ARCHETYPES
Archetypes are the mechanical bridge between your market context and your revenue goals.
Why?
You should recognize that without an archetype, your strategy likely suffers from "Strategic Noise", a state where you attempt to optimize all 24 dimensions simultaneously, leading to resource dilution and a blurred market presence.
What role could you play?
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The Disruptive Newcomer
You are the aggressor entering a market to displace incumbents through technical or conceptual superiority. You should realize that your survival depends on being noticed and understood immediately; if you fail to be distinct, you will be filtered out by the market. You should prioritize aggressive storytelling and feature-led proof to validate your claim of category disruption.
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The Efficiency Machine
You are the high-volume player whose victory is determined by operational scale and the removal of transaction friction. You should focus almost exclusively on optimizing the acquisition funnel to ensure your cost-per-acquisition remains the lowest in the market. You should recognize that in a commodity space, your ability to automate the journey through "Magic" is your primary defense against margin erosion.
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The Brand Evangelist
You are a brand built on identity and tribal belonging where the product serves as a badge of the user's personal values. You should prioritize the emotional connection your audience feels toward your brand purpose above all technical specifications. You should view your customers as members of a community; your mission is to deepen that engagement to make price a secondary consideration.
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The Stagnant Leader
You are the established incumbent with a massive legacy base and a high-price position that is increasingly under threat. You should acknowledge that your biggest liability is the technical debt and organizational inertia that frustrates your long-term users. You should prioritize fixing the core experience and reinvesting in customer lifetime value before attempting to scale new, unproven features.
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The Pivot Pioneer
You are an organization transitioning away from an obsolete category toward a new, unproven direction. You should accept that your historical positioning is now your greatest brake on future growth. You should prioritize market listening to find the new "Job" your company can solve, using new technical features as the tangible proof that the pivot is real and not just a marketing rebrand.
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The Value Harvester
You are focused on extracting maximum cash flow from a stable or shrinking asset with near-zero reinvestment. You should prioritize operational efficiency and margin-focused upselling (ARPU) above all else. You should recognize that your mission is not growth, but the maximization of the return on investment from an asset that you have already paid for.
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The Scale-up Guardian
You are in a phase of rapid expansion where the pace of growth is threatening to break your delivery systems. You should realize that acquiring more customers while your experience is failing will lead to a brand collapse. Your mandate is to "Guard" the brand by automating the experience and securing the lifetime value of the customers you have already fought to win.
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The Niche Expert
You are a specialist who wins by solving a very specific, high-complexity problem for a targeted group of users. You should prioritize technical proof and deep alignment with your customer's specific "Job To Be Done." You should recognize that your authority in a narrow field is your only defense against broader, cheaper generalist competitors.
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The Category Creator
You are "The Teacher" and the architect of the new, defining a "Job To Be Done" that the market hasn't yet named. You should recognize that your mission is to write a brand-new rulebook, becoming the noun or verb that defines a vacuum where no competition exists. You should acknowledge that because your world is unproven, the "Burden of Proof" is 10x higher, requiring you to educate before you sell.
How?
By selecting a specific archetype based on your market stage (M3) and economic value (M4), you should force a resonance mandate that aligns your organization’s internal energy with the external reality of the category. This structural focus ensures that every dollar spent is directed toward the specific Vital 8 dimensions required to hit your Step 2 Goal, rather than being wasted on generic industry benchmarks that do not move your specific needle.
Benefits
You should view archetypes as an enforcement mechanism for strategic trade-offs. In a saturated market, excellence is a commodity, but distinctiveness is a moat; therefore, you should use your archetype to identify which dimensions are Fatal Brakes (F) that currently act as a "leaky bucket" for your revenue. This approach mandates the use of "Integrity Gates," where you should prioritize fixing these systemic failures before attempting to scale. By adhering to this archetype-driven sequence, you should transform marketing from an unpredictable cost center into a predictable systems engineering discipline that protects your margins and secures your competitive position.