Score your first contact

First

Paste your first message unit.

The dominant headline plus the first line of copy under it. No nav, no eyebrow tag, no buttons. Copy it exactly — score the text, not your memory of the page. Open it on your phone if you want the honest version.

Question 1 · Position

Which does it lead with?

Apply in order, stop at the first that fires. If any reasonable reading has this naming a buyer's situation, choose Negative Present. Lean toward the answer that would prove the model wrong.

Negative Present — names a situation, pressure or condition the reader is living in now Positive Future — names a future state or outcome for the reader The Shortcut — names what you are, do, provide or offer Unclassifiable — none of the above, or two tie with no dominant reading

Does not count as Negative Present: "challenges" or "complexity" with no situation specified · a question that names no condition · the problem framed as your expertise rather than their experience.

Question 2 · Level

What altitude is it pitched at?

If two apply, choose the one carried by the headline, not the subhead.

Informational — this is who we are and what we sell Aspirational — your company could be better or different Transformational — your company could be new

Question 3 · Assertion Band

Could any sentence in it be disputed?

The court test. If nothing in the text could be challenged by someone acting in good faith, it is Don't-Hurt-Me language — no matter how confident it sounds.

Don't-Hurt-Me — nothing here could be disputed Assertive — at least one claim could be contested on the facts Aggressive — attacks, presumes failure, or disparages an alternative

Question 4 · The Upstream Test

How far up does it get?

Four hand-offs. Answer honestly and in order. The first "no" is where your message stops — everything after it is moot.

Pass 1 · Champion → Manager. Could someone repeat it from memory after reading it once?

Yes No

Pass 2 · Manager → VP. Does it give a VP a reason to spend an hour on it?

Yes No

Pass 3 · VP → CEO. Is there a number, a stake, or a cost in it that reaches a P&L?

Yes No

Pass 4 · CEO → Board. Described secondhand next to three competitors, would it sound different from theirs?

Yes No

Question 5 · The swap test

Put your nearest competitor's name in it. Would anyone notice?

Yes, they'd notice — it contains something only we could say No — it transfers cleanly

Score your first contact.

What it means