Julian Stubbs and Dr. Robert England spend Episode 4 doing the hard, delightful work of unpacking positioning. It’s not about clever copy or a snappy strapline. It’s about choosing one thing to stand for and having the courage to stick with it. And as they demonstrate, the best scientists in history understood that instinctively - sometimes by accident, sometimes by genius.
Why positioning matters (and why science needs it more than most)
Julian puts it best: “If you don’t position your company, your competitors will do it for you - and not to your benefit.”
Rob adds the science angle: positioning is the difference between complexity and clarity - between “here’s what we do” and “here’s why it matters.”
Whether you're selling lab equipment, founding a biotech startup, or running the world’s largest particle accelerator, positioning isn’t optional. It’s your mental shelf space. The single word people associate with you. The symbolic shortcut that decides whether you’re remembered - or forgotten.
Science is full of brilliant complexity. Positioning gives people a handle. A doorway. A reason to care. Without it, the smartest idea becomes wallpaper.
Newton’s apple: not an explanation, but a doorway
We all know the story: an apple falls, Newton notices gravity, the rest is legend. The truth is messier - the apple anecdote surfaced after Newton died - but that’s the point.
A single, simple image does what pages of equations cannot: it invites people in.
Newton didn’t hand people the inverse-square law as an on-ramp. He let the apple drop. Mic drop. That tiny, human gesture turned an abstract force into a story people keep telling centuries later.
Einstein: mad hair, one equation, a whole identity
Einstein’s brand feels effortless: wild hair, a twinkling grin, and E = mc² - an equation that became shorthand for genius itself.
Rob and Julian unpack why that matters. The equation doesn’t need to be understood to be meaningful. It’s a symbol - an invitation to awe. Einstein’s public persona did something else too: it made complex science human. He was the scientist people could recognise and, crucially, trust as a moral voice on the big issues of his day.
Positioning turned Einstein from a brilliant mind into a cultural touchstone.
Positioning exercises you can steal (and one word that will change your briefing)
Julian and Rob run the same simple test with almost every client:
What one word do people immediately associate with your brand?
If your board can’t answer quickly - or if everyone gives different words - you’ve got a positioning problem.
Stop trying to be everything. Brands that attempt “fastest, cheapest, highest quality, most innovative” simultaneously become wallpaper. The job of positioning is to pick a corner of the market and own it. Be the Volvo of something. Or be the Apple of something. But be something.
When positioning goes wrong - and it can get very, very wrong
Positioning doesn’t just stick for good things. Rob and Julian flag two cautionary tales:
Andrew Wakefield: One fraudulent paper rewired public perception of vaccines in ways we’re still cleaning up. Negative positioning can outlive a career - and tarnish public trust in whole fields.
Elon Musk (as a brand lesson): One person can be many things to the public. But when your actions contradict your positioning, the consequences ripple across your business. Positioning is fragile; reputation is hard to rebuild.
Lessons: be careful what you stand for. And if you’ve taken a stand, be ready to live by it.
CERN: the poster child for great work, poor positioning
Here’s a juicy example Julian and Rob both love to dissect. CERN invented the World Wide Web, helps create medical imaging tools, and probes the very fabric of reality. Yet most people either don’t know what CERN does - or think it’s responsible for conspiracy-theory nonsense.
Why? No tight public positioning. No human doorway. If you can’t explain your work in one memorable line, the internet will tell your story for you - and often in ways you don’t want.
Rob and Julian toy with taglines - “Secrets of the Universe from a Subatomic Haystack” - partly tongue-in-cheek, mostly to show the point: give people a doorway, and they’ll walk in.
Quick, brutal checklist: how to test your positioning
One-word test: can someone name a single word that equals your brand?
Story door test: can you explain what you do in a sentence that anyone can understand?
Proof test: do you have the evidence to back the claim you want to own?
Stick-to-it test: can you live with this one thing for five years? If not, don’t pick it.
If you fail two or more - you’ve got work to do.
Final thought: position like Newton, narrate like Einstein
Positioning is not spin. It’s discipline. It’s choice. Newton didn’t publish a textbook titled “How Gravity Works.” He gave us an apple story that pulled people towards the work. Einstein didn’t print a poster of his papers; he became the personification of scientific imagination.
You don’t need to be a scientist to learn from them. Pick your apple. Own it. Then tell the story so that the rest of the world can finally remember what you’re trying to do.
Coming Up Next:
In Episode 5, Julian and Rob reflect on the biggest marketing event of the year, HubSpot’s INBOUND 25. What does it mean for science brands? From the rise of AI to the timeless power of imagination, they explore where creativity meets technology - and what every marketer can learn from it.
Until then: stay curious, stay creative, and keep pushing the boundaries.