How do we explain our role in an ecosystem?

Find what participants value about your contribution through stakeholder interviews and audience research. Look beyond recognition of the platform to understand how participants perceive the organisation behind it.

For Strategy Object, research revealed a gap: its SOClass platform was widely respected, but the company remained largely invisible. Stakeholder interviews and audience research identified a contribution that went beyond technology: enabling collaboration, innovation and trust between governments. Strategy Object had helped countries exchange data securely and deliver reforms, yet its brand did not reflect that role.

The work also identified precision, clarity and continuous improvement as values shared by Strategy Object and its users. Use interviews to identify both the contribution participants recognise and the values that can make your positioning credible to them.

Define the outcomes your business enables by connecting your contribution to what other organisations can achieve. Describe the relationship between your capabilities, participants' activities and the experience they ultimately deliver.

Genius Sports captures and shares detailed sports data, from the speed of a ball to the angle of a player's arm. That data enables broadcasters, streamers, betting companies, teams and sponsors to create richer fan experiences. The positioning task was to make that enabling role visible across a diverse audience.

The resulting concept, "Built on Genius", connected the company's data to an ecosystem of businesses reaching and engaging sports fans. Follow that logic: explain what participants can build or deliver with your contribution, rather than describing your platform's capabilities in isolation.

Show your role through each audience's perspective while keeping one recognisable positioning idea. Adapt the examples and emphasis to the participant, rather than creating a separate account of your business for every audience.

For Genius Sports, "Built on Genius" carried across a brand campaign, film and social campaign aimed at broadcasters, streamers, betting companies, teams and sponsors. A layered collage style showed the scale of the data collected and its ripple effect within a single graphic. The design could be tailored from a player perspective to a brand perspective, with the fan at the centre.

Use a similarly flexible approach: retain the central explanation of your contribution, then show how that contribution matters from each participant's viewpoint. Consistency should make your role recognisable without making every communication identical.