Tweet

What's your one thing? Tips for creating your USP.

Written by: Donna Williams

Article Overview: Have you ever thought about what sets your service or product apart from your competitors? What's the "one thing" you can say your small business has that no one else can claim? In this article, you'll learn the three essential steps to creating your own unique selling proposition.

What's your one thing? Tips for creating your USP.

Have you ever thought about what sets your service or product apart from your competitors? What's the "one thing" you can say your small business has that no one else can claim?

In other words, what is your Unique Selling Proposition - also known as a USP?

Your USP is basically how you distinguish yourself from your competition. It helps you go from being just one of the crowd, to a head-and-shoulders standout. The USP is the core around which you build your company. It's the promise you make to your customers, to your employees, and to yourself.

Given the importance of a USP, you would think that all small businesses would have one. Unfortunately, most don't. Instead, they adopt a "just buy it...because" mentality for no particular reason. Many think that if they throw enough money into advertising, the customers will come. That may work in the short-term, but if you're in it for the long haul, and you want to grow your business to its maximum potential, you need to develop your USP.

Ready to get started? Before you begin, keep the following three points in mind:

Simplicity
Don't load up your USP with all the things you think your product/service has going for it. Pick the "one thing" you can own. Are you more experienced than your competition? Maybe that's your USP. Are you faster, cheaper, more expensive (but worth it)? Keep it conceptually simple and you will have a USP that sells. I may be showing my age here, but remember Wendy's "Where's the beef?" campaign? There were a lot of claims Wendy's could have made, but they chose to focus on a bigger-meat burger. Genius simplified...and the rest is history.

Specialness
Your USP needs to reflect a quality that your competition can't (or don't) claim. Other competitors might have or do what you have or do, but if you claim it, you own it. If you are the only one who claims the USP, then in your customers' minds, you're the only one. Think about Heinz ketchup. They became the number-one selling ketchup by being the slowest. Obviously, other ketchups are thick and rich, but Heinz claimed it in a very unique and creative way.

Sales Appeal
Ultimately, you want to position your product / service as the best choice for your customer. But it will be difficult for you to do this if your USP doesn't reflect a real customer need. Before you decide what your USP is, make sure you're in touch with your customers' needs and desires and your competitors' positions.

Realize that your USP is different than an advertising slogan. It's the basis for your advertising slogan, but it's not the same. Typically, a USP stays fairly consistent year after year, while an advertising slogan sometimes changes every couple of years.

Creating a dead-on USP and using it as the basis for all your marketing and advertising materials can transform your business. Think about just how powerful that can be to your bottom line.


© Copyright 2009. All rights reserved.

Related Articles
  For Good SEO You Must Go Back To Basics
  Powerful Relationship Selling
  Getting to your North Pole
  December 2008 List of Dofollow Blogs
  Bookkeeping Tips on Tips

Article Tags: crowd, genius, head and shoulders, heinz ketchup, long haul, mentality, money, rest is history, simplicity, small business, small businesses, standout, unique selling proposition, usp, wendy



Related Forum Posts
Business Tips - How about: Tips for managers to handle employees more effectively? Tips on how to deal with difficult customers? Tips on how to deal more effectively with suppliers? The only three I have in mind right now, but will try to come up with something else. Chris
Re: Hello from a San Diego-based marketer - Welcome Aaron! Whats the next stage for your business? Ben
Re: New, young entrepreneur - Congrats H20ismyLife! Do you have a website so we can see any of your work? Whats the next step for you?
Re: 7 Top Blog Design Tips - Hi Tyrone, Great tips! I think these tips can be applied to any web page, as the same rules will apply to them as well. As webmasters we should always be trying to improve or enhance the look of our sites/blogs and make sure that we are attracting and keeping as many visitors as possible. The best thing I think you mentioned was about creating an "About Me" page and posting a picture of yourself. People like to know that there's a real person behind the site. It makes them feel more comfortable and allows them to trust you more. David, thanks for posting about Bravenet.com. I haven't heard of them, but I had used a simple script at one time to do the same thing.
Re: Specific Strategies To Raise PR Levels? - The time involved in creating backlinks, generating hype, and generally creating infrastructure to deliver your products and services is extremely demanding. However, the quality and return for doing this can be unbelievable. We've all seen the success stories - and its not that they are lucky, they simply spent the time and resources to get things running the right way. It's the time commitment that most people cannot guarantee.


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Tweet

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

Setting Goals for your Home Based Business

Ready for a Fresh Image?

Selling On Ebay The Good The Bad And The Ugly

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.