What does brand discovery produce?

A discovery report plus appendices. The report has an executive summary, 1 to 3 named audience segments with one-page profiles, a competitor matrix (3 to 8 deep) with per-competitor analysis, a category and problem-space map, 3 to 5 positioning territories, implications and recommendations, and the open questions that need further research. The appendices hold sanitized interview notes, competitor research data, and a source list.

When should I run discovery instead of skipping to the brief?

Run it at the very first phase of a new brand or website project, or when a brief was requested but the upstream inputs (audience, competitors, problem space) are not yet clear. Skip to creative-brief or brand-ideation only when the audience and category are already well understood. Every shortcut at this stage costs roughly 10x downstream when the brand fails to land, so the time spent here is rarely wasted.

Who counts as a competitor?

Three layers. Direct competitors solve the same problem the same way (another SaaS in the category). Indirect competitors solve the same problem a different way (a spreadsheet replacing a SaaS tool). The status-quo competitor is doing nothing, doing it manually, or living with the problem, and it is the one most often forgotten and most often the actual competitor. Map 3 to 8 deep, and pick the 3 that are genuinely dangerous rather than listing every competitor as equal.

What makes a good audience profile?

Behavior, beliefs, and jobs-to-be-done, not demographics. 'Women aged 25 to 45' is not insight. Surface demographic, psychographic, behavioral, and jobs-to-be-done layers from customer interviews (5 to 8 ideal), sales call recordings, support ticket themes, review and forum analysis, first-party analytics, and social listening. Look for surprises: if the research validates every assumption you held going in, you did not actually research.

What is a positioning territory?

A place the brand could plausibly stand, generated from underserved audience segments, underserved jobs, category-convention violations, honest brand truths competitors cannot also claim, and where the category is heading. Each territory documents a one-sentence statement, why it could work, who would resonate, who is already competing there (often no one good), and the risk that makes it fragile. Discovery surfaces 3 to 5 territories without committing; brand-ideation narrows and commits. A territory without rejection criteria is not a territory.

How often should discovery be re-run?

At least every 3 years. Categories shift, audiences evolve, and distribution changes. Treating discovery as a one-time event leaves the brand positioned against a market that has already moved, so re-run it when the category dynamics or the audience have changed materially.

Skill · Brand discovery

Brand discovery.

Know who the brand is for before anyone writes the brief.

Upstream of every brief, identity, and content plan. Discovery answers four questions: who the brand is for, what they need, who else competes for that need, and where the brand could plausibly stand that competitors do not. Audience research, competitor mapping including the status-quo competitor, category and problem-space mapping, and 3 to 5 positioning territories.

The output is a discovery report that feeds the brief, ideation, and content work. Skip discovery to save time and every shortcut costs about 10x downstream when the brand fails to land.

Audience: founders, brand strategists, and marketing leads at the start of a new brand or website project, or anyone handed a brief with the upstream inputs still missing.

View the skill on GitHub Browse the full catalog

The framework

Four dimensions, each with its own sources.

Discovery covers four dimensions. Each has its own sources, methods, and output.

01Audience: who specifically this serves, surfaced across demographic, psychographic, behavioral, and jobs-to-be-done layers. Output: 1 to 3 named segments with one-page profiles.
02Competitors: direct, indirect, and the status-quo competitor (doing nothing or doing it manually), the one most often forgotten and most often the real one. Output: a 3-to-8 competitor matrix.
03Category and problem space: the underlying problem, the category structure, the conventions every brand shares, the shifts underway, the moats, and the vocabulary.
04Positioning territory: where the brand could plausibly stand, given the first three. 3 to 5 distinct territories, not yet committed, fed into brand ideation.

How the skill runs

Eight steps from scope to handoff.

Discovery starts by scoping the effort and auditing what is already known, then works through the four dimensions before handing off.

01
Define the discovery scope
1 week for a startup pre-launch, 4 to 6 weeks for a major rebrand. Set expectations before the work starts.
02
Audit existing inputs
Sales calls, support tickets, reviews, analytics, internal docs. More is usually known than people think; start there before new research.
03
Audience research
5 to 8 interviews where possible, plus secondary research from review and forum analysis. Look for surprises, not confirmation of what you already believe.
04
Competitor mapping
3 to 8 competitors deep, including indirect and status-quo competitors. Pick the 3 that are genuinely dangerous rather than listing every competitor as equal.
05
Category mapping
The conventions every brand shares, the shifts underway, the vocabulary, and the moats that protect incumbents.
06
Territory generation
3 to 5 plausible positioning territories from underserved segments and jobs, convention violations, honest brand truths, and where the category is heading.
07
Write the discovery report
Executive summary, audience segments, competitor matrix, category and problem space, territories, implications, and open questions.
08
Hand off to the next phase
Discovery feeds creative-brief, brand-ideation, or content-strategy, depending on where the project goes next.

Where this skill sits

Upstream of the whole creative track.

Discovery is upstream of every brief, identity, and content plan. Its territories feed brand ideation; the brief, direction, and identity work build on what discovery surfaces.

01
brand-discovery (this skill)Upstream scope
Who the brand is for, what they need, who competes, and where it could plausibly stand. The research the rest of the track answers to.
02
brand-ideationNarrows and commits
Takes discovery's positioning territories, narrows them, and commits: positioning, naming, mood directions, narrative angles.
03
creative-briefBrief scope
The bridge from discovery to execution: scope, audience, deliverables, constraints, success criteria.
04
creative-directionDirection scope
Sets the four directional axes (tone, aesthetic, relationship, sensory) that the identity system is built to answer.
05
brand-identityIdentity scope
Builds the five-element system (logo, color, typography, imagery, motion) on top of the approved direction.

Pairs with these platforms

Quantitative grounding for the competitive scan.

Beyond naming the competitors, the scan gets sharper with quantitative grounding: how much traffic they earn, where it comes from, and how the audiences overlap. Similarweb is the standard for competitive landscape and audience overlap; pair it with Ahrefs for the SEO-specific overlap and Semrush for the keyword and digital-PR angle.

Reference files

Two references that go alongside the SKILL.md.

references/discovery-report-template.md
The full discovery report template: executive summary, audience segments, competitor matrix, category and problem space, positioning territories, implications, and open questions.
references/interview-guide.md
An audience interview guide with question prompts, structured to surface behavior, beliefs, and jobs-to-be-done rather than demographics.

Browse all reference files on GitHub

Bridges to other skills

When to reach for something else.

Discovery is the research phase. These skills cover the cases it is not for, and the search-angle scan it points to.

Validate a design
usability-testing
Validates a specific design or feature with real users, which is a later-stage job. Discovery runs upstream, before there is an artifact worth testing.
Existing audience
journey-mapping
When the audience is already understood, this maps their journey across touchpoints. Discovery is the earlier phase that defines who the audience is in the first place.
Search-angle scan
seo-competitor
The search-specific competitive analysis the competitor-mapping dimension points to: SERP overlap, content depth, and backlink posture.
Content handoff
content-strategy
One of discovery's handoffs. Positioning and audience from the report become the required inputs for planning a content program.

Open source under MIT

Read the SKILL.md on GitHub.

The skill source lives in the rampstackco/claude-skills repository alongside dozens of other skills covering the full lifecycle of brand and product work. This page is a structured overview; the SKILL.md is the source. MIT licensed.

View SKILL.md Browse the full catalog

Frequently asked questions.

What does brand discovery produce?: A discovery report plus appendices. The report has an executive summary, 1 to 3 named audience segments with one-page profiles, a competitor matrix (3 to 8 deep) with per-competitor analysis, a category and problem-space map, 3 to 5 positioning territories, implications and recommendations, and the open questions that need further research. The appendices hold sanitized interview notes, competitor research data, and a source list.
When should I run discovery instead of skipping to the brief?: Run it at the very first phase of a new brand or website project, or when a brief was requested but the upstream inputs (audience, competitors, problem space) are not yet clear. Skip to creative-brief or brand-ideation only when the audience and category are already well understood. Every shortcut at this stage costs roughly 10x downstream when the brand fails to land, so the time spent here is rarely wasted.
Who counts as a competitor?: Three layers. Direct competitors solve the same problem the same way (another SaaS in the category). Indirect competitors solve the same problem a different way (a spreadsheet replacing a SaaS tool). The status-quo competitor is doing nothing, doing it manually, or living with the problem, and it is the one most often forgotten and most often the actual competitor. Map 3 to 8 deep, and pick the 3 that are genuinely dangerous rather than listing every competitor as equal.
What makes a good audience profile?: Behavior, beliefs, and jobs-to-be-done, not demographics. 'Women aged 25 to 45' is not insight. Surface demographic, psychographic, behavioral, and jobs-to-be-done layers from customer interviews (5 to 8 ideal), sales call recordings, support ticket themes, review and forum analysis, first-party analytics, and social listening. Look for surprises: if the research validates every assumption you held going in, you did not actually research.
What is a positioning territory?: A place the brand could plausibly stand, generated from underserved audience segments, underserved jobs, category-convention violations, honest brand truths competitors cannot also claim, and where the category is heading. Each territory documents a one-sentence statement, why it could work, who would resonate, who is already competing there (often no one good), and the risk that makes it fragile. Discovery surfaces 3 to 5 territories without committing; brand-ideation narrows and commits. A territory without rejection criteria is not a territory.
How often should discovery be re-run?: At least every 3 years. Categories shift, audiences evolve, and distribution changes. Treating discovery as a one-time event leaves the brand positioned against a market that has already moved, so re-run it when the category dynamics or the audience have changed materially.

Brand discovery.

Four dimensions, each with its own sources.

Eight steps from scope to handoff.

Define the discovery scope

Audit existing inputs

Audience research

Competitor mapping

Category mapping

Territory generation

Write the discovery report

Hand off to the next phase

Upstream of the whole creative track.

Quantitative grounding for the competitive scan.

Similarweb

Ahrefs

Semrush

Two references that go alongside the SKILL.md.

When to reach for something else.

Read the SKILL.md on GitHub.

Frequently asked questions.