Sales & Marketing Advice

The Insider’s Guide on How to Create Your Customer Value Proposition

Does your business have a customer value proposition? Many business owners overlook this crucial step, assuming their value proposition is obvious. This is only sometimes the case. Here’s what you need to know about creating a solid value proposition statement for your organization.

What Is a Unique Value Proposition?

A customer value proposition, or a unique selling proposition or USP, summarizes the unique benefit your company provides through its products or services. In other words, why should your target audience buy what you’re selling?

It’s not the same as a mission statement about your company. It’s also not a tagline, which is often catchy but vague. The value proposition is about what you sell and why it’s great. In a Venn sales and marketing diagram, the USP sits in the middle, whereas a tagline would fall somewhere between marketing and branding.

As a business owner, you’ve likely given this much thought. For your employees, though, it’s not intuitive. Leaving them to guess or summarize your USP independently creates a muddied message for potential buyers.

You’ll need to make your customer value proposition clear internally to your employees and customers on your website or during a sales pitch. Despite its importance, you would be surprised that many business owners need concise help articulating their value proposition.

How to Write a Value Proposition

Whether revamping your message or starting from scratch, the steps are the same.

First, could you clear your main selling point? It’s not enough to know only what your product does or what gap it’s filling in the marketplace. Why should your target customer choose your product or service specifically? What sets you apart from your competitors?

Once you have that in mind, it’s time to summarize your customer value proposition in a short, memorable statement that you can feature prominently on your website and in your marketing and sales materials.

Ready to give it a shot? Here are three tips to consider when crafting your customer value proposition.

  1. Be real. Customers can see through generic sales language like “best” or “number one,” especially if it’s an exaggeration. If you’re boiling your selling points down to one sentence, it’s better to be specific. What exactly makes you the best? Is it your price point? What materials do you use? Focus on that instead.
  2. Be persuasive. The purpose of your USP is to convince customers to buy. Don’t get bogged down with industry jargon. Keep your audience in mind and confidently communicate what they need to know.
  3. Be one-of-a-kind. Your value proposition should be unique to your company and product or service. It shouldn’t be something that could refer to your competition. What would make someone choose your product over other similar products?

Is your value statement working for your company? A business coach can help. You can click here to schedule a complimentary video call with Coach Dave to workshop your customer value proposition.

Coach Dave

10 CRITICAL RESPONSIBILITIES OF A BUSINESS OWNER

LEARN MORE about the book or fill out the form below to download it.

Follow Dave
Dave Schoenbeck

Dave Schoenbeck is a professional business and executive coach who translates complex business methods, processes, and strategies into actionable plans to dramatically improve financial results. Read more about Dave here.

Share
Published by
Dave Schoenbeck

Recent Posts

Helpful Productivity Ideas from the Book The 12 Week Year

Introduction: Why The 12 Week Year Book Still Matters In 2013, Brian P. Moran and…

6 hours ago

How to Create Psychological Safety in Your Business

Simon Sinek's Leaders Eat Last details how great leaders prioritize their team's well-being to cultivate…

1 week ago

Management 101: Why You Must Use Management by Walking About

I firmly believe that you shouldn’t expect what you don’t inspect, which means if you want…

2 weeks ago

Best Practices We Have Learned About Managing Remote Teams

Following the pandemic, many workplaces either transitioned to permanent remote work or adopted a hybrid…

3 weeks ago

How and When to Use AI for Idea Creation

As AI technology advances daily, small business owners must think strategically about how and when…

4 weeks ago

What Does a Copyright Protect? A Small Business Guide to Copyrighting Your Business

Small business copyright is a form of legal protection for original creative works produced by…

1 month ago