Last week I walked you through our framework for turning customer conversations into strategic insights using Jobs To Be Done and the Four Forces.

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This week, we’re digging into the bit that actually makes or breaks everything - the translation.

Because this is where most positioning projects die.

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You’ve done the research. You’ve mapped the Forces. You’ve spotted that compliance teams have massive push, IT teams are anxious about breaking things, and business teams aren’t even in the room.

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And then you’re staring at a blank landing page thinking: Now what?

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The translation gap

I see this pattern constantly.

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A founder or CMO commissions great research, presents the insights to the team, everyone nods enthusiastically… and three months later, nothing’s changed.

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The website still says “governance for everyone.”

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Sales are using the same pitch deck.

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Ads sound just like before.

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The insights never actually changed anything.

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Why? Because there’s a huge gap between strategic insight and tactical execution.

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You might know “IT teams have integration anxiety,” but do you know what that means for your homepage, your sales deck, your ad copy, or your nurture sequence?

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That’s the hard part - translating insight into execution while still trying to run the business.

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Why implementation fails

It usually comes down to a few things:

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You’re too close to it, so new messaging feels uncomfortable.

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Context gets lost - the team weren’t in the interviews, so they don’t feel the emotion behind the insights.

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Capacity isn’t there - your content person’s juggling 15 things and can’t rewrite the website on top.

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And often, nobody actually owns it. The report’s delivered, but execution becomes everyone’s job, so it ends up being no one’s.

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That’s why bringing in external help focused purely on implementation (not just strategy) makes such a difference.

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What good translation looks like

Let me give you a few real-world examples.

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A payments client learned their best buyers were compliance teams in regional banks. We built the infrastructure around that insight - target lists, tailored LinkedIn sequences, messaging written in the language those teams used, and one-pagers mapping the product directly to compliance KPIs. The research was the spark; the system built around it drove the results.

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A B2B SaaS client discovered their prospects had strong “push” (governance nightmares) but big “anxiety” (implementation fears). We restructured ads to lead with the push, built landing pages that addressed anxiety head-on, and created nurture flows showing proof points. Each element worked together to ease the tension uncovered in research.

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An enterprise software business uncovered two distinct ICPs. We rebuilt their campaigns, scoring models, and landing pages around those differences, creating separate nurture paths and feedback loops so the insights were baked into every decision - not left in a deck.

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That’s what translation looks like: embedding insights into daily marketing activity so they actually move the needle.

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Making it work in your business

To bring insights to life, start by mapping them to the customer journey. Identify where each one has the biggest impact and which channel or message it touches.

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Then, make sure the right infrastructure exists - from automation and assets to tracking and sales enablement - and be explicit about who’s responsible for what. Someone needs to own it.

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Once things are live, build feedback loops with sales to understand what’s landing and what’s not.

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Adjust messaging, assets, and targeting as you go. And document what works so it becomes part of how the business runs, not something that disappears when someone leaves.

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The real difference

If you’ve got customer insights sitting in a strategy document that haven’t changed how you sell, the problem isn’t the insights - it’s the translation.

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Bridging the gap between knowing “IT teams have integration anxiety” and having a live nurture sequence that addresses it is a huge leap. Most teams don’t have the bandwidth to do it properly while running the day-to-day.

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You’ve got three ways forward:

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• Build the capability in-house (and give the team real time to do it).
• Bring in specialists who can execute.
• Or do it yourself, one channel at a time, with focus and patience.

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The key is being honest about what’s realistic for you.

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The insights only matter if they change behaviour - what you say, where you show up, who you target, and how you sell.

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That doesn’t happen through a handover deck. It happens through consistent, focused execution by people who understand both strategy and tactics.

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Whether that’s internal team members with proper support or external specialists who can build the engine for you, someone needs to make it real.

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Want to chat about how to approach this for your business? Hit reply - I’d love to hear what’s still sitting in your strategy docs that deserves to be in market.

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P.S. I’ve put together a guide showing what different implementation approaches look like - from ABM playbooks to full growth engines. Just drop me an email and I’ll send it over.