It’s an irrefutable law of business that a product with an ineffective value proposition is going to under-perform, no matter how good that product is. If you can create a winning unique value proposition (UVP) not only will prospects flock your way, but you’ll also find acquisitive firms on your doorstep willing to pay a premium for your company. Read on to find out how to build a strong UVP and what this means for equity value …

In a moment I’ll give you five reasons why you really do need to have a close look at your UVP from the equity value perspective. First, let’s clarify what we mean by a UVP and break it down into its component parts in a little model you can use for yourself.

What’s a UVP?

A UVP is a bit like a brand. At one end a brand is a company logo and visual identity, at the other end it’s the total embodiment of a company’s products, personality and the experience of its customers. Likewise, at one end a UVP is a simple marketing statement, at the other it’s a sales promise, fulfilled through the delivery of the service. In reality the UVP forms a part of the brand.

Here’s how to construct a UVP for your firm and individual products…

Unique

• Vertical industry sectors
• Horizontal job functions
• Services deployed
• Style or method of service delivery
• Quality of client experience

Value

Create a powerful perception of valuable outcomes and benefits, rather than features and costs, provide credible examples, and hit their emotional and logical interests.

•  Financial outcomes
• KPI improvements
• Company benefits
• Personal benefits
• Proof of the above

Present offers that starts the relationship which the prospect finds easy to digest, empathises with their burning need, and is hard to say “no” to.

• Situations attacked
• Needs addressed
• Low to no risk entry level offer
• High gain outcome
• Easy to make happen

The output of a UVP exercise should be worked into your sales and marketing process, but one thing is VERY IMPORTANT...there must be a high level UVP statement that’s succinct and easy to understand. Do this and it will have an impact, it will be easy for you to communicate and people will be able to refer business contacts in your direction because they can clearly pass on your message for you.

Now that we’ve clarified what a UVP is and how to build one, let’s talk about why they’re important to your firm…

Five reasons why you want the strongest UVP you can get:

Imagine this as a scenario; you’re a management consultant providing expertise in the field of Human Resources (HR). We know from our intelligent database of UK consulting firms that your part of a crowd of nearly 1000 companies with a reasonable turnover. From the point of view of your target audience, these are your competitors. The strength of your UVP will make a difference to your equity value in the following ways:

1. The market awareness of your company

By standing out in the crowd with a strong and unique message to market alignment, you have to work less hard than your competitors to grab attention. This means that competitors need to spend much more on marketing than you to get the same result.

2. The potency of your sales messages

Because of the emphasis on value, you are able to exploit your market awareness and pull more leads than your competitors who are more focused on product and service messages. Therefore you gain a stronger pipeline than your competitors.

3. Converting your prospects into clients

Faced with a decision between a value based proposition and more service based offer, your prospects are more likely to choose you because you’ve pressed the important buttons. So your cost per client acquired is lower than competitors.

4. Charging a premium price for your services

The more uniquely niche and targeted your proposition, along with claiming the value high ground, the more you can push your fees up because clients are less sensitive to cost. This means that your profits go up too.

5. Atractiveness for a buyer

With a strong UVP, you’re more likely to get on the radar of acquisitive firms looking to fill a niche in their growth strategy. Without a strong UVP, you may make the long list, but not the short list, even if you have the best fit, you could go unnoticed!

Going back to our example…imagine that Equiteq’s been commissioned by an acquirer to find them a firm like yours in HR consulting, with a turnover between £5m and £10m, serving the Financial Services industry, specialists in leadership development, with strong training products.

Unless you’re already known to us, or someone in our network, we have to start with our database of UK consulting companies and the profile of the target firm provided by the acquirer. Using our search technology, you would almost certainly make the first cut of 1000, you may make the long list of 328 firms because you’d get matched on the high level factors like company size and industry sector profile, but unless your website tells us that you fill the unique space required by our client, you could be left behind!