šŸš€ How to find the right messaging

3 tactics, 2 traps and 1 tool to find the right messaging

Hello founders!

Welcome to ā€˜Tactical Tips’ by Jerel and Shuo at DECODE, where we cover one new idea to help you build and grow your startup – every week in <5 minutes!

Today, we’ll be answering the question, ā€œHow to find the right messaging?ā€

And here’s the advice from Matt Lerner, Founder and CEO at SYSTM, who ran B2B growth teams at Paypal and was previously a Partner at 500Global.

If you’re struggling to craft marketing copy that resonates—and still searching for product-market fit, then today’s newsletter is for you.

šŸ”„ Inside this issue:

āœ… 3 tactics to find the right messaging
āœ… 2 traps to avoid 
āœ… 1 tool to leverage 

šŸ‘‡Let’s dive in.

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3 tactics to find the right messaging

šŸŽÆ Uncover goals, struggles and triggers

  • Find users who recently tried solving the problem you address and ask them to walk you through their decision step-by-step 

  • Uncover their struggles, the solutions they tried, and what didn’t work (Eg. What will this purchase allow you to achieve? Why is that important to you? What other options did you consider?)

  • Clarify vague answers (Eg. If they say ā€œbetterā€, ā€œflexibleā€, ā€œconvenientā€ or ā€œall-in-oneā€, ask what it means for them)

  • Dig into triggers (Eg. What prompted you to act on that particular day?)

šŸ“¢ Turn specific goals and struggles into headlines

  • Goals:

    • Headlines should complete the sentence ā€œNow you canā€¦ā€, ā€œI wish I couldā€¦ā€ or ā€œSomeday I hope toā€¦ā€

    • Listen to users saying ā€œI was trying toā€¦ā€, ā€œI needed a tool that canā€¦ā€ or ā€œI wish it were easier toā€¦ā€

  • Struggles:

    • Best for cases where people are reluctant to act (Eg. weight loss) 

    • Listen to users saying ā€œI hate it whenā€¦ā€, ā€œI’m tired ofā€¦ā€ or ā€œWhy can’t Iā€¦ā€

    • Use first-person and skip rhetorical questions (Eg. None of my clothes fit anymore, and I think about food constantly.)

    • Follow with a clear ā€œNow you canā€¦ā€ goal in the sub-headline.

  • Avoid vague terms that signal unclear value like ā€œall in oneā€, ā€œfasterā€, ā€œrevolutionaryā€ or ā€œconvenientā€

šŸ†Ž Validate comprehension before A/B testing at scale

  • Flash the headline for 5-seconds, then ask: 

    • What did it say? (Readability)

    • What would it do for you? (Clarity)

    • What does it mean in your own words? (Interpretation)

  • Do this with 4 people per headline. If they can’t explain, messaging needs work

  • Scale with A/B tests after messaging is clear. Use Meta ads for faster feedback vs landing pages

2 traps to avoid

🚨Chasing product features while ignoring messaging

  • Great product, wrong words = no traction 

  • Stop everything else and fix messaging first—it’s a prerequisite for product-market fit 

  • Small messaging tweaks can unlock big conversion wins, especially with low-intent traffic

🚨Educating the market too early

  • Educating the market is tough—it requires attention, belief shifts, and behavior changes

  • Focus on grabbing attention with simple messaging first. Save education for after you’ve gained attention and built trust

1 tool to leverage

šŸ“– Best practice on measuring messaging

  • Conversion rates range from 8–40% with the right messaging, but drop to 0.5–3% without it.

  • Use tools like SEMRush, Ubersuggest, or see ā€œpeople also searched forā€¦ā€ at the bottom of Google’s search page, to iterate on messaging

Bonus: 1 trend to spark startup ideas

šŸ’µ Usage-based pricing is reshaping billing infrastructure

  • AI is killing seat-based models—now it’s all about performance and usage

  • Real-time tracking, flexible billing, and deep data observability is key

  • Sales, product, and finance can’t treat billing as back-officeā€”ā€œBillingOpsā€ / ā€œFinOpsā€ is now strategic

  • Startups with agile billing infrastructure can iterate faster, monetize smarter, and outpace slower rivals on product and pricing innovation

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