Entries from June 2007 ↓

A Unique Selling Proposition (USP) is your way of telling people why they should do business with you rather than any of your competitors. Your USP answers the following question that your prospective customer always asks, even if subconsciously: “Why should I buy your product or service versus anyone else’s products or services?” If you do not have an answer for this question, then you have ignored one of the strongest and most basic pillars of your business.

Why is a USP so important? Let’s look at an example. Once upon a time, two guys in college needed to make some money and bought a little pizza place that was going out of business. Neither one of them knew anything about making pizza, let alone running a business, but they slowly figured it out. What they also figured out was that they were going to quickly go out of business if they didn’t start selling more pizza. They decided to deliver the pizza and that helped a little, but not enought to hold off the inevitable end. One of the partners lost his nerve and sold out to the other guy. Now the pressure was REALLY on and Tom had to figure something out fast. Although he did not know that it was called a USP, he came up with a compelling reason (did you catch that word? compelling) for people to do business with him. Here’s what he came up with: “Fresh, hot pizza delivered in 30 minutes or less. Guaranteed.” That right, this was Tom Monaghan, the founder of Dominos Pizza. And because of this USP, he went on to open thousands of stores and make millions of dollars. All because of a compelling USP.

So how do you come up with a compelling USP? Let’s get started…

Step One: Gather Information

First, make a list of every word or phrase that you can think of that describes your art. Notice that I have given you a lot of room to write. Take your time and come back often:

Second, survey anyone that has bought from you and grill them on all the reasons why:

Third, look at your competitors and write down all the reasons that people would buy from them. Put yourself in the shoes of your competitor’s customers:

Fourth, write down every reason why people should buy from YOU that is NOT on your competitor’s list.

In Lesson 2, I will show you how to take this information and craft a compelling USP.

Chris O’Byrne
http://OnlineArtsMarketing.com

Wikipedia does such a good job of explaining the Unique Selling Proposition, that I am simply going to pull material from their site.

“In his book Reality in Advertising, Rosser Reeves (Chairman of the Board at Ted Bates & Company) gives the precise definition as it was understood at his company:

1. Each advertisement must make a proposition to the customer: “buy this product, and you will get this specific benefit.”
2. The proposition itself must be unique - something that competitors do not, or will not, offer.
3. The proposition must be strong enough to pull new customers to the product.

However, Reeves warns against forming a USP based on what he calls “The Deceptive Differential” - a uniqueness that is too small or too technical for customers to observe the differences in actual practice.

Examples

Some good current examples of products with a clear USP are:

• Head & Shoulders: “You get rid of dandruff”
• Olay: “You get younger-looking skin”
• Red Bull: “You get stimulation of body and mind”
• Ronseal: “You get exactly what it says on the tin“

Some unique propositions that were pioneers when they were introduced:

• Domino’s Pizza: “You get fresh, hot pizza delivered to your door in 30 minutes or less — or it’s free.”
• FedEx: “Your package absolutely, positively has to get there overnight”
• M&M’s: “The milk chocolate melts in your mouth, not in your hand”
• Wonder Bread: “It helps build strong bones 12 ways”

In my next post I will start the series that I previously offered as my USP mini-course. I decided against the mini-course for a couple of reasons. The main reason I started it was so I could “capture” email addresses and then send follow-up “selling” messages. That just didn’t feel right. It felt too devious and gimicky (is that a word?). I feel that people should have the right to choose what kind of content they want to receive in their emails. Instead, I am going to add the option to have my posts sent directly to your email. You can also receive these posts through a news aggregator (such as Bloglines, Google Reader, and many more). As time goes by and this series of posts about your USP becomes covered up by newer posts, I will have an option in the sidebar to view all of them at once. I want to help artists understand all the facets of online marketing and how they can use it to help them sell more art.

Chris O’Byrne
OnlineArtsMarketing.com/blog

Have you identified a niche that you want to market your art to? Have you identified what their most pressing problems and needs are? Then it’s time to let them know that you have the solution they’ve been looking for.

Start by creating a make believe person that fits your niche perfectly. Write a letter to them that focuses on what their need is and how you can provide that for them. Do not simply tell them how great you and your product or service are, show them how you can help them. Give them examples of how you have helped others that are in their same position solve the same problems. This isn’t the place for testimonials that say how wonderful you are, this is where you build trust and confidence.

Actually, let’s go back one step. Before you even start to write the letter, write a headline. And don’t just write one, write many of them. Even 50 to 100 is not too little. One very helpful and easy technique I use is to use a swipe file. A swipe file is a file of winning headlines. These are headlines that have been used by the best of the best throughout the years and have proven themselves by bringing in hundreds of thousands of dollars for those that have used them. Here is more information about how to write the best and most effective headlines.

Chris O’Byrne
OnlineArtsMarketing.com/blog