The framework problem

Many well-known frameworks aid us in product development, messaging, ads, and marketing. Without exception, they are interesting and, for given purposes, useful. Otherwise they’d be unknown.

Examples:

• Lean Startup for quick product iteration
• AIDA for persuasive ads and landing pages
• Jobs-to-be-Done for pinpointing customer needs
• StoryBrand for recasting your solution into narrative

Interesting stuff! To you at least – and a few of your fellow framework fans. And again, useful, on a case-by-case basis, thus firms rightly exploit them.

But if you know about a framework, so do at least 100,000 other people using it to create.

And if you rely on any one framework too much in your messaging, it might dilute down your original thinking; it won’t feel different.

Different is better than better.

Just as in baking: if you use the same framework (the baker’s percentage, the creamingg method), ingredients, and equipment as other bakeries.. how will your products taste different?

And if there’s an “art of message”, it’s the art of tasting different.