On the Snipply blog, we’ve been walking you through how to build your startup as a brand, and what it means for your startup’s growth trajectory. One aspect of your brand is your business or value proposition. The proposition refers to the value you promise to deliver to your customers. It’s exuded in your brand, your communication, and every touchpoint you have with a potential user or buyer.
A great way to think of your business proposition is that of a statement or summary of why those in your market should become users. It is what conveys that you are better than the competition — whether it is related to solving a problem better, being easier to use, more reliable, more cost-effective etc.
Keep in mind that this also needs to be simple, direct, and all-encompassing. Your company or product might do a million different things, but what is the core problem that is solving for your market segment?
Templates:
Starting with a template for communication is a good way to organize your thoughts into a statement. You don’t have to follow the formula exactly, but writing down a few of these is a great way to start refining your value prop and making it clear and concise.
The following have been provided by the OptinMonster via their article OptinMonster’s 32 of the BEST Value Propositions. It’s a great place to start so I summarized the ones I feel are helpful below”
Geoff Moore’s Value Positioning Statement
This is a bit of a long template, but it encompasses everything your business or value prop should be.
For [target customer] who [statement of the need or opportunity], our [product/service name] is [product category] that [statement of benefit].
Example: “For non-technical marketers who struggle to find a return on investment in social media, our product is a web-based analytics software that translates engagement metrics into actionable revenue metrics.”
Steve Blank’s XYZ
Simple and to the point, regardless of how your value prop ends up looking you should be able to communicate this with ease.
We help [X] to [Y] by [Z].
Example: “We help parents spend more quality time with their kids by providing parent-friendly play areas.”
Venture Hacks’ High-Concept Pitch
I would like to note that I’m not a huge fan of this actually being your business or value prop, but I do think coming up a few of these is a healthy way of understanding how someone might view your product for the first time as they tend to equate it to things they already know and understand.
[Proven industry example] for/of [new domain].
Example: “Flickr for video.”
Customer-Problem-Solution
Vlaskovits and Cooper use what they call a Customer-Problem-Solution value proposition template. this is also great for building a basic explainer deck.
Customer: [who your target audience is] Problem: [what problem you’re solving for the customer] Solution: [what is your solution to the problem]
Example: “Customer: I believe my best customers are small and medium-sized business (SMB) markets. Problem: Who cannot easily measure campaign ROI because existing solutions are too expensive, complicated to deploy, display a dizzying array of non-actionable charts. Solution: Low cost, easy to deploy analytics system designed for non-technical marketers who need actionable metrics.”
Walkthrough Examples
This post by WordStream goes through some in-depth examples of companies and products we already know and love. Below is one of the examples used in Unbounce and is a great example:
Unbounce
A/B Testing Without Tech Headaches
“As you might expect from a company specializing in conversion rate optimization, Unbounce’s value proposition is abundantly clear from the moment you arrive on the homepage, namely the ability to build, publish, and test landing pages without any I.T. support. For many small businesses (and even larger companies), the perceived technical overhead of A/B testing is a major barrier to entry, making Unbounce’s value proposition particularly appealing.”
If you are looking for additional examples to help point you in the right direction you can check out Impact’s 31 Best Value Proposition Examples You Wish You Had and OptinMonster’s 32 of the BEST Value Propositions.
Going through these exercises are a great way to start understanding your brand as a startup, or realigning it as you grow. All of these things evolve over time, so make this an exercise you go through periodically to stay on the right path. By honing your value proposition you’ll be able to convey more value to your users, communicate effectively to potential buyers, and ideally grow your audience.
If interested in more exercises like these make sure to sign up for Snipply and follow our blog as we’ll be posting full guides and how-tos on building your startups brand, user acquisition strategy and more.
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