsky23:57

       Leninewsletter.com.

   14. AJArielle Jackson23:59

       (laughs)

   15. LRLenny Rachitsky24:00

       Sh-

   16. AJArielle Jackson24:01

       Yeah, yeah. Well, so you got the Lenin part with the two. Uh, two syllables is generally like a nice sweet spot.

   17. LRLenny Rachitsky24:08

       Sweet. Have you put out a template or anything that folks can find to do this or should they kinda listen here and take notes?

   18. AJArielle Jackson24:15

       Yeah. There's an article on the First Round Review called Positioning, Positioning Your Startup is Vital: Here's How to Nail It. And there all those, um, criteria and, like, how to do naming is, is actually in that article.

   19. LRLenny Rachitsky24:27

       Awesome. We'll put that in, in our little show notes.

   20. AJArielle Jackson24:30

       Cool.

   21. LRLenny Rachitsky24:30

       And then, as you go through this, is this like a binary thing, or are you kinda like rate each of these categories like one to five?

   22. AJArielle Jackson24:36

       Yeah, so the way I do it is I apply the criteria after we do the brainstorm, and then we do like red, yellow, green on each of those criteria, just to weed out ones that are not doing well on any of those.

   23. LRLenny Rachitsky24:48

       Got it.

   24. AJArielle Jackson24:48

       And then you add your own criteria. So the brain- the next step's the brainstorm. Um, I'm gonna, I was kinda gonna go fast through this-

   25. LRLenny Rachitsky24:55

       Yeah, yeah.

   26. AJArielle Jackson24:55

       ... since it's a lot, but-

   27. LRLenny Rachitsky24:55

       ... I was gonna ask you about the brainstorm. I'm excited to hear this.

   28. AJArielle Jackson24:57

       Yeah, so the way it- the way

5. 24:59 – 31:09

   How to run a naming brainstorm for the best results

   1. AJArielle Jackson24:59

      that I run the naming process is I like to first do positioning, and then I set up an hour with the founders and me and i- ideally a couple other people who are interested but disinterested, so like I'll bring a writer from the first round team, or the founder has a friend who's a linguist, or the founder has a friend who speaks four languages. Like, we like those kind of people to be in, uh, in it if possible, and it's generally like five to seven people in a brainstorm. And the idea is we spend one hour. I set it up beforehand, and we try to come up with like hundreds and hundreds of bad ideas, and a couple decent ones that are worth exploring more. And the brainstorm is two parts. The first part is based on words in your positioning statement, so we take out all the meaningful words out of your positioning statement, this is like the warmup, and we run synonyms, antonyms, free associations, other languages, whatever we can do off of those words. And so if your words in your positioning statement are related to what that you do, which they very well should be, that's a great way to just come up with like hundreds of words really quickly. And then the second step is a thematic brainstorm, so I pick between like seven and 10 themes, you can think of them like Jeopardy themes, so it's like, um, I don't know, like, uh, okay, so there was like an AI-

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky26:12

      Swords.

   3. AJArielle Jackson26:12

      Yeah, yeah. It was like an AI tool for strawberry picking, and, um, the themes would be like the history of strawberry farming or like botany 101, like we'd... things, things that are related. If you could do like last names of famous farmers, you know, that's... think about like how did Tesla get their name? They probably did like last names of people related to electricity, you know, and then s- such a great name. But so like thematic brainstorm and then that's usually a little more fruitful. And we do the same thing, like free association, all that. I spend some time afterwards on Wikipedia and the internet and like actually finding words words. Also love the library. Check out books sometimes and just like read books on the topic and just write down the interesting words that come up. And anyway, so then I give them back a short list. The short list is around 10 to 25 concepts that are ideas that are worth looking at further, and we n- from there narrow it down based on the criteria in the red, yellow, green. We come up with like three to five. Don't come up with one 'cause you might not get it for trademark, and it's really sad when you get really attached to one and then you can't use it. So yeah, three to five top contenders and then you go through trademark process, uh, domain, and kinda go from there.

   4. LRLenny Rachitsky27:23

      That was amazing.

   5. AJArielle Jackson27:24

      (laughs)

   6. LRLenny Rachitsky27:24

      If you're doing a s- a startup name versus a product, is the process any different or is it basically the same?

   7. AJArielle Jackson27:29

      No, same. The only difference is if you have a lot of equity in your company name, like I'll... Square's a good example. Like Square had a lot of equity. Google is a perfect example. Lot of equity in the company name. You often don't wanna name your products something really creative and different because you actually want the m- the equity in the master brand to come through. So if you think about Square's names, I mean, they, they have other ones like when they diverge from the Square brand, like Cash or, you know, th- th- when they want something new or like Google when they came out with Android and they wanted to diverge from the master brand, but think about all the products that's like Square Register, Square Stand, Square App, you know, Google Maps, you know, they're, they're like really boring and it's because the equity is in the product, in the company name and the product name can actually be boring and descriptive.

   8. LRLenny Rachitsky28:20

      That makes sense. I wanna come back to a point you made that a great name will help a startup and a bad name is, is not going to hurt you or I forget the word you used. I'd love to-

   9. AJArielle Jackson28:30

      Mm-hmm.

   10. LRLenny Rachitsky28:30

       ... hear that 'cause that's, that's really interesting.

   11. AJArielle Jackson28:33

       Yeah. So if your company has a great name and the name is remarkable, like people will be like, "Oh, that's a great name," or it just makes sense like in the case of Seesaw, like, "That's a good name for that company." That good name is just gonna help people talk about it. It's gonna spread word of mouth. People are gonna like to talk about the company. If you think about there's a lot of companies with bad names that we use all the time or even quite boring names that we now love. So if you think about like Disney, Walt Disney's last name, it didn't mean anything, but over time, that's such a good company and it got imbued with all this meaning and now it stands for magic and stands for so much. It was just the dude's last name, you know? So over time, a word can come to mean something that is beyond what that actual word means. Like Disney means magic today, you know? Volvo means safety. Those names are not good. Like if I (laughs) just put it in a spreadsheet-

   12. LRLenny Rachitsky29:29

       (laughs)

   13. AJArielle Jackson29:29

       ... or one of those lists, y- no one would pick it. So that's kinda what I mean that like the name is just part of the overall marketing or the overall brand and a bad name with a really great company with great company strategy, great marketing is gonna be great over time, and, um, a, a good name is just gonna help you, but I don't think a bad name is gonna kill a good company.

   14. LRLenny Rachitsky29:51

       So interesting. So basically your goal is to help find a name that will help. Uh, worst case, you're gonna be okay if your product is awesome.

   15. AJArielle Jackson29:59

       I think so, yeah. I mean, it- it also takes a little bit of the pressure off to be honest-

   16. LRLenny Rachitsky30:03

       Mm-hmm.

   17. AJArielle Jackson30:04

       ... you know? Like-

   18. LRLenny Rachitsky30:04

       Yeah.

   19. AJArielle Jackson30:04

       ... everyone wants to find that perfect name.

   20. LRLenny Rachitsky30:07

       Mm-hmm.

   21. AJArielle Jackson30:07

       If you actually think about it, and this happens a lot, like you give someone a list of 10 names or 15 names and they're just cells in a spreadsheet these days, like we're doing most of this virtually. You give people name like that and it's like you have to imagine what it could be. You think about Apple or Disney or Nike or Volvo or any of... Lego, any of these brands, you know, in a cell spreadsheet in plain Arial in 10 point, like they're just okay. Like they're, you know, you have to grow them over time. You just hear about like, um...... I think Phil Knight was with Nike when he was given that name. Like, as a, as a option. He was like, "It's okay. You know, I'll sleep on it."

   22. LRLenny Rachitsky30:48

       Hmm. Hmm. Hmm.

   23. AJArielle Jackson30:48

       Such a great name, you know? (laughs)

   24. LRLenny Rachitsky30:50

       This makes me, uh, think about my startup back in the day. It was called Local Mind, and we went through an exercise similar to this, not nearly as in-depth and well-run, but I remember our designer was the person that helped us nail the name. He's just like, "Oh, I could do so much with this name. Let's just see where this one can go." Is that something you find ?

6. 31:09 – 34:17

   Bad names and naming mistakes

   1. LRLenny Rachitsky31:09

   2. AJArielle Jackson31:09

      Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, there's definitely been bad names. Like, I helped a company rebrand recently that they had a bad name. Like, it just looked dated. It didn't fit any of those. It wasn't distinctive. It wasn't timeless. It had one of those, like, naming trends. Those are not good. Like, you want to avoid those. But if you come up with something that is, like, pretty good and you can make up something beautiful out of it and it fits your company, it does some of the marketing work for you, and people like to say it, and ideally it's memorable and it has some emotion to it, like, go. Go for it.

   3. LRLenny Rachitsky31:39

      Awesome. One last question about naming. What's a, what's a common mistake that people make going through this process coming up with a name?

   4. AJArielle Jackson31:46

      Yeah. A really funny one is if you have, like, a code name for your product or... At First Round, a lot of the companies we invest in, they, they, they raised their seed round with one name. They may or may not be attached to it. But then, you know, they work with me and I'm like, "Ew, your name's not that good and here's why. We should probably change it," or they say, "We can't use this name. We found out we have a trademark conflict." I really believe in using a code name that's so ridiculous that you won't ever launch a product like that if you're just trying to incorporate and go really quick. So for example, a lot of people, they, you know, they need their name for their, their incorporation and so they are filing r- you know, all the steps to creating a business, and they just, like, pick something but then they end up getting attached to it, and then they wanna actually, like, launch under that name and it's like, well, that's not so great. Like, here's why I think you should change it. If you pick something so ridiculous that you would never launch, it's actually helpful because then you can go through a process and find it, a name that will do more of your work for you, and you won't be attached to something crappy.

   5. LRLenny Rachitsky32:50

      Such a good point and idea. And by the way, so if you're a First Round company, you get this naming service for free and all these other things we're gonna talk about, just to be clear?

   6. AJArielle Jackson32:59

      Yes, that's right.

   7. LRLenny Rachitsky33:00

      Oh, my God. I could do a whole episode about how much I love First Round, but I will-

   8. AJArielle Jackson33:03

      (laughs)

   9. LRLenny Rachitsky33:03

      ... say I'm a huge fan. Uh, I think I've participated in every program that First Round offers. The First Round review is actually one of the first pieces of writing that kind of helped spur my now career, and so I'm really-

   10. AJArielle Jackson33:15

       I remember that article.

   11. LRLenny Rachitsky33:16

       ... glad.

   12. AJArielle Jackson33:16

       It was awesome.

   13. LRLenny Rachitsky33:17

       Mm-hmm.

   14. AJArielle Jackson33:17

       Yeah.

   15. LRLenny Rachitsky33:17

       And I did two more after that. So much work. But yeah, that was-

   16. AJArielle Jackson33:20

       (laughs)

   17. LRLenny Rachitsky33:20

       ... a big deal, so I'm really appreciative to First Round, so. And we can talk about First Round a bit at the end, too.

   18. AJArielle Jackson33:26

       Sure, yeah. E- everything we're talking about that you've asked me so far, I think that you're going to ask me about, like, um, positioning and hiring a marketing person, and all that is stuff we offer to First Round companies. We offer my services as part of the investment. There are times when we might get stuck and we have to bring in, like, an outside person to help us with something, but for the most part, it's all included, and, you know, you'd pay a lot of money. I, I... The naming firm I like the best, uh, when I get stuck is called 100 Monkeys. They're awesome. A long time ago, I used to be like, "Oh, yeah, it's about $25,000," and I recently got, couldn't take on an outsider First Round project and referred it to them. It's $47,000 for a name.

   19. LRLenny Rachitsky34:04

       Whoa.

   20. AJArielle Jackson34:05

       So yeah. It's gotten expensive. But if you have the means, it's nice to get some outside help.

   21. LRLenny Rachitsky34:12

       Hashtag value add.

   22. AJArielle Jackson34:14

       (laughs)

   23. LRLenny Rachitsky34:15

       Okay. I wanna transition to

7. 34:17 – 36:02

   Arielle’s brand development framework and when founders should implement it

   1. LRLenny Rachitsky34:17

      your brand development framework, which I read a bunch about, and I know you teach a course about this, which we could also chat a bit about. But first, I'm curious, just, like, practically, what is the... Why is a brand useful? Why is it even something people should spend time investing in? Why doesn't it matter?

   2. AJArielle Jackson34:33

      Okay. So a lot of founders may think that when we say your brand, we mean your logo and your font and your colors, and that is a visual expression of your brand, but it's not actually your brand. Your brand is who people think you are. And so why is it important for people to s- think what you want them to think? (laughs) Um, that, that really comes down to, like, people's understanding, and particularly your target audience's understanding, of what your company and your product is. And I don't really think there's anything else more important than that b- if I was building a company. So your brand is who people think you are, and developing a brand strategy is what do you want to be, what do you want people to think you are, and what are you going to do to help shape that perception. So when I work on a, a company, there's a lot of steps to this, but I kind of have this nice little process that's, like, right-sized for early stage startups, and I like to start with, why do you do what you do? Like, just having a really clear understanding of that. That's your purpose. The second part is your product positioning, so meaning how do you want people to understand your product and what role it plays in their lives? And then the last part is your personality, which is, how do you show up in the world? What are you like? If your brand was a person, would I wanna hang out with them? Would someone else wanna hang out with them?

8. 36:02 – 41:17

   How do you know when brand development is completed?

   1. AJArielle Jackson36:02

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky36:02

      We're gonna get into each of these three pieces, but before we get in there, as a, as a founder, like, how do you know when you're done with your brand development? I know it's like a never-ending, ongoing process-

   3. AJArielle Jackson36:13

      Mm-hmm.

   4. LRLenny Rachitsky36:15

      ... but, like, like, at the end of a process like this, is it like you figure out your purpose, positioning, and personality, and then there's, like, logo and colors? When you think about just like here's the brand package, what are all the little pieces of it? And then, and then we'll dive into these three elements.

   5. AJArielle Jackson36:28

      I think what you said is right. It's like you, you get those three components, your purpose, your positioning, your personality. You use that as an informant to your visual design and also to your tone of voice, so the way your copy sounds, the way y- your, you show up in written copy.And then ideally, you have some sort of, a lot, a lot of companies have what they call, like, a style guide or, like, a brand style guide, and it really only covers logo fonts, colors. Like, "Don't put our logo in blue. Don't tilt it on an angle." You know, "Here's what it looks like in white. Here's what it looks like in black. Here's the favicon." But they don't have that for, like, "Here's who we are. Here's, you know, here's 10 lines that could be ad copy for us. Here is why we do what we do. This is the personality of our brand. Here are five attributes." You know, "We are playful but not silly," th- w- that, we can talk about that a little bit more, but, like, I think all of that belongs in the style guide, not just logo, font, colors, which is really just an, a visual articulation that, that feeds into your brand. I was... I'm a big Volvo fan. I'm on my fourth Volvo right now, so I-

   6. LRLenny Rachitsky37:36

      (laughs) Cool.

   7. AJArielle Jackson37:36

      ... I'm, like, super brand loyal, and I always use them as an example 'cause if you can picture the Volvo logo in your head right now, it kind of looks like the male symbol. You know, like, it's like a circle with an arrow coming off-

   8. LRLenny Rachitsky37:46

      Mm-hmm.

   9. AJArielle Jackson37:46

      ... the side.

   10. LRLenny Rachitsky37:47

       Mm-hmm.

   11. AJArielle Jackson37:48

       There's nothing about that logo that means all the things I like about Volvo, all the things that the Volvo brand has come to mean to me. And their colors, they're, like, black and white and a little blue. Like, there's nothing more boring than their color palette. (laughs) And so, like, it's not the logo and the font and the colors of Volvo that has made them mean, they literally, like, own the word safety in cars right now. It's other stuff. And if you looked at their style guide, I actually looked at their style guide recently, and it's just like, "Here's our black and our white and our blue, and here's our tertiary colors, and here's our logo." It would not help you understand Volvo as a brand.

   12. LRLenny Rachitsky38:29

       I'm guessing some of that happened because they've evolved over the years, and it's probably a very different initial brand, so it kind of tells me that it's more important to have a, a logo and a brand that can kind of represent many things, it isn't, like, so stuck in a certain positioning maybe. Does that resonate at all?

   13. AJArielle Jackson38:44

       Yeah. Th- their logo has to do with a very early history. They had, I, I, like, researched this 'cause I was-

   14. LRLenny Rachitsky38:49

       Hmm.

   15. AJArielle Jackson38:49

       ... like, nerded out on this stuff, you know? Um, they had some early history as a ball bearings company, and so I guess that logo had some meaning then, but it wasn't so descriptive to being a ball bearing company that they were able to keep it as they evolved into a car company. But if you look at, like, their early writing, it's so cool. Like, it's so cool. Like, long, long time ago, they would talk about cars are driven by humans, and our job as a car manufacturer is to protect the humans who drive the cars. Like, that was, like, fundamental formation of the company, so they really knew why they existed. And then they did stuff, like, in, like, I think it was, like, the 1950s when everyone just wore lap bands in the car, and they came out with the three-point safety harness, and instead of, you know, patenting it and, like, licensing it, they gave that away for free for everyone because that would make, like, all the world's cars safer. And, like, those kinds of company decisions, that's what made Volvo stand for safety. It's not the logo.

   16. LRLenny Rachitsky39:47

       Hmm. Very interesting. This episode is brought to you by Athletic Greens. (instrumental music plays) I've been hearing about AG1 on basically every podcast that I listen to, like Tim Ferriss and Lex Fridman, and so I finally gave it a shot earlier this year, and it has quickly become a core part of my morning routine, especially on days that I need to go deep on writing or record a podcast like this. Here's three things that I love about AG1. One, with a small scoop that dissolves in water, you're absorbing 75 vitamins, minerals, probiotics, and adaptogens. I kind of like to think of it as a little safety net for my nutrition in case I've missed something in my diet. Two, they treat AG1 like a software product. Apparently, they're on their 52nd iteration, and they're constantly evolving it based on the latest science, research studies, and internal testing that they do. And three, it's just one easy thing that I can do every single day to take care of myself. Right now, it's time to reclaim your health and arm your immune system with convenient daily nutrition. It's just one scoop in a cup of water every day, and that's it. There's no need for a million different pills and supplements to look out for your health. To make it easy, Athletic Greens is gonna give you a free one-year supply of immune-supporting vitamin D and five free travel packs with your first purchase. All you have to do is visit athleticgreens.com/lenny. Again, that's athleticgreens.com/lenny to take ownership over your health and pick up the ultimate daily nutritional

9. 41:17 – 42:42

   How long should branding take?

   1. LRLenny Rachitsky41:17

      insurance. One question on my mind before we get into these three elements, last question, kind of setting context, is-

   2. AJArielle Jackson41:24

      Mm-hmm.

   3. LRLenny Rachitsky41:25

      ... if I'm, like, a non-founder or a PM, I'm just like, "Oh, my God. A branding exercise is gonna take months. It's gonna suck up all these resources."

   4. AJArielle Jackson41:32

      Mm-hmm.

   5. LRLenny Rachitsky41:32

      "I don't know what it's gonna do for us," what are, what kind of timeframe do you recommend for early stage companies to go through kind of a branding exercise and go through something like this? And maybe even later stage, just, like, what's, what's reasonable?

   6. AJArielle Jackson41:45

      Yeah, I mean, it depends on the stage of your company and how much you have already that you have to kind of, like... It's hard for people to scrap what they already have. There's a lot of, like, sunk cost fallacy type stuff going on. If you're starting from nothing, I think you can do this in, like, three weeks. If you are starting... The naming process itself, because of trademark and domains, can take a little longer. When I name companies, we usually, it usually takes about a month just for naming. But, like, the whole brand strategy process, you could do, if you're, like, a, you know, really early stage company in a matter of weeks, and I think whatever time it takes you actually is gonna save you so much time down the road. It's gonna help you save time on company decision making. It's gonna help you save time writing your website. Your, literally, like, your w- web copy almost writes yourself, i- writes itself if you get this all done right. So, it's a small investment of time upfront that actually saves you a lot of time down the road is how I would, like, sell it to a skeptical PM.

   7. LRLenny Rachitsky42:40

      You've sold it. That's, uh, sounds like very high ROI.

10. 42:42 – 48:51

    How to build a brand purpose that ignites excitement

    1. LRLenny Rachitsky42:42

       (laughs) Let's get into it.

    2. AJArielle Jackson42:43

       High ROI.

    3. LRLenny Rachitsky42:43

       So purpose is the first piece. What is that, and then what are some examples of really good executions of purpose that you've seen?

    4. AJArielle Jackson42:50

       Sure. So your purpose is why you do what you do. It makes people wanna root for you, and it has a big role in aligning people to come wanna work for you and to have employees all feel like they're part of something. I like to think of it as, we exist to blank. And, like, whatever that blank is, is your purpose. Do you wanna hear about, like, examples or do you wanna hear about, like, what makes a good purpose?

    5. LRLenny Rachitsky43:14

       Both would be most excellent.

    6. AJArielle Jackson43:16

       So a good purpose, it explains the change you wanna see in the world irrespective of financial gain. So people often get hung up on, like, mission and vision and values and all this stuff. And, like, values are fine, they're, like, internal. I- I'm not gonna talk about those today. But I don't care about mission and vision. I just want one thing, 'cause people can only remember one thing, and it's your purpose, and it's why you do what you do. And when you articulate this really well, it helps you make company decisions. It exists on a 10-year or so f- frame. So everything we were talking about with product positioning, it's pretty malleable. It exists on, like, an 18-month frame if you're a early-stage company, so it can evolve. Whereas your purpose is pretty much gonna stay the same for, like, 10 years. It's that north star. And it helps align people in the company, and it helps the public want you to win. So, um, a good one, like, uh, I worked, I worked at Google, you know, uh, right out of grad school, and Google's purpose was to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful. And Google, I thought every company had a purpose that everyone at the company knew. Like, I just thought that was my first job, real job, you know? It turns out that's not true, and Google's actually been amazing at this. Like, if you... I had a person in my last cohort who had recently left Google, when there were, like, I don't know, 80 or 100,000 people. He said everyone still can say that. Like, that's amazing. But I joined, it was like 1,400 people, and by the time of your first day, you already knew that. Like, it was part of your hiring process, it was part of your onboarding, it was in your, like, offer letter. It was, it was everywhere. And I just thought that was, like, really cool and a good purpose. Um, one that is kind of related to financial gain, but I still think is cool, is Stripes, which is to increase the GDP of the internet. I think that's, like, really well said and cool, and just, like, gets you thinking about the internet as a country and... I don't know, it's, it's like really, um... If you're a internet person, it makes you wanna root for, for them. Um-

    7. LRLenny Rachitsky45:21

       Yeah.

    8. AJArielle Jackson45:21

       Nike's is awesome. Nike's is, uh... I wrote Nike's down 'cause I don't remember it. To bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete in the world, and if you have a body, you are an athlete.

    9. LRLenny Rachitsky45:33

       Mm-hmm.

    10. AJArielle Jackson45:33

        Like, it's not just about, you know, LeBron, it's about me and, like, how was my Peloton ride this morning too. So those are some famous companies. I could tell you a little bit about some that I've worked on that I think are pretty cool that are, like, companies you may not have heard of yet, just because sometimes we get hung up in, like, thinking Stripe and Nike and Google are awesome names because of all the meaning we have behind them. And I, I wanna talk about some companies you may not have heard of, because you can have a good purpose and not be Stripe and Nike and Google.

    11. LRLenny Rachitsky46:01

        Yeah, that'd be awesome. And, and by the way, is the purpose, should it be, like, a sentence? Is that the general-

    12. AJArielle Jackson46:06

        Yes.

    13. LRLenny Rachitsky46:06

        ... guideline?

    14. AJArielle Jackson46:07

        Yeah.

    15. LRLenny Rachitsky46:07

        Great.

    16. AJArielle Jackson46:07

        So you, I want you to just s- to be- s-... You can introduce yourself at a conference, like you're the keynote speaker at a conference, and I want you to introduce yourself, and I want you to go, "Hi, I'm Lenny, I'm the founder of company X, and we exist to," blah. And say it and, like, have that feel natural.

    17. LRLenny Rachitsky46:21

        Awesome.

    18. AJArielle Jackson46:22

        And it should make people want to hear what else you have to say. And the other thing it should be able to do is be the header for your about page. So meaning, we exist to blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, but you would just take out the we exist and say the verb and start there. That could be the header-

    19. LRLenny Rachitsky46:38

        Awesome.

    20. AJArielle Jackson46:38

        ... for your about page. So one company I worked on, first round company, they're called Logicloop, and it's an operations automation company. You can think of it almost like, um, y- you know, stuff like a no-code, low-code platform to automate a lot of the operations data-based work that people have to do. And we did this whole brainstorm, and I really like their purpose, that they... You can look at their about page, it will be right there. It's to make operations data work harder than operations people. And if you ever have worked in operations or have friends who have, like, they work really, really hard and it can be kind of thankless, so it gets anyone in that field to root for you. Like, your data should be working harder than your operations people. That was a fun one.

    21. LRLenny Rachitsky47:21

        Disclaimer, I'm an investor in Logicloop, and I love that you work with them.

    22. AJArielle Jackson47:24

        Oh. Cool.

    23. LRLenny Rachitsky47:25

        (laughs)

    24. AJArielle Jackson47:25

        Awesome. And then another one that I worked on, a- for another first round company, they're called WULF. They're informed by the UC model, where there's a bunch of individual schools that all exist by themselves, but they get something from being part of a larger organization. And what they do is they provide accreditation through being part of the larger WULF, but uni- uh, uh, larger WULF University, but every individual college can still operate as their own independent college. And so their purpose is to increase access to world-class higher education and ensure that it is globally recognized and transferable. So this idea of, you know, you should be able to take a class from the best instructor online and then go travel to Australia and take a class there and then go to China and take a class there and get the best education that the world can offer. Another one that I worked on a while ago is ALT. So ALT, AL- I think they've recently gone through a, a little bit of, like, a rebranding, but theirs was to increase the transparency and liquidity of alternative assets. And in their case, the, the, the product positioning was really about, like, making sports cards as easy to invest in as stocks. So the idea of alternative assets in this case are not, like, private equity and hedge funds and real estate, but a- alternatives to alternatives, like sports cards and Pokemon cards and art.

    25. LRLenny Rachitsky48:45

        Awesome. Those are so many awesome examples. That's gonna be useful for people to wrap their head around what a purpose might be.

11. 48:51 – 51:12

    Specific tactics for building your brand purpose

    1. LRLenny Rachitsky48:51

       Execution wise, do you just kind of open up a Google Doc and just start writing out ideas and brainstorm a little bit and just kind of keep refining with your team?

    2. AJArielle Jackson48:58

       I actually stole this exercise, or borrowed it, from Ogilvy, uh, that I actually think adds some structure to that. If you do it that way and it works for you, that's awesome, but if you wanna go and go through a process to get there, what I like to do is list all of the cultural tensions that are happening in the world that are relevant to your business first. And so for alt, that would be things like there's an increase in interest in alternatives. People are nostal- people who are now in their 30s are nostalgic for things that happened in the '90s. There is, at the time, really low interest rates and people are not getting any sort of, like, edge off of investing in the things that their parents used to invest in. So those would be, like, examples of cultural tensions. Um, cultural tensions are zeitgeists. They're things that your audience might be thinking of, they're things that they may be even subconscious to them, they're current events. So you make a long list of all of those. Then you make a long list of all the ways that you might describe your brand's best self, and this is related to your product positioning but let's say you haven't done it yet, so just think of it as your brand's best self. How would we want someone to describe us? When everything works perfectly and our product really delivers, what does it deliver? And again, like bullets, just ways that you would talk about that, and then you pick one from each side that's really the best articulation of what's happening in the world and what your product delivers, and with that context, now you're primed, with that context in mind now you do the brainstorm of "we exist to," let me finish this sentence. And even before you get there sometimes, it's helpful to do, "The world would be a better place if..." So, "For my company the world would be a better place if," and finish that sentence and then go into the "we exist to."

    3. LRLenny Rachitsky50:49

       Well, I'm so happy I asked that question. Uh, by the way, is there also a place we can point people to that are doing- wanna do this exercise? Is there another First Round Review post or ... I know you have a course on this too.

    4. AJArielle Jackson50:59

       Yeah, yeah (laughs) , there's another First Round Review article. It's called, um, three, Three Moves every Startup Founder should make. Something like that.

    5. LRLenny Rachitsky51:07

       Great. I will find it, I'll add it.

    6. AJArielle Jackson51:09

       Yeah, okay (laughs) , awesome.

    7. LRLenny Rachitsky51:10

       Okay, great. Amazing. Okay,

12. 51:12 – 55:22

    How to master your positioning

    1. LRLenny Rachitsky51:12

       let's move on to the next part which is around positioning, which is a big deal. First, just like, what is positioning, and then I'd love to know just, like, what tells you you may have a positioning problem that's something you should really focus on?

    2. AJArielle Jackson51:23

       Okay. So positioning is the space that you occupy in your target customer's mind and everything you can do to influence how they describe your product. Um, you know you have a positioning produ- problem if I ask 10 of your customers or 10 of your employees what the company does or what the product does and I get multiple answers, and unfortunately that's the case for most companies. It's okay if the answers are, like, tiny slight variants on the same thing, but I have actually done this with some later stage companies where go- my first step is often I go in and I interview 10 people and the 10 people are, you know, everyone from execs to, like, people who talk to customers to a few customers, and when you get 10 people saying 10 wildly different things you have a positioning problem. Other ways you might know that if you have a positioning problem is, uh, if you can't explain what you do to me in, like, a sentence, th- that- that's- you have a positioning problem.

    3. LRLenny Rachitsky52:25

       That's a high bar.

    4. AJArielle Jackson52:26

       Yeah, it is. And I used to- when I first started consulting, I would spend the first meeting with a founder just, like, totally cold, "Hey tell me about your company," and they would take 30 minutes to tell me about their company, and at the end of the 30 minutes I would pretty much get it, but it always took the first 30 minutes. So now when I engage with a new company I have them fill out this little worksheet beforehand and one of the questions is like, "What do you do?" And they have to write, you know, in a box that's kind of like paragraph length.

    5. LRLenny Rachitsky52:55

       Clever.

    6. AJArielle Jackson52:56

       And then we go- I go in and I ask questions about that and ultimately we get it to sentence length.

    7. LRLenny Rachitsky53:00

       Amazing. Okay, how do you go about figuring out your positioning? Big question.

    8. AJArielle Jackson53:05

       Yeah, so um, I start with your audience, uh, who- who is this for, and we really think about, like, what's the broadest set of customers or users that you might have and narrow in from there to a target audience which is who are you outwardly going to try to acquire for the next 18 months? You can think of it like concentric circles. The biggest circle is like your TAM, as you get clo- smaller there's, there's like five parts to it, so the biggest circle is circle one, circle two, circle three, circle four is your target audience, all of the circles have to be contained within the bigger circle and then the dot in the middle is your model persona. So this is actually, like, a person with a name and an age and a location and a job and, you know, feelings and priorities and interests and all of that. And so we talk about the model user and the target audience, the target audience again is who will you outwardly try to acquire for the next 18 months if you're an early stage company. It's very possible that you're going to acquire people outside of that circle, like in the next circle or even the bigger circle, but they're not who you're actively going out to try to acquire.

    9. LRLenny Rachitsky54:15

       Can I ask you a couple of questions on- on the person?

    10. AJArielle Jackson54:17

        Yeah.

    11. LRLenny Rachitsky54:18

        I'm doing some writing and research into this stuff, how- how specific do you suggest people get with this person right at the middle? Like, I love that it's, like, an actual person, I guess not a real person but a very descriptive-

    12. AJArielle Jackson54:29

        Can be a real person or like a amalgamation of- of not real people.

    13. LRLenny Rachitsky54:33

        ...oh, okay.

    14. AJArielle Jackson54:34

        So the- with the target audience I- I like to think of it as someone- something you could name so with Eero it was tech-savvy dads, right? It's a category of people and then the model persona, or like that individual user who represents a tech-savvy dad, for them was this guy who had teenage kids, lived in suburban St. Louis, had a 2800 square foot house that was made of brick, worked at home on Fridays, his kids were into gaming.He was the VP of sales at a company that was, like, tech-adjacent but not tech. He was more of, like, a tech enthusiast than an actual, like, software engineer. We knew a lot about him, like, I could tell you a lot about him. Was kind of robust. But tech-savvy dads was the way to represent him and all other people like him. That would be our target

13. 55:22 – 59:15

    Why it’s important to stay niche when you’re mastering your positioning

    1. AJArielle Jackson55:22

       audience.

    2. LRLenny Rachitsky55:22

       A lot of founders have trouble recognizing that going very focused and niche is a good idea, versus like, "Man, well I'm just gonna have these 10 people in the world that really want what I want."

    3. AJArielle Jackson55:32

       Mm-hmm.

    4. LRLenny Rachitsky55:32

       What have you found to be the reason it's very powerful and important to start really focused?

    5. AJArielle Jackson55:37

       Yeah. So when you're an early stage company, the worst thing you can do is try to be everything to everyone, because you don't have enough runway, and even, like, uh, you just don't have enough of anything to do that successfully. The best thing you can do is find an audience that is big enough that if you dominate, dominated, if you got to a significant market share among that audience, you'd be a giant business, and tech-savvy dads is a pretty big audience. Also, that's just who your outbound are going to try to acquire for the 18 month, next 18 months. It does, I'm a tech-savvy mom, or not, I live with a tech-savvy dad. I have an Eros system. You know, it doesn't mean everyone you'll ever acquire must be in that audience. It means that is who we're focused on acquiring.

    6. LRLenny Rachitsky56:24

       Awesome. Uh, I took us off course around the positioning process. We, I think we, we kind of went off course with the concentric circles model. So I'll give it back to you to keep going.

    7. AJArielle Jackson56:33

       Yeah, yeah. Okay. Okay, so the way that you, that I like to run positioning exercise is to start with, who is this for, and then what is the problem that they have? Like, there's some problem usually that these people have. They may not even be aware it's a problem, or they may not be experiencing the problem as particularly troubling, but there's something going on for these people. And then how do they address that problem today? So they do something, you know. They're, they're buying something, they're, have a workaround. They're doing something today, and that something might not be another startup or your direct competitor. It might be the old way of doing things, but they're doing something. So we go through, like, who is it for, what's their problem, how do they address it, and then what do you make? How, how does it work, and what would you want a happy user of your product or service to tell another? And that's kind of like, if you answer all of those questions, it ultimately leads into this, like, classic for statement, which is not something I invented. It's something that's been around for, like, 40 or 50 years, and I learned it when I was 22, and I think it's one of the most powerful tools in marketing. It can feel like Mad Libs if you just approach it cold, but if you've gone through that work of defining who is it and what's their problem, all it is is a distillation of that. So that statement is like for target audience who, there's a statement of need or opportunity, and then you say, like, our product name is a category that has a benefit unlike the old thing they were doing. Our product works this other way.

    8. LRLenny Rachitsky58:10

       Awesome, and we'll link to the post that actually has that so people don't have to write this all down. That last piece you mentioned, I hadn't heard before. The idea what will they tell other people or how will they describe it to other people? Is that right?

    9. AJArielle Jackson58:21

       Mm-hmm. Yeah. So I believe that great benefits, if you've defined your benefit really, really well, will actually be the thing that will be the H1 on your homepage and will be the thing that you want someone to tell someone else. Like, think about Square Stand and turn your iPad into a point of sale. Right. Turn your iPad into a point of sale, like, yeah. If I went to a small business owner and they were having drinks with a friend who's also a small business owner, what would I want them to say about the Square Stand? "Oh, yeah. I just got the Square Stand. It's this really cool new register that turns my iPad into a point of sale." That's pretty much exactly what I want them to say. And so if you can write that line, that is, uh, your ideal benefit, like, what you want people to say, and it's something that your target audience would actually say, that's great.

    10. LRLenny Rachitsky59:12

        Interesting. I love that. That makes a lot of sense.

14. 59:15 – 1:02:38

    The process of positioning and Arielle’s bar test

    1. LRLenny Rachitsky59:15

       For people trying to go through this exercise, you always have such good answers to, like, how actually the process of coming up with, say, your position in this case, um, is it, again, you pull up a doc and start writing things, or is there something even more structured?

    2. AJArielle Jackson59:28

       Yeah, there's something more structured. I have kind of, like, a worksheet that goes through all those things we just talked about. So it's like, you know, who is it for, what are they doing today, you know, all those questions we just talked about. It's more like a structured brainstorm. There's an exercise I really love that I've called the bar test that is helping you get everything you've written into human language, 'cause one of the really big pitfalls I see, especially for B2B companies but really for everyone, is they write in a way that people don't talk. So the document, when I get the first draft back from founders, often has things like leverages and empowers, and, like, all these, nobody talks like that. And so getting this into, like, turns your iPad into a point of sale, blankets your home in fast, reliable WiFi, records your screen and cam at the same time, like, really basic stuff that it describes your product in a way that someone would actually say, like, that's the type of language that I think people wanna use. So the bar test is you part- first of all, you've defined your target. Now you pretend to be someone in your target having drinks with someone else in your target at a bar, and you have to be able to say, "Hey, I just started using product name. It's this really great category, that benefit," and the other person goes, "Hmm, tell me more," or, "That's cool. What do you mean?" Or some other, you know, similar prompt. And then you have to say your differentiator. You actually have to say it out loud. And if you run through that test and it's actually stuff people would say out loud, then you've done a pretty good job and you can start using that copy.... publicly.

    3. LRLenny Rachitsky1:01:07

       That is very cool. I have not heard this (laughs) bar test before, and I like that it might happen in an actual bar. Is that also something people can find online or is that, is that, they write it down right now?

    4. AJArielle Jackson1:01:18

       Ooh, I don't, I don't know if that's online.

    5. LRLenny Rachitsky1:01:20

       Okay, cool. This is it, exclusive.

    6. AJArielle Jackson1:01:22

       (laughs) Yeah, that, that's in my course, and we talk a lot about that, and we go through the exercise like a, um, a real role play-

    7. LRLenny Rachitsky1:01:28

       Awesome.

    8. AJArielle Jackson1:01:29

       ... in the course. But yeah, take some notes.

    9. LRLenny Rachitsky1:01:31

       I like that a lot.

    10. AJArielle Jackson1:01:33

        Thanks.

    11. LRLenny Rachitsky1:01:33

        Your point reminded me of an email I, I just pulled up that I got from ADP. Your point about just, like, you wanna make sure your branding is something that feels like something you would say to a person. So it's like ADP, which is a security, you know, service for f- like alarms.

    12. AJArielle Jackson1:01:47

        Mm-hmm.

    13. LRLenny Rachitsky1:01:47

        I got this email, like, "Summer's on with fun or our free secure app and more," and then it's like, "Make summer safer and more fun at home or away." Like, ADP, you're not gonna make, make it more fun. What are you t- what are you talking about? (laughs)

    14. AJArielle Jackson1:02:01

        See, that's an example of trying too hard.

    15. LRLenny Rachitsky1:02:03

        Right.

    16. AJArielle Jackson1:02:03

        Like, they tried too hard to make it sound colloquial and fun. Like, they're a security system, it should be more like, "Secure your home while you're away." Like-

    17. LRLenny Rachitsky1:02:12

        Right.

    18. AJArielle Jackson1:02:12

        ... "Feel safe when you're on your summer trip." Like, stuff like that.

    19. LRLenny Rachitsky1:02:16

        They even included a GIF of a, this, like, TikToker being like, "ADP is my MVP."

    20. AJArielle Jackson1:02:21

        Yeah, this kind of relates to brand personality, where, like, the brand personality for ADP, I mean, I don't know, it's, it's pretty not fun. And so for them, when they put on fun hat, it seemed awkward and forced.

    21. LRLenny Rachitsky1:02:36

        That's exactly the feeling I got.

15. 1:02:38 – 1:07:39

    How to build a brand personality using the five big brand descriptions

    1. LRLenny Rachitsky1:02:38

       And so yeah, personality, that's our next topic. It's not something, uh, you think about when you think about brand and marketing and plans. And, and so I'm really curious to hear why you think that's important and how to f- figure out your own personality for your brand.

    2. AJArielle Jackson1:02:51

       So I think personality is one of those inputs that will help define your visual design, and it will definitely help define your written copy, and it really comes from this idea of brands are like people, and if you start thinking of your brand more like a person, it's quite obvious that it needs a personality 'cause all people have personalities. And these days, especially when brands show up in places where people show up, like TikTok and Instagram, like, your brand certainly needs a personality, or else you end up like ADP trying to be fun for the summer, which just feels really off and weird. So personality is one of those things that it's actually the easiest part. I think it's, like, the fastest part. It often ends up, like, an hour, you can get it done. But I have some frameworks I like to use that really just get at, like, are you Mountain Dew, or are you Rolex, or are you somewhere in between? And when you think about brands that have a lot of equity, they really do have a personality. Like, I can... I, I often talk about, like, Mountain Dew marketing as that marketing that's, like, trying really hard to be, like, cool and rugged and edgy and fast and, like, kinda teen. And Rolex is very, like, you know, you know, Grey Poupon-like. You know, like, "Oh dude, roll down your window, and do you have any Grey Poupon?" Like, it's fancy and-

    3. LRLenny Rachitsky1:04:09

       (laughs)

    4. AJArielle Jackson1:04:09

       ... sophisticated and a little bit, like, aspirational and maybe even a little British. And, like, all... Those two things are really, really, really different, right? And there's a lot in the middle, and not everyone's gonna be a Mountain Dew or Rolex but where on... where are you? And so you can just, like, write it down. K- I think a lot of these answers come back to, like, if you're good with just opening a blank Google Doc and, like, writing down who you are, by all means, go for it. And if that feels daunting and hard for you, like, use a framework. And the framework that I like to use has two parts. The first part is based on some academic research by Jennifer Aaker, and it basically analyzed the top brands in the world and figured out that all brands can be segmented into five dimensions of brand personality, and that really strong brands spike in two of the five. So the five dimensions that she found were sincerity, so this is like, is it down to earth and honest; excitement, it's spirited, this is a Mountain Dew thing; competence, reliable and intelligent; sophisticated, sophistication, which is charming and upper class; and rugged, outdoorsy and tough. So sincerity, excitement, competence, sophistication, and ruggedness. And going back to those two brands we just discussed, Mountain Dew is rugged and exciting, Rolex is sophisticated and competent. And you can do this with, like, any brand you admire or just think about brands you like and kind of deduce them to their two of those five. So that's the first step. Which two of those five are you gonna spike in? And it turns out, a lot of tech companies end up spiking in sincerity and competence, just usually does happen that way. Amazon is sincere and competent, Google is sincere and competent. Apple is not, Apple has a little more of that, like, sophistication to it. But in any case, like, if you just did that, we would end in a world where everyone's sincere and competent and/or maybe sophisticated and competent, and it's, like, a really boring world. So the next step after you do that is to define five attributes, like, five brand personalities, thinking about those two dimensions. I like to think about this as a star, like a five-point star. And brands need tension to be interesting. So if you tell me, like, "We're helpful, we're nice, we're approachable, we're competent, and we're reliable," like, you basically haven't told me anything because you just used three words to say one thing and two words to say another thing. Whereas if you tell me, you know, "Oh, well, we're really savvy, but we're also really approachable," like, that's kinda cool 'cause people who are expert are always approachable. You know, they have to have a little tension. And then you wanna write them as statements that say, like, "We are X but not Y," or, "Y is taking X too far." So in the example, like, Google is playful but not silly.... so they would say, "We are playful but not silly," or maybe Mountain Dew would say, um, "We are daring but not stupid," so, like, taking that attribute a little too far. And so yeah, then you end up with these five statements that are like, "We are X but not Y," and those are really useful in informing how you write and maybe even, like, what your visual design would look like and certainly what, like, your illustration style, photography style, ad copy will be like.

16. 1:07:39 – 1:09:14

    Where to put brand and product positioning documents so they’ll actually get used

    1. AJArielle Jackson1:07:39

    2. LRLenny Rachitsky1:07:39

       Once you've gone through that exercise an- and maybe all the other, the other two pieces, where do you put this? Is it just, like, in a doc th- that's like here's our brand overview, here's our personality, here's our positioning, here's our purpose, and- and then you refer back to that whenever you're designing and s- putting together strategies? That- is that how it works?

    3. AJArielle Jackson1:08:00

       I mean, yeah, you could do it that way. That's definitely one way of doing it. That's a good start. I think that one other place where it shows up, like, we talked about that visual style guide that everyone has that they give to, like, an agency or a copywriter who's writing on their behalf. I think these should all be inputs into that doc that you end up sharing. I also think it should go into any, like, onboarding you do for n- new employees so that they understand who the company is, any partners that you're marketing with, co-branding, all of that. Like, it should really be... Think of it as, like, your little brand bible about who you are. And also it should be revisited when you're doing, let's say, a new product or to make sure, does this need to be updated or does this new product need to fit into who we are?

    4. LRLenny Rachitsky1:08:40

       What do you call this document/place?

    5. AJArielle Jackson1:08:43

       When I take all those three components and then add a bunch of other stuff, I call it a creative brief, which is the thing you would hand to an agency or a writer who's writing on your behalf. It would include some other things too that we didn't talk about, like creative inspiration, direction. So picking, you know, visual clips and written clips and all these things that you like and that you don't like, so you can show both positive examples and counterexamples to the thing you're looking for.

    6. LRLenny Rachitsky1:09:09

       Awesome. Thank you for all of that. There's just, there's so much juice there.

17. 1:09:14 – 1:14:49

    How startups can get PR

    1. LRLenny Rachitsky1:09:14

       I think people are gonna have to listen-

    2. AJArielle Jackson1:09:15

       (laughs)

    3. LRLenny Rachitsky1:09:15

       ... to this a couple times to get all the learnings. Before I let you go, there's two other areas I wanted to dive into-

    4. AJArielle Jackson1:09:22

       Okay.

    5. LRLenny Rachitsky1:09:22

       ... but I'll keep them brief 'cause I know we're going long. One is about getting PR, and just, like, a question I wanted to ask you while I had you. Founders in even bigger companies are always just like, "Man..." They're always like, "How do I get PR? How do I get press for my-"

    6. AJArielle Jackson1:09:36

       Mm-hmm.

    7. LRLenny Rachitsky1:09:36

       "... product?" Even though it's sometimes a waste of time. Do you have just any tactical advice for startups hoping to get some PR?

    8. AJArielle Jackson1:09:43

       You mean initial, like, initial coverage around a launch or ongoing? Okay.

    9. LRLenny Rachitsky1:09:47

       Let's say early on, yeah, for like a launch.

    10. AJArielle Jackson1:09:49

        Um, sure. So the first one is to get your story straight. So, so many times I have founders come to me, and they're like, "Hey, we need help with this announcement." I'm like, "Cool, what's the announcement?" And back to the 30 minutes until I understand (laughs) what the company is. So if you can't describe it to me in a sentence, your reporter is certainly not gonna understand in a sentence, and they won't be able to describe it to their audience in a sentence. And so really getting your story straight, all the stuff we talked about specifically around product positioning is so key. Almost always when someone comes to me and says, "I'm ready to announce," we go back to positioning first. Um, also make sure that your website is ready for, like, the traffic you're gonna drive to it, that you're not driving traffic to a name that you're gonna later scrap. Like, are you really ready for this? So all those, go back to all the other (laughs) things we discussed first. And then having realistic expectations about the outlets that will cover you and the time it will take to get them. So a lot of people will be like, "I'm, I'm launching next week," and it's like, "Well, cool that you're doing that, but no reporter is gonna cover you next week." It just doesn't work like that anymore. Five years ago, eight years ago, founders could really dictate the date of a launch announcement. They could brief three to five outlets under embargo, which means, like, "You all can't tell our secret news until we tell you, 'At this time you can publish.'" And at that time, three of the five would all file a story and write, and it just doesn't work like that anymore. These days, for early stage startups, we're almost always running the launch announcement as an exclusive, which means you give the news to a single outlet and they're the only ones who get to write about it. You can obviously still do all your own owned and operated stuff, your blog, your social, your investors, your friends and family, but they're the only, like, news outlet who gets to write about it. So having expectation that, like, this is probably gonna be an exclusive. It's harder than ever to succ- to secure funding for a seed stage company, and funding in and of itself is, like, not that interesting anymore. There's so many bad companies getting funding, there's so many... There's, like, so many good companies getting funding too, it's just, like, more than ever. The number of reporters and the number of outlets that are covering it is just less than it used to be. So really just thinking about, like, w- who writes about this space? Do they write about companies at my stage? That's another really big one is, uh, "Hey, we want the New York Times." It's like, "Cool, no one at the New York Times has ever covered a seed stage startup," unless it's, like, crazy for the last five years. Who- who do you think is gonna write about you? But there are still outlets that do, you know? The other one is don't do a straight funding announcement. Like, a lot of founders raise money and they're like, "Cool, let's announce." It's like, no, we'll use that funding announcement as a news hook to k- to tell a larger story, and the larger story might be your product's available, you have reference customers, you have momentum, you have some great partnership that you're announcing. There's something else going on, not just your funding. And using your funding as part of that initial launch is great, but what else are you announcing? The last thing is really about making what you do interesting and relevant so that it's not just interesting and relevant to you and, like, the three other people who work there at the time, but interesting to all the readers of whatever outlet you're trying to target. And so, um, an example of that is I worked on this company, Vitable Health, and the founder, Joseph, he created a product for hourly workers.... that their employer would buy and it cost, like, $50 per person per month. And what it does is it provides urgent care and primary care to these hourly workers who make too much to qualify for Medicaid and too little to pay their health insurance premiums. And so primary and urgent care for hourly workers. And we tied it into this idea of the great resignation and small businesses not being able to hire hourly workers, which was, like, a big trend, you know, end of- end of 2021. W- and the- the company operates in Philadelphia and Delaware. We were actually able to get him, like, the Sunday after Christmas Philadelphia Inquirer story, but it was all about making this daycare and this restaurant in Philadelphia into heroes because they offered this cool benefit to their hourly workers. And so the- the headline was perfect for them, but it wasn't- it wasn't like, "Here's Vitable and here's what they announced and here's..." It was like, "Hey, look at this cool new thing that local businesses are doing to attract hourly workers." And so think about your- your company and a way to make it interesting and relevant. And- and don't sleep on local press. Like, if you have a local business or a local story or local customers, this was a huge thing at Square, like, we turned all of our customers into heroes and went after local press. Most PR firms that service, you know, the tech community aren't experts in local press, but if you have a way to make some connections with some local press, like, they are the ones hungry for these stories more than, um, you know, the New York Times and the Wall Street

18. 1:14:49 – 1:14:50

    When should you hire a marketer?

    1. AJArielle Jackson1:14:49

       Journal.

Episode duration: 1:22:33