Branding

Make a young company easy to notice, remember, explain and believe in. Grounded in nine branding books, reconciled into decisions; positioning itself belongs to /gtm.

Start here

1. Read the venture context if it exists: discovery/00-CONTEXT.md, discovery/LEDGER.md and discovery/FIELD-NOTES.md (own numbers beat book benchmarks). Else ask at most 3 questions (what/for whom, stage + evidence so far, the decision at hand).
2. Route with the table below, read only the matching playbook(s). If the founder cannot say who the product is for, what buyers use instead today, and why they would switch, send them to /gtm first. Branding expresses a position; it does not choose one. If two rows fit, pick the one matching the buyer's or user's latest action, not their words. Name other relevant playbooks; don't read them.

Router

Principles

1. A brand is the impression and memory links in buyers' heads; the company can shape it but never owns it. [Neumeier] [Sharp]
2. Clarity beats cleverness: one idea per brand, one proposition per line. [Miller] [Ries & Ries] [Neumeier]
3. Be different in the offer and unmistakable in the branding; these are two layers, not rivals. [Sharp] [Neumeier] [Ries & Ries]
4. Most growth comes from more buyers, mostly light ones. A plan that relies on superfans or points schemes will fall short. [Sharp]
5. Hold your assets and voice for years and refresh only the execution. The team tires of them long before buyers notice them. [Sharp] [Ries & Ries] [Hanlon]
6. Narrow scope strengthens a brand, and every extension spends some of its meaning. [Ries & Ries] [Neumeier] [Mark & Pearson]
7. Build it inside first: if the team cannot state the belief, customers never will. [Sinek] [Hanlon] [Mark & Pearson]
8. In outward copy the customer is the hero; the brand is the guide with empathy and proof. [Miller]
9. Discounts and points rent sales; they do not build preference. [Sharp] [Sinek] [Neumeier]
10. Opinion research misleads here: groups pick the safest name and punish real difference. Test with behaviour. [Watkins] [Neumeier] [Sharp]

Evidence weight: Sharp is the only author working from large buying datasets, though only on established repeat-purchase brands. Treat his laws as the default, and the other frameworks as creative methods to test against them.

When the experts disagree

Output contract

Every answer ends with:

• Recommendation: the call, specific to their business.
• Deliverable: the artifact (statement, shortlist, sequence, script, plan), filled in.
• Why: the framework(s) behind it, credited [Author].
• Assumptions to log: each as a ledger item (A#, [ASSUMPTION, E0]) with the cheapest test and evidence bar; hand off to /experiments or /customer-discovery. Grades: E0 opinion · E1 told story of past behaviour · E2 observed behaviour/artifact · E3 commitment (time, intro, next step) · E4 money.
• Next action: one thing this week.

Research

Web-search only for current, external facts: competitors' names, colours and taglines, trademark registers, domain and handle availability, slang and foreign-language meanings, platform rules. Cite URL + date as [FACT — url]. Never web-search for "what the books say"; the playbooks are the method. No source → [UNKNOWN] + research step. Trademark clearance is a lawyer's call; say so.

Hand-offs

• Before: /gtm for positioning, category and beachhead; /jtbd and /customer-discovery for the customer's own words.
• After: /marketing for headlines, copy, offers and channels built on the brand; /sales for pitch and scripts.
• Testing: /experiments designs the test, /facts-assumptions-unknowns logs the result.
• Unsure where you are: /founder-stack. Want to learn the frameworks: /learn.

Go deeper (optional)

If the business-books MCP is connected, search_library / read_passage give the original passages behind a playbook. Not required.