Value Proposition at its Worst
A colleague told me a funny and unbelievable story that sparked today’s blog post. While he was leaving the office the other day he noticed a man standing outside the office next door. Apparently the man was estimating how much it would cost to move their office to a new location. As my colleague was walking to his car, the man yelled across the parking lot, “Hey, if you need to move I’m your guy! I don’t carry insurance so I’m cheaper than everyone else!!”
I’m sure on some strange, distant planet that could be considered a value proposition statement. I certainly don’t live on that world, and I think smart Earthlings would probably run in the other direction too. How do you position yourself against your competitors?
Answering the question of what makes you better than your competitors should be pretty easy for business owners, CEO’s and top producers. When going through the discovery process with many of our clients I sometimes find it more difficult than it should be to uncover strong value proposition. Sometimes I’m met with negative tirades against competitors. Most often I get the benign, “we will beat anyone else’s prices.”
Bashing your competitors makes you look petty. And most agree that positioning yourself as “the cheapest in town” typically gets you a lot of customers who aren’t loyal to your company and/or don’t value what you do.
Having the ability to explain tangible and useful benefits to prospective clients is an extremely important ingredient for the success of your business. To do an effective job you first need to pay attention to how your competitors advertise themselves. Also, when new clients come to you from a competitor, ask them what your competitor did well. Ask what made them leave your competitor. And finally, ask them why they decided to come to your company.
Using this information will help you build your value arsenal and be prepared to knock it out of the park when asked the inevitable question, “Why should I come to you instead of your competitor?”
Here is the final piece that is most often overlooked: once you have established your value proposition, get it on your website! I sometimes get the most amazing elevator pitches when talking to new clients, but when I look at their website, none of that information is anywhere to be found! Packaging your strongest value proposition and building it into strategic areas of your website will insure much better conversion rates.
Remember, getting someone to your website is only the first step—if they don’t contact you (or, convert) as a result of visiting your website you’ve just lost an important lead!
Learn more about Conversion Rate Optimization.
