Whether online or offline, a unique value proposition (UVP) is critical for any sales narrative. But people seem to have a limited understanding of them.

They overthink the difficulty of writing an excellent unique value proposition. They assume it has to be complex, fancy, or wordy. However, complexity doesn’t make your product look better. Neuroscience proved it.

Clarity trumps complexity in great value propositions

Picture a very skeptical person. What would make her so excited about your offer? Break it down into two questions:

• What is in it for me? (WIIFM)
• Why should I choose you (over X)?

Companies tend to overvalue what is unique about their product, forgetting about what the market needs. 

People don’t buy just the products

…they buy the stories and the vision you tell.

You can’t describe your product’s value to your audience without understanding the core benefits your audience gets from it. Be data-driven, highly empathetic, and a great storyteller.

So how can you move away from a features-focused mindset to a customer-centric perspective? Let’s start with the building blocks for a great unique value proposition.

The Building Blocks of a Great Unique Value Proposition

Based on Momoko Price’s methodology, these are the three aspects to build one:

• What your customers want
• How your product helps customers to achieve their goals
• What is unique about your product

These questions might seem hard to figure. Especially if your company has little or no traffic, with an unproven business model. That’s why where a logical and repeatable framework for UVPs enters the picture.

7 Steps to Brainstorm the Best UVP For Niche Products

Important: the best way to execute these 7 steps is by using a spreadsheet. It makes the process easier to understand and faster to finish. Use this spreadsheet.

1) List Your Product’s Key Features

What does your product do? List the features and critical resources involved.

2) Pinpoint Those That Are Unique

Which things are particular about the product?

3) List Customer Pain Points For Each Feature

Here is where we switch from what your product does to how your product impacts your customer’s life. How do your features relate to your audience’s pain points?

4) Define Desirable Outcomes For Each Pain

What is the positive side of eliminating your customer’s pain? What is your customer getting from solving that problem? Those improvements are critical to building a great UVP.

5) Score Pains/Outcomes by Severity & Frequency

Keep in mind: eliminating severe pains differs from moving away from inconveniences. You have to figure out the real sorrow for your prospects. That’s when scoring comes into the picture. Define scores based on 1) severity and 2) frequency.

6) Edit Top-Scored Pain/Outcomes Into UVPs

Tally up the scores features and pain points and outcomes that resulted from the previous step. You’ll have the highest scores in terms of the most significant pain points — that’s what you want to be focused on to write a killer unique value proposition.

7) Last step: Score the UVPs (and go with the best one)

Pick the UVPs you like the most and start using them. Finally, this is an example of what Momoko could build after the entire process of answering questions:

Keep in mind: this process analyses assumptions

And that’s totally ok, especially for new products that didn’t have enough market validation. Experimenting and validating your value proposition with external tests are also important.

As soon as possible, start A/B testing and get feedback about your UVPs. Help prospects visualize your product’s benefit. The sales will follow ?