Winners is an example of a refined value proposition: The latest brand names for up to 60-per-cent off.
Everyone understands it, and it’s powerful.
There are many approaches and techniques that work well at getting to a clear and compelling value proposition. Most organizations use a three-step process:
Step 1: Internal competencies review: Who are you?
This question should be answered by the group responsible for founding or running the company – the partners, the executive team, the owners. And it is usually through a series of guiding questions that the answer is arrived at. Here are some examples of good guiding questions to ask:
- Why did we get into this business?
- Why not shut down the company right now?
- How would the world be worse off without us?
- How would (BNN host) Amanda Lang introduce us to a mass TV audience?
- What is it we are really, truly great at?
If we use a book publisher as an example, the answer from Step 1 might be: “We got into this business because we are great storytellers. So who are we? We are great storytellers?”
The founders of Nantucket Nectars love to say: “We are juice guys.”
Step 2a: Customer demand and perspective: What do you do?
At this point, customer feedback is important, especially if you haven’t received it in a long time. Why? What you do must meet a match in the market. Finding customers in their own environment, and asking them questions about what they like or dislike, want or don’t want is a pretty effective way to do a temperature check.
Beyond customer input, more guiding questions will get your group to the answer to ‘What do you do?’
- If we had to explain our business to a children, what would we say?
- How do we help address a customer pain point, or fulfill a customer desire?
- What is the outcome for customers of buying and using our product or service?
- How are customers better off after using our product or service?
Staying with the book publisher example, the answer from this step could be: “We write great children’s fiction that tackles diversity issues.” Disney is fantastic when it comes to understanding and talking about what it does, over-and-over, “we make people happy.”
Step 2b: Customer demand and perspective: What makes you special?
You can’t answer this question unless you have a good, up-to-date understanding of what your competitors are offering. Competitor intelligence is a whole topic on its own, but suffice it to say it’s based on thorough research.
After finishing the competitor research, again more guiding questions will help here:
- How are we fundamentally different from our competitors?
- Why do/should customers pick us instead of our competitors?
- What or how do we do things that no one else does?
- What is the one thing we do which is both unique and compelling to customers?
In our publisher example, the answer here could be: “Our books incorporate public figures and celebrities which make the stories real for our young readers.” Vitamin water does a great job of explaining how they are special right in the name of their brand/product.
Step 3: Development and articulation: What does it all mean?
To complete the process, most firms look at the answers to all three core questions, and work through a series of implications. To spur new ideas, two great guiding questions are:
- In 100 years, what do we want people to say about our company?
- If a client from overseas called tomorrow and said, “Hey, I hear you’re the best at X,” what would X be?
In our example, the big idea answer could be: “We are the most relevant children’s book series dealing with issues of race and gender.” Another great example you will probably recognize is Grocery Gateway: the most convenient grocery option for busy people.
