Boutique Growth

Marketing for B2B Professional Services & Consulting Firms

Tutorial · How to Write a Value Proposition

Writing a value proposition for your firm is REALLY important. It forces you to get laser focused on what you do, who you do it for and why they should care. In this tutorial, you’ll discover how to design a value proposition for your professional services firm using a tool called the Value Proposition Canvas.

Here’s a video that summarizes the 3-step process. In the first few minutes, I explain how I’m experimenting with live video. Skip ahead to the 3:50 mark to jump into the value proposition tutorial. Also, remember to unmute the audio!

If you’re looking for more, the audio lessons below go into more detail with examples.

LESSON 1

Develop a Customer Profile

If you struggle to craft a compelling value proposition for your firm, chances are you’re doing it wrong.

As we’ve discussed previously on the show, powerful messages don’t live inside your head… they live inside your buyer’s head.

So instead of trying to come up with messages that you like, or that make you sound smart — you should focus on getting a handle on the conversation already going on inside your buyers mind — and then join it.

Communicating a value proposition that speaks to the buyer’s “pains” and “gains” is a great way to enter that conversation.

In this lesson, you’ll discover:

  • A powerful exercise for developing a value proposition you can complete in minutes
  • The 3 critical elements of a customer profile that will inform your value proposition
  • How to get beneath the surface and identify what buyers really want
Listen here…

LESSON 2

Design Your Value Proposition

Now that you have a clear customer profile, your next step is to determine how your products and services can help buyers achieve their “gains” and avoid their “pains”.

The mistake people make here is they jump into the writing stage. They start putting pen to paper hoping they’ll be able to come up with the right words based on the customer profile.

But that’s putting the cart before the horse. Before you jump into the creative process of writing a value proposition, you have to complete the strategic process of figure out what you want to say.

That’s what this lesson is all about. We’re going to look at the left side of the value proposition, which is all about what you sell and how your services create value for buyers.

Tune in to learn:

  • Why jumping into the writing process is a terrible mistake
  • How to extract relevant value from your products and services
  • How to prioritize which “gains” and “pains” to focus on
Listen here…

LESSON 3

Write Your Value Proposition

So you’re finally ready to put pen to paper. You’ve completed the customer profile and identified the ways your products and services create value for your buyer.

This next step should be the easiest. Because you’ve already figured out what you want to say. Now you just need to say it.

Here’s the formula:

Our [product/services] helps [customer profile carry out their job] by [gain creator] and [pain reliever]. Unlike [competitive advantage].

Now this only meant to be used as a starting point. If it feels too rigid and you want to go beyond the confines of this formula, don’t hesitate.

Listen here…

Additional Resources

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