Testing Your Business’ Value Proposition
How to test your Value Proposition in 5 easy steps:
Step 1: Review Data.
You are seeking to establish context. Your proposition must be developed within external factors (competitive offers, customer motivations and the like). This context is best established using three key points:
- Current metrics – what can you tell about website visitors, which pages or products are getting the most response, where are visitors coming from and where are they clicking within your website?
- Previous Campaigns – Which campaigns have you found to be successful in the past? Which haven’t been as successful? This doesn’t have to be limited to online campaigns.
- Competitive Analysis – What do you competitors have that you don’t? How do you compare? Understand how you stack up against your competitors.
Step 2: Compose Drafts.
Once the data has been reviewed thoroughly, you can compose a number of drafts containing possible value propositions of your business. From the information gathered in Step 1, you should try and craft five to ten possible points of value. These could be, for example, low prices, savings, support given, unique designs and more. Always try to add as many sub-points as possible within the categories you have listed.
Step 3: Add Force.
Once you have identified the potential points of your proposition, as mentioned above, you should begin to measure and refine their expression. To do this, you need to also measure the triangulation of the following three essential elements:
- Appeal – You need to assess the degree to which the value proposition in question is desired by your ideal prospects.
- Exclusivity – Assess the degree to which the ideal prospect can obtain the same value elsewhere. How unique is the potential proposition – what sets it apart?
- Credibility – Assess the believability of your claim. It should be instantly credible.
Step 4: Conduct Test.
Begin actual testing on your Value proposition. You can do this by using your channels (emails, banners, PPC ads etc.) and presentations (product pages, landing pages etc.). First test within your channels, so that you can narrow down the contending points of value. Eliminate as many options as possible. The cost of testing within the channel is typically low and traffic is often higher. Once you have narrowed down your value propositions, you can then test them within your presentations (as listed above). These presentations are the strongest communication of your propositions, and so the results should be a good representation of what it is that your visitors find most appealing.
Step 5: Analyse Results
Here, you will analyse your results and identify the most effective expression of value. Do keep in mind that the appeal of your value proposition will change over time, and so it is essential that you record all insights learned from your test results. You can use this to begin planning for any future testing. You will therefore occasionally want to re-evaluate your proposition, especially with an ever evolving marketplace and a variety of competitors.
The next thing to focus on is the integration of your value proposition.
See Part 3 – Integrating Your Value Proposition Online
