“If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough” -
Albert Einstein
Any advertising executive worth their weight in gold will tell you about the
importance of pinpointing your brand’s single-minded proposition (SMP), unique selling point (USP) or unique value proposition (UVP).
At first glance, the SMP, USP and UVP might sound baffling, but they are actually pretty straightforward – and very similar. They’re all about finding that one thing – the one benefit – that your brand brings to the table (and your competitor’s brand doesn’t).
As a brand strategist, my clients often ask me whether a SMP is necessary. And my answer is a resounding yes.
Defining your brand’s SMP may seem like a daunting task. And let’s face it - many marketing frameworks are confusing or lame. But I love guiding my clients through any SMP murkiness.
So let's strip it back.
This is how we do it
Let’s say you run a doughnut shop in a market saturated with doughnut shops. You might get a bit overwhelmed by all the competition and wonder what your doughnut shop offers that others don’t.
I can assure you that there is definitely something unique about your doughnut shop. It could be your employees, price-point, customer service, the ease and flow of information on your website, sugar-free rainbow sprinkles, or simply how delicious your doughnuts taste.
Every business and person has something unique about them.
To find your SMP, we can start by pinpointing all the benefits your brand offers, what your brand does that makes people’s lives easier, and importantly - how that makes people feel. Because often the reason we choose a brand (or even a person) is based on how the brand or person makes us feel - rather than relying on logic.
Then, we want to take all the delicious benefits and features of your brand and cut out the noise…
Keep it simple
Maurice Saatchi said it best with his idea that a company’s brand strategy should be attributed to a single word because “only the most brutally simple ideas stand a chance”.
While finding one word to articulate your brand strategy might be a challenge, Maurice has a point. Simplicity trumps detail, every time.
If you’re interested in learning more about how this concept relates to your SMP or brand strategy, take a look at the book Building a story brand by Donald Miller. Donald tells us that our customers will literally ignore confusing information in an effort to conserve precious calories because: “there’s a survival mechanism within our customer’s brain that is designed to tune us out should we ever start confusing them”.
With this knowledge under our belt, we can make important decisions about the meaningful words that make it into our SMP draft - and those superfluous words that don’t.
But if all of this seems a little too tricky, our team of brand strategists are on hand to help demystify your SMP, USP or UVP writing process.
Ready to chat?
Book your free 15 minute intro session today.