Caution: Unique Selling Propositions (USP) Can Cause Advertising Failure

 by Kendy Sproul

Why do advertisements fail? The answer’s not what you might think. The most common cause of failure in both advertisement and marketing campaigns is that the company’s USP is either weak or non-existent.

 What is a USP?

USP stands for a company’s Unique Selling Proposition. That is, an aspect of a company or product that sets it apart from the competition. It’s what makes customers want to buy your product or service over your competitor’s.

 There are three things that a USP must be in order to accomplish this.

1. Descriptive. A strong USP will be descriptive. It will tell the customer exactly what your product or company does differently or better than the competition.                                                                      
2. Clear. A strong USP will leave no fog in a customer’s mind regarding exactly how he will benefit from using your product or service.
3. Short. A strong USP will be short and to the point. There’s no need, or rather, no room for a long, drawn out explanation in the USP. This is the place to be brief.

Now that you know what a USP must be in order to be strong, let’s take a look at how to come up with one that will turn those failing advertisements and marketing campaigns into successful, money generating profit machines. You see, once you have a strong USP in place you can build all of your advertising and marketing, in fact everything about your company, around that USP.

 How is a strong USP created?

Formulating your company’s USP isn’t, nor should it be, a quick, simple thing. It will take a lot of thought and research. But it will be well worth it, I guarantee it. To simplify it slightly, I have broken it down into a three step process.

 Step 1:  Features and Benefits

Take a piece of paper and divide it down the middle. In the left hand column list all the product’s features. In the right hand column list the benefits of each feature.

“Aren’t they the same thing?” you may ask. The answer is no, they aren’t. A feature is something a product has (such as a lifetime warranty or a special adaptation) or something a company does (such as tax preparation). A benefit, on the other hand, is how that feature is important to your customer. How does it improve your customer’s life? Does it make things simpler? More enjoyable? Give her more time? You get the picture.

 Step 2: Identify the USP of your competition

In this step you’re going to do a bit of research on your competition. You need to find out what the USP is for each of your competitors. Next, you’ll want to find out all you can about what features and benefits your competitor’s products offer.

By doing these things you will be able to compare your product with your competitor’s and find out what sets you apart. You can’t build a USP on something that is not unique to your product or company.

But what if your product is so common that there really isn’t a difference strong enough to base your company’s USP on? This is where it can get tricky. But there is hope. If you can’t find a benefit in your product that you can use for a strong USP then you may have to get creative. Check out the USP of M&Ms candy: “M&Ms melt in your mouth, not in your hand.” How many other candies can you think of that could claim this same benefit? At least a few, right? But none of the competition was using this benefit as their USP, so it worked. And worked very well. Now that’s being creative.

Dig deep and you just may be able to find such a gold nugget in your own product or service. When you do, use it to its fullest advantage in all your advertising, marketing and other publicity.

Another angle to try if you’re stuck for a unique product benefit is to look at the company offering the product. In what ways does the company itself differ from the competition? Do you offer outstanding customer service? Do you make a guarantee that your competitors do not? Do you provide an actual human when a customer calls rather than an automated run-around? In short, what makes your company unique? This can be the basis for a very strong USP.

Take State Farm Insurance’s: “Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.” This is a perfect example of basing a USP around the company rather than the product.

 Step 3: Contact customers and clients

This can be one of the most informative ways of building your USP. Past and current customers or clients will tend to tell you exactly what they did or did not like about your product or service. But be careful. Make certain they are sharing ways their lives were benefited by the product rather than simply what features they liked. You may have to ask specific questions and dig a little deeper in order to extract the information you need, but when you do you’ll know you have a gold nugget.

Contacting customers and clients can be helpful in other ways as well. By keeping customer interview transcripts or questionnaires on file your copywriter can glean them for testimonials or for implying a market preference. This is done quite often. Take Jiff Peanut Butter for example: “Choosey moms choose Jiff.” This is an implied preference.

These three steps will help you on your way to identifying a strong USP for you company or product. Remember, however, that a USP must be important enough to a customer to make him want to buy your product or service over your competitor’s. So, know your customer as well as you do your product and company and you will soon have a USP strong enough to turn those failing advertisements and marketing campaigns into sure-fire winners.