Hey there,

The cycle studio I used to coach at promised to be “the toughest workout in Nashville.”

I had an irk with that promise from day one. Partly because, as a spin instructor, you quickly discover what kind of coach you are. And I was the party instructor (of course). Folks came to me for a good time and to watch me go fully unhinged with karaoke-level sing-alongs.

But mostly, because the “toughest” positioning never matched our riders or what actually kept them coming back.

Every class I coached was full of people prepared to sweat, but none of them asked for it to be the “toughest.” My regulars came back for the high-fives and the friendly challenge not to push themselves to the brink. That gap? Classic positioning trouble. And yup, you guessed it! Brand strategy could have prevented it from happening.

That’s this week’s issue of Brand Burnout. 🔥 Plus, some words of encouragement if you’re struggling with positioning and differentiation.

I want to start by acknowledging that the gym I worked at was one of the longest-running cycle studios in Nashville and had weathered a gauntlet of challenges—COVID, a new location, and an increasingly competitive market—to name a few.

Would brand positioning save them completely? Probably not. But it may have solved their perception problem, and in the long run, it likely would have attracted new clients that matched the culture of the gym. But brand work takes time, and time was not on their side. Plus, running a business is one of the hardest things you can do, and the world of business ownership is rife with armchair experts (but more on that in a future article).

So this isn’t shade. I loved working there, loved my riders, and miss it every day. This is just me putting my brand hat on to say, “Huh, what might have happened if we’d approached it differently?”

Most founder-led brands wrestle with three equal and opposite pulls: the urge to stand out, the pull to sound like everyone else, and the temptation to create only for yourself.

Strong positioning lives in the middle.

Why Positioning Misalignment Happens

In this specific case, the gym’s brand was shaped by a mix of assumptions and personal preferences—none of which are solid foundations. I see this with a lot of brands—especially those that are founder-led. This can look like (in the form of all things I’ve seen and heard IRL):

“We can’t use the color orange because I hate Tennessee.”

“I wouldn’t read testimonials, so we don’t need to gather them.”

“We can skip email marketing, I don’t open newsletters.”

And when someone too close to the work shapes the brand positioning, they’re often operating under a few different triggers:

1. Pressure to Stand Out

The studio wanted to be “the toughest workout in Nashville.” It sounded bold, but it missed what riders were actually coming for: community (we were living in a post-quarantine world, after all!), great music, and a friendly challenge.

That “toughest” promise is the perfect example of different for difference’s sake. Differentiation is important, but it’s also a trap. We think if we’re just more different, we’ll attract more customers—but “different” can just as easily mean different in a way nobody wants.

The pressure to stand out is real—especially in crowded or competitive markets. But before you go billing yourself as the ~wacky~ accountant or the confrontational customer service expert, ask yourself:

• Does this difference solve a problem my customers actually care about?

• Would they notice (or miss it) if it disappeared?

• Does it still feel true if everyone else copied it tomorrow?

2. Trapped in the Industry Echo Chamber

Ironically, while we were leaning on “toughest” to sound unique, we were also borrowing from the same workouts, choreography, playlists, and lingo every other studio used. Anyone who’s taught or taken group fitness knows the drill: playlists overlap, cues and choreography get passed around. At my peak, I was teaching four classes a week—yes, including full-out sprints to Sabotage by Beastie Boys—and it was easy to start repeating the same phrases everyone else used without realizing it.

While some brands focus solely on standing out, others (or the very same ones) unconsciously echo the buzzwords of their peers. When you live inside your industry bubble, you start to believe its trends and language are what everyone wants and understands. In reality, you’re mostly echoing what your peers are doing, not what your customers are actually asking for. That’s how every studio ends up promising “the ultimate ride,” every agency claims “next-level strategy,” and every SaaS product is suddenly “AI-powered.”

Before you jump for the buzzwords, ask yourself:

• What am I assuming everyone else knows or values?

• If my category didn’t exist, what fundamental problem would my customers still be looking to solve?

• Where might sameness be a sign of safety, not strategy?

3. Personal Taste Overshadowing Market Reality

And finally, to escape sameness, many folks swing hard in a third direction: I’ll just be 100% myself and completely authentic¹. And that’s not bad advice. Personality is powerful (and it’s the fun part of running a business, IMO). But when personal taste outweighs customer reality, positioning drifts.

Even at the “toughest workout” studio, instructors—including me—built playlists or class themes simply because we loved them. That’s not a crime, but it shows how easily personal preference can crowd out what members actually need or enjoy. And yes, I’ll go to my grave saying be yourself to attract the right people—but the right people still have to exist in your market.

I see this often in ideal client persona work. We start with the dream: Who do you want to serve? What lights you up? That vision is really important. But then we have to root it in reality: What do those people actually buy? Do they even know they have the problem that you solve? How do they describe their pain points? And finally, where is the overlap in your passion and their priorities?

Finding that middle ground is where strong positioning lives. Here’s how to land there:

• Which parts of my brand are non-negotiably me, and which can flex?

• What requests keep resurfacing from clients, even when they surprise me?

• What feedback have I heard (and maybe ignored) because it doesn’t match my personal taste or perception?

Choosing the Truth to Lead With

Each of these tensions—the urge to stand out, the pull of the industry echo chamber, and the temptation to build only for yourself—showed up at the gym in different ways. Together, they point to the real work of positioning: deciding which truth belongs out front.

I still think about that “toughest workout in Nashville” flag we were so proud to fly. The classes were tough, but the real draw was the sense of the community, the instructors themselves, and let’s be real—the location and lack of competitors in our immediate vicinity. We highlighted the part that sounded bold instead of the part people actually valued.

That’s the crux of positioning: choosing which truth to lead with.

Strong positioning lives somewhere between being clear about what makes you different while being anchored in what customers actually come for.

Thanks for reading,

1  PS, if you are worried about being authentic or always talking about the importance of being authentic…you probably aren’t being authentic. The end.