The following is an excerpt from our new book, The Automatic Marketing Machine.
The first, foundational step you must take in order to build your Automatic Marketing Machine is developing your answer to the following question:
“Why should a customer choose you and your business versus any and every other option to obtain the very same service to solve the very same problem?”
Your answer to this question is what’s known as your “Unique Selling Proposition” – aka, your USP.
Billion-dollar businesses have been built on the back of a strong USP. Dominos Pizza became the dominant force in their market through their original, revolutionary USP: “Fresh hot pizza delivered in 30 minutes or less, guaranteed.”
There’s a lot to learn from what Dominos did with their USP.
Note that they don’t claim to be all things to all people. They’re not talking about a “special sauce” or that they use the finest ingredients or that their recipe has been passed down through their family for generations. In fact, they don’t speak to the quality of the pizza at all – other than to note that it will still be hot and fresh when they deliver it to you!
They simply make a very clear, appealing, totally unique (at the time) promise to their customers.
What is your USP?
This is going to take a little bit of work. Somewhere in your business, there is a good answer. If not, you need to make one.
There are two different extremes most struggling business owners go to when we start to talk about their Unique Selling Proposition.
First is to jump to the conclusion that there is nothing special about them. “I’m just like all the other businesses in my area who provide basically the same sort of services;” the other extreme is to take unwarranted comfort in being “better” than all the other businesses in town.
Well, sometimes in rare instances, that’s true. Maybe your business really is exactly like all the rest. Or maybe you really are the best.
But none of that matters. Because what’s going to make your business’s marketing more effective isn’t bragging about being the best. Everyone is doing that. And when everyone is saying the same thing it’s sort of the same thing as everyone saying nothing.
Instead, we have to carve out what’s going to make your business unique, as in, different.
Here are three questions that will help you develop your USP:
>>> What specifically do you do that’s truly unique and different from anyone else in your marketing?
>>> What unique benefits do you provide to your target market?
>>> Can you create a unique “niche” for your services that nobody else can or will?
A lawyer named Carrie Shultz created Fathers’ Rights Divorce, out of a “normal” family law firm by creating special programs that cater to the unique challenges of dads who need to file or respond to a divorce. Admittedly, 80% of what Carrie’s firm does is the same as what would be called for if representing a mother going through a divorce or even a man or a woman with no children. But if you’re a father facing the prospect of divorce, the 20% “difference” could make 100% of the difference and so more than two-million-dollar’s worth of business is now attracted to Carrie’s law firm every year.
There’s no need to allow your business to be perceived by the market like every other business only “better,” or worse, “cheaper.” Take the time to create your own USP – it’s one of the greatest marketing weapons you can ever have for your business.
