The problem with listing everything
Ask most businesses why a customer should choose them and you will get a list. High quality. Competitive prices. Experienced team. Excellent service. Fast delivery. Every item is true. Together they say nothing, because every competitor could say the same.
A value proposition is your answer to one question: why should this customer choose you over the alternatives? A good one is short, specific, and impossible to mistake for anyone else's. Most fall short because they try to say everything.
Three kinds of value proposition
In a widely cited 2006 Harvard Business Review article, James C. Anderson, James A. Narus, and Wouter van Rossum studied how companies describe their value to customers and found three broad approaches.
1. All benefits. The company lists every benefit its offering might deliver. It is easy to write and requires little knowledge of the customer, which is exactly the problem. The authors warn of "benefit assertion": claiming advantages for features customers do not care about at all.
2. Favourable points of difference. The company lists the ways it is better than competitors. This is an improvement, because it at least considers the alternatives. But without a deep understanding of the customer, it falls into "value presumption": assuming that anything different must be valuable to the buyer.
3. Resonating focus. The company concentrates on the one or two things that matter most to its target customers, makes sure it is genuinely superior on them, proves it, and communicates it in a way that shows it understands the customer's priorities.
The third approach is harder, because it requires real knowledge of your customers. It is also the only one that reliably persuades.
How to find your resonating focus
Start with the customer, not the product. Talk to your best customers and ask what nearly stopped them buying, what made them choose you, and what they would miss if you disappeared. The answers are often different from what you would guess.
List what matters to them, then rank it. Out of everything a customer weighs, which two or three things decide the purchase? For a family choosing a builder, it might be trust and a home that lasts. For a lab buying consumables, consistent quality and reliable supply.
Be honest about where you are better. Your value proposition should sit where what customers care about most overlaps with what you do better than anyone else. If you are not superior on anything that matters, the problem is not the wording.
Leave out what does not matter. This is the hardest part. Strong value propositions are as much about what they leave out as what they include.
Make it believable
A value proposition is a promise, and customers have heard many promises. The best ones come with proof.
- Numbers: results, years in business, clients served, delivery records.
- Evidence: certifications, case studies, testimonials, recognisable clients.
- Specifics: "we deliver in 10 days" is more credible than "fast delivery".
Anderson, Narus, and van Rossum stress this point too. The companies with the strongest value propositions do not just claim superiority. They demonstrate and document it.
A simple structure to start with
You can test a draft with a single sentence:
For [your specific customer] who [their key need or problem], we [the one or two things you do that matter most], unlike [the alternative], because [your proof].
It will not be your final headline. But if you cannot fill it in clearly, your website, pitch, and sales material will struggle to say anything sharper.
Where your value proposition lives
Once it is clear, it should show up everywhere:
- the headline and first lines of your website,
- your sales deck and proposals,
- your social profiles and bios,
- your brochures, catalogues, and exhibition stands,
- and the way your team answers "what do you do?"
When every touchpoint carries the same focused message, customers remember it. When each one says something slightly different, they remember nothing.
The bottom line
A value proposition that tries to say everything says nothing. The ones that work focus on the few things customers care about most, prove them, and say them in the customer's language. It takes more research and more discipline, but it is the difference between being considered and being chosen.
If you want help finding and sharpening yours, it is often where our branding work begins.
