Spelling Out Your DNA: How To Communicate Your Unique Selling Proposition

Spelling Out Your DNAHow do you get customers to remember you? It’s a matter of telling them why you stand out from the competition. You need to tell them the story of why you’re different…and why you’re better.

Marketers call this your Unique Selling Proposition (USP). It’s a short statement about your product or service that spells out exactly what it is that makes you valuable.

The One Thing

Is it your pricing? Maybe it’s your unparalleled customer service. You do one thing better than anybody else. It’s got to jump into the customer’s brain and push all your competitors out of the way.

It may be obvious to you, but remember one important thing: potential customers may know little about you. And in this ADHD age, you’ve got just a few seconds to communicate why it’s you and no one else that can fulfill their needs.

How To Define Your USP

This might be a no-brainer. Your unique selling proposition often is the one thing that gave birth to your business. It was the need in the marketplace you knew that only you could solve.

Sometimes, that’s not such an easy thing to define. If your USP doesn’t jump right out at you, it might be time to do a bit of sleuthing. The exercise isn’t necessarily an introspective one. It could involve doing research on your competitors.

If your customers didn’t come to you, why would they go to your competitor, instead?

  • What are they doing that you’re not.
  • What are they not doing?
  • What’s the one thing that your competitors don’t share with you?

All Things To All People?

Powerful unique selling propositions are built around one of three elements:

  1. Cost
  2. Quality
  3. Service

Pick one. Successful companies know it’s unwise to try doing everything. Are your prices unbeatable? Your USP should explain why. Are you known for quality? Tell them why. Is customer service your hallmark? Craft a USP that explains how you do it.

USP Examples

  • Domino’s Pizza’s USP is speed.
  • Starbucks wants you to know they’re all about personalization.
  • Tom’s Shoes wants you to know they care.
  • Enterprise comes and picks you up.

In each case, you get an immediate and clear understanding of what makes these companies unique.

What To Do If It’s Not Quite Clear

We human beings don’t always know what it is about ourselves that endears us to others. It can be the same for companies. If you’re fuzzy about why your best customers love you, ask them. You’ll find that most are happy to tell you why they seek you out. They might write your USP for you.

No matter where it comes from, once you have your USP, use it everywhere. It’s your calling card. A unique selling proposition is both a messaging and an education tool.

Our unique selling proposition is that we have over 5,000 dies in-house. This allows us to create customized solutions for our customers often without them having to take the expensive route of starting from scratch. We’re as fast as Domino’s Pizza and friendlier than Starbucks…but we’ll leave the pizza and coffee making to them.

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