If You Can't Communicate Your Difference, You'll Die!
Finding Your Unique Selling Position (USP) May be The Most Critical Activity for Your Success. Your advertising lives in a world of complexity and confusion. Consumers have so many choices in almost every product classification. When you're shopping for a service or product it's common to have even thousands of choices..
Think I'm crazy? Just search the Internet for everyday products and look at the number of search results. It's possible to have alternatives in the millions.
So that's good right? You're sure to like it if you're the buyer. But us markteters will find it a challenge? What are we to do in order for our companies to survive?
Your Advertising Must Set You Apart from Your Competitors. Your advertising must tell your prospect that you're different from the competition. In a meeting with a client the other day, we turned to the yellow pages for their product category and there was a vivid example of how NOT to do advertising.
We found pages and pages of ads--all so much the same that you could literally substitute one company name for another and not have to change the ads at all!
This was obviously a problem for all those companies--but an opportunity for my client! He (or she) who differentiates--wins!
When there's no obvious difference, your customers will decide based on who has the best price. When customers are faced with hundreds of choices but dont see any difference between one business and another, what happens? The only thing they can compare is price, so that's how they make their choice. If your differences arent clear, price will be the deciding factor for your customers. That's not the ideal thing for you and your business. And it's not that good for your customer either--especially if the value of your business is best appreciated through a long-term relationship with your customer. Customers who come to you because you have the best price will go to your competitors as soon as they find one with a better price. What if you're the fastest gun in the West? But no matter how fast you are, there will always someone faster. That's not a long-term game. It's better and smarter to differentiate.
You can command higher prices through differentiation. Companies who effectively differentiate themselves from their competitors can demand higher prices for their products or services. The lowest price is not always the winner. Think about this for a minute. You don't always buy the lowest price. Even if you're the world's biggest cheapskate you can differentiate between bruised and fresh vegetables and you'll pay the higher price for the fresh produce. Right?
So, what makes you think your customers are any different? Sure, your price must be reasonable, but if you have highlighted a difference in your product, customers will pay extra to have that recognized benefit.
So, your key to increased sales, happier customers and increased profits is to simply find the thing which makes you different from your competitors and make certain you're getting that message out in your advertising.
Article Source: http://www.search-raven.com
About the Author
The author, Craig Mecham, is the founder of of The Mecham Company The Mecham Company, a marketing consulting firm. With two decades success in Business to Business Marketing and communications, Mr. Mecham counsels with under performing businesses.
This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution - No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License, which means you may freely reprint it, in its entirety, provided you include the author's resource box along with LIVE links (without "nofollow" tags).
by: J.CraigMecham
Total views: 30
Word Count: 528
Rating: Not yet rated