The marketing myth that is losing small businesses a fortune in sales!
A guide by Jim Connolly
In this free marketing guide, I am going to show you how you can make your marketing more powerful, less expensive and far, far easier - by exposing a common marketing myth.

The myth
How many times have you heard or read the ‘fact’ that every business needs to develop a USP (Unique Selling Proposition) in order to successfully sell or market its services?  The story goes that if you want to make lots of sales, you need to offer something unique, something not being offered by your competitors.  This ‘fact’ is actually 100% incorrect; however, it is stated over and over again in marketing guides and marketing books as if it were true.  There are even some marketing consultants and marketing trainers who still repeat this myth!

Benefits and Features
People buy a product or service based on benefits and not features; and a USP is just a feature.

For example
A feature of chocolate is that it is has lots of calories.
A benefit of chocolate is that it tastes great.
People buy it for the taste (benefit)  - not the calories (feature). 

A USP is a feature; something unique, but not necessarily of any benefit or value to anyone.  This is the core problem with the USP myth; ‘unique’ does not necessarily mean ‘valuable’ and your potential clients or customers are looking for, (and are attracted to), value .

The answer - You need a VSP (Valuable Selling Proposition)
The answer is to focus on developing something about your product or service that will give potential clients or customers a valuable, compelling reason to go to you and NOT one of your competitors.  You need to develop a VSP; that's a Valuable Selling Proposition!  When you have one, selling and marketing your services is MASSIVELY easier, faster, more powerful and far less expensive too!

For example:
Imagine there are 20 accountancy firms in your town who all offer the usual range of accountancy services.  However, one of these accountancy firms ALSO OFFERS AN ADDITIONAL SERVICE; a simple free facility where each of their 700 clients can market their services to one another at no cost.  Now, anyone who owns a business and who is keen to win more clients and make more contacts locally will find this VSP extremely compelling. It makes the other 19 equally qualified accountants totally fade into the background!  The accountant with thatVSP could quickly OWN the local market, if they market their VSP correctly.

The key word here is ‘value’
It’s not the uniqueness of the above service that made it so powerful; it’s the value of it.  If their unique service had been of little value, it would not have worked.  If, for example, they offered discounted gym membership to new clients instead – it would be far less effective.  It would still have been unique, but when a London-based accountant actually offered discounted gym membership as his firms USP in their marketing, it generated no additional interest at all! 

Unique yes - valued no!

Here’s a question that will help YOU create a powerful VSP for your business:
“Why should a potential client or customer come to me and not one of my competitors?”

All your competitors, even the awful ones, claim to offer great customer service, so your answer needs to be better than that.  Your potential clients are just like you; they want value when they spend their money.  Unless you can provide a genuinely valuable answer to the above question, you are not offering the marketplace what it wants!  If people do not see genuine value in your business offering, it’s always going to be a real struggle to win the volume or quality of business you need.  You will also find people are cost or fee sensitive; (a sure sign they believe your value is less than what you are charging!)

If your past marketing has provided disappointing results, take a look at what you were offering.  Did you give the people you marketed to a valuable, compelling reason to respond to your mailing , your advertising ,  your promotion or your sales pitch?

If your answer is no – Here’s what you need to do!
Firstly, answer the question from earlier; “Why should a potential client or customer come to me and not one of my competitors?”, with as valuable and compelling a reason as possible.  This may take a while but it’s worth it!

Secondly, communicate that valuable and compelling reason in everything you do!
It needs to be; on your website, in your sales presentations, in your advertising, in your conversations with suppliers, in your marketing letters, in your meetings with potential Introducers and in your newsletter.  Shout this value from the rooftops and start attracting more business than ever before!

In summary
If people, (the marketplace), are given a valuable enough reason to become one of your clients or customers they will.  The more valuable the reason and the more people you successfully reach with that reason, the more sales you will make!


To your success,

Jim Connolly
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