"What's Your USP? -
You've Gotta Have a Powerful USP To Set Yourself Apart..."
By Rocky Tapscott
The vast majority of
Businesses have never seen their USP.
What's a USP, I hear
you ask?
Well many Business advisers call it a
Unique Selling Proposition, but Best selling author
Robert Allen
has changed it to mean something much more powerful.
Your USP, according to
Robert, means -
U - Ultimate advantage
- what is the ultimate advantage customers get from using
your product or service?
S - Sensational offer
- Your offer really has to be great. After drowning under
the weight of up to 3000 marketing messages every day,
most people have just become desensitised to anything that
looks like it is trying to sell them something. Your offer
has to astound them and force itself into
their consciousness immediately.
P - Powerful promise
- If you have convinced your customers that you have an
ultimate advantage over your competitors and you have made
them a sensational offer, then making a powerful promise
that takes away the risk for them will usually guarantee
the sale.
A powerful promise is more
than just a limp statement like 'satisfaction guaranteed'. It means
'powerful'; a promise that
removes any doubt in the customers mind that you are
taking all the risk in the transaction and they either
love what you offer or
it's not going to cost them a cent.
Let's explore developing
your USP further
Firstly, what's your Ultimate
Advantage?
Big companies spend
millions on developing and promoting the USP. Shouldn't
you follow their lead (without spending millions, of
course ;-)
I bet you know the USP of
these Companies -
Volvo - of course,
it's Safety
BMW - the Ultimate
Driving Machine
Ipec - when it has
to be there Overnight
Mercedes Benz -
means Outstanding Quality
So, what is
your Ultimate
Advantage?
Are you faster, more
reliable, have friendlier staff, use more pure ingredients, cheapest in
your field...what is your Ultimate Advantage?
To determine your unique
Ultimate Advantage if you aren't sure, think in terms of 'You
Get'
Say to your customer,
"When
you deal with us, You Get"...what? What makes you different
to the thousands of other Businesses selling the exact
same products and services as you?
Do you get -
-
Prices
consistently 20% below other retailers, or
-
Guaranteed
24 hour turnaround on repairs, or
-
20%
more filling in every meat pie with less fat and fewer
calories, or
-
Delivery
within 4 hours or it's free, or
-
Someone
who arrives on
time to fix a plumbing problem, wears a neat, tidy
uniform, and then cleans up afterwards
like he hadn't been there at all (unlike many plumbers,
but that's another story), or...
-
What
do you do (or could you do) that nobody else offers in
your industry?
Your
Ultimate Advantage has to differentiate you from everyone
else. Imagine looking across the African plains and
watching 10,000 flamingos standing together around a water
hole. That's your Business in the eyes of your customer.
Would
you rather be like one of those flamingos or the hippo standing in the
middle of the sea of pink birds?
Your
Ultimate Advantage has to make you stand out in the sea of
other similar Businesses and let your customer know that
if they want this benefit or product, you're
the people to see.
Then,
promote your Ultimate Advantage in every piece of
communication you do. On your Business cards, letterheads
and stationary, your advertising and marketing campaigns,
everywhere. You are different - point it out
and make sure that your customers know it.
What
exactly is a Sensational Offer?
A
Sensational Offer is one where your reader or prospect sees
your proposal as a 'No-Brainer...' Something that they
would be foolish to pass up. Now most Businesses think
that people only buy on price, and for some customers, this is true.
But
many more are looking for Value, they don't
want to get ripped off, but they will happily pay a higher
price if they perceive the value to also be
much higher.
So,
let's have a look at some sensational offers.
Ken
Evoy at Sitesell makes a truly sensational offer with his Solo Build It! web Business building package.
After
giving you everything you need to create massive, measurable
success online, then giving you hundreds of examples of
other small Business people who are doing it including
specific case studies, and with
follow up through regular Newsletters and a dedicated and
experienced support team, if you can't make a go of it
online or
it's just not for you, you get your money back!
Not
that too many people ask for it.
Many people buy multiple
SBI! websites when they realise the power that the system
gives them in building free traffic from the search
engines and them converting that traffic into dollars in
the bank.
If
you haven't done so yet, take a few minutes to read
through Ken's website and see what a sensational offer
looks like for an online product.
To visit the site and
study how Ken does it, Click
Here.
Another
sensational offer is made by Brian Winters of Push
Button Publishing.
Read
through this website and feel the emotional triggers that
make subscribing to his service if you want to publish
information products, and the sensational offer at the
end, almost irresistible.
To visit Brian's website, Click
here.
That's
fine I hear you say, but I'm selling stuff off-line, what
can I do to make a sensational offer?
What
can you offer to increase the perceived value of your
offer to make it irresistible?
You
could offer -
-
A
free report or series of articles showing your customers
how to get the maximum benefit out of your products or
services
-
An
extended warranty
-
A
discount Coupon on the next purchase from your Business
-
Membership
in an exclusive buyers club where you offer special
discounts on selected items
-
A
discount offer from another Business who will Joint
Venture with you in offering products or services to each
others' customers (We'll discuss Joint Ventures in more
detail in future Newsletters)
-
A
free seminar to educate your customers and show them great
new ways to use your products and services
Take
a good look at the bonuses offered on Brian's website and
think of how you could offer something similar in your
marketing.
If
you can get your customer's email address by telling them
that you will send them their bonuses via email and let them
know that you will be making regular discount offers as well, you have their permission to offer them
products or services forever until they
unsubscribe from your list.
If
you keep making Sensational Offers to your list of
customers, they will stay with you and buy from you many,
many times.
Imagine
sending an email to your list and within 24 hours banking
loads of cash. With email marketing, it is very possible,
and a website makes it easy to do this.
The
thing I like about a Solo Build It! website is that it removes the need to understand
the technical side of things and lets you
concentrate on building content and marketing instead. All you have to do
is write the articles, collect the email names and make the
offers.
But
you need to start collecting those email names and
addresses now, before your competitors do...
Then,
build a relationship with your customers by offering great
services and making sensational offers, and you should see a
great improvement in your bottom line.
Creating
a Powerful Promise
You've
told your customers about your Ultimate Advantage, you've
made a Sensational Offer and they're interested, but they
still won't buy. What's going on here?
The
reason they won't sign up is that they still feel this
thing called risk.
They
have been taken advantage of before...and it doesn't feel
very nice. They took some sales persons advice and they
were sold a lemon. They don't want to take the risk of
that happening again.
What
can you do about that?
You
need to reverse the risk - you have to put all the risk on you.
If
you have done your job right earlier and sold your
prospects on the benefits of owning what you
offer and the consequences of not buying it,
they should be seriously considering your proposal.
Reversing the risk will push them over the line nearly
every time.
So,
what do I mean by reversing the risk?
I
see so many Businesses with signs up saying something
like, "Please choose carefully, as we do not exchange
or refund simply because you changed your mind."
Why
would anyone say that?
They have to be nuts! The risk to
the buyer is horrendous!
If
they make a mistake, they are stuck with it no matter
what. How many potential customers do you think might have
purchased if they had the peace of mind that comes with a
money back guarantee or the ability exchange the product.
This
is such short sighted thinking.
The
top marketers have reported a massive increase in sales
with a minimal increase in returns simply by offering a
money back guarantee on everything they sell.
Of
course, your product or service has to be good or you will
be inundated with returns, but if your quality is not in
question (and of course, it shouldn't be) then your profits
should naturally increase if you are selling more.
One
of the masters of marketing, Jay
Abraham, has taken this step of risk reversal
even further by letting his customers try out or use
his services, manuals or seminars for 30 days before being billed.
Many
other marketers are starting to do the same thing and
recording sales increases of up to 400%.
Of
course, they have a 400% increase in returns as well, because the
same percentage of people will still send the product
back, but the huge increase in sales means that their profits
are still much greater.
How
could you apply this to your Businesses?
Take
the time to study these two websites again and see how
they reverse the risk, then work out how you can do the
same. If these top marketers are using this technique, how
can you benefit from it also?
To
visit Ken's website, Click
Here.
To
visit Brian's website, Click
Here.
Study
the psychological triggers they use. Take notice of the
sensational offers they make, see how they take all of the
risk. Then imitate their strategies. It works!
I
hope this article had given you something to think about.
If you have any questions or comments, please send them to
me by using the contact
form. I will be happy to answer them for you if I can.
Thankyou
for reading this article. I hope it has been valuable for
you.
Kind
Regards,
