How to Write a Unique Value Proposition for Your eCommerce Store
Your value proposition is the bread and butter of your business. It’s the key message that tells potential customers what benefits they’ll get from using your product, and why it’s different from what your competitors sell. If you write it well, your value proposition will convert those potential customers into paying customers. However, despite how important it is to a company, many entrepreneurs don’t even know where to start when it comes to creating their proposition. It’s a finicky task that can take hours, days, or even months to perfect. Instead of struggling through it, learn all you need to know about writing a unique value proposition with this guide!
- Understand what makes a good value proposition
- Learn about your customer’s main problem
- Explain the benefits of your product
- Connect the problem to the benefits
- Explain what makes your product unique
- Use the correct elements
Step One: Understand What Makes a Good Value Proposition
Not all value propositions are good but the best ones all share certain elements that make them stand out from the crowd to succeed. There are four main, very simple requirements that all good propositions include.
- Clarity: Make sure your writing is very clear. You have a limited amount of time to make potential customers understand what it is about your product that they need in their lives. If your writing is muddled and confusing, you’ll immediately turn customers away.
- Specificity: There’s no sense in being vague. Bluntly explain to your customers the benefits they’ll have if they use your product. If they have to struggle to understand why your product makes their lives better, they’ll give up and shop with a competitor instead.
- Uniqueness: Whether you sell soaps, baked goods, blankets, or homemade canoes, you have a competitor out there somewhere. You should have a unique value proposition that explains what’s different about you compared to your competition, and why customers should choose your product over theirs.
- Brevity: You have approximately five seconds to convey your value proposition to your customers. Keep it short and to the point, and you’ll be more like to wow with what you come up with.
Step Two: Learn About Your Customer’s Main Problem
The majority of products are created to solve a problem. Purses allow women to keep items close at hand when they go out. Blankets keep people warm. Cartons of milk prevent customers from needing to own their own cow. Some are even more specific than that. For example, Lush sells soaps to customers who want vegan, eco-friendly products. The Dollar Shave Club sells razors that are cheaper than their competitors. So, before you begin writing your unique value proposition, ask yourself what problem your customers have and how your product fixes it. By understanding your audiences’ motive for buying, you’ll be able to offer them a clearer explanation of your value.
Step Three: Explain the Benefits of Your Product
The next step to take when writing a value proposition is to write out all of the benefits of your product. If it improves the lives of users in any way, write it down. You may have only one or two benefits, or you may have 20. Come up with as many options as you can. Chances are, you’ll have more benefits than you can explain in a short value proposition but keep going anyways. That’s it. That’s all you have to do for step three.
Step Four: Connect the Problem to the Benefits
Once you know what problem your customers have and what benefits your product offers them, you can start getting to the heart of your unique value proposition. Because your audience is interested in how you can improve their lives, connecting their problem to your benefits will help you hone in on a focus for your proposition. If you run a bakery, the main problem of your customers might be that they’re on gluten-free diets. If you sell gluten-free cupcakes, you’ve found the benefit your customers are most interested in and therefore have discovered your value proposition.
Step Five: Explain What Makes Your Product Unique
But wait! There’s more. More that you need to learn before you can actually start writing. The most important aspect of the value proposition explains what’s unique about you. When there are a hundred alternatives to your product, you need to learn what makes yours different than others. This is the detail that will hook “window” shoppers and turn them into paying customers.
Step Six: Use the Correct Elements for a Unique Value Proposition
Finally, before you start writing, consider how you actually want to structure your value proposition. There are certain elements and layouts that make them pop more than solid blocks of text. We recommend a blend of the following elements:
- Headline: The headline should have the biggest font size of your value proposition because it’s what your customers will read first. Use it to describe the biggest benefit of your product.
- Subhead or Paragraph: Use this section to provide more details about what your product is, who benefits most from using it, and why. Don’t be afraid to single out a specific audience. You can’t target every customer anyways so the more specific you are, the more likely you are to generate sales.
- Three Bullet Points: Optionally, if you want to include a few extra “added value” benefits, you can list them in bullet points.
- A Visual: Not every customer will be drawn to written content. You can help enhance your message for all by adding a visual element to your value proposition, such as a photo or short video.
Don’t just tell your customers how awesome your business is. Use your value proposition to show them!
Visit Shopivo and stay tuned for exciting news and updates! Sign up for our emails and stay up-to-date on new developments and features.