Are you struggling to grow your business? There is probability that you have a weak value proposition—it’s as simple as that. It’s a common problem; and in fact, lack of focus around a core value proposition is the root cause of most business growth challenges. This is why your value proposition is a critical piece of business strategy.
After you define a target market, you must work to clarify your ‘desired’ value proposition. Without it, its hard to resonate strongly with customers and can invisibly destroy your business. But what exactly is a value proposition? And how is it different from ‘elevator’ pitches and Unique Selling Proposition’s?
Elevator Pitches & Unique Selling Propositions
Value propositions are often confused with elevator pitches or unique selling propositions (USPs). However its impact on your company’s success is fundamentally different.
An elevator pitch answers the question “what do you do?” Its a one sentence answer that defines your customer and the general area you help them:
“My company provides Hotels efficient property management system and room distribution over the Internet”
An elevator pitch is the foundation of a value proposition; but much weaker.
A USP answers the question, “what makes you different?” And looks like the following:
“We are the only company to that is a SaaS based Property management system with a integrated room distribution for hoteliers”
The USP is another piece of the value proposition, but again it lacks the impact of a strong value proposition.
The Value Proposition
A value proposition is a clear statement of the concrete results a customer will get from purchasing and using your products and/or services. It is focused on outcomes. So as opposed to the above examples, the smart businessperson will always speak in terms of results that products can create or results it produces produces.
A good example might be: “Our products help people leverage the internet to triple their market reach and cut marketing costs in half when launching new products.”
Value As Strategy
Strategy is all about execution of vision with results ending in enhanced customers expectation of service. Since the creation of value is the end destination in business—it is important to establish what your value proposition will be in the future.
First things first in business are to figure out what your value proposition will be to your customers. Hence, the goal is to help improve operational efficiency its time to assess by how much, by tracking and measuring your results. Then talk to your customers and ask them if your plan is based in reality and a viable product.
To roll this out as a piece of your plan, simply state an value goal in your business or marketing plan, e.g. “we plan to reduce Cost of goods sold while improving inventory controls for hotel room distribution while providing business intelligence for your hotel.”
Once you have established your core “value strategy” you will have a measuring stick to measure your efforts. And then you can use your value strategy as a basis for making decisions—whenever you have a choice to make, you can ask yourself, “will this improve our value proposition.”
This holds true if your message is communicated via the Internet through Internet Marketing strategies or in person.
Read more on MindSpring Software Value Proposition Here
