of base price, add-ons, upgrades, and so forth?
✔ Delivery: Are they fast, reliable, and on time? Are their prices for these services clearly disclosed and competitive?
✔ Resale: How does their product hold its value?
✔ Support: What type of support staff do they have when problems arise? How does it compare to your support?
✔ Marketing messages or themes: What marketing promises are they making or expectations are they reinforcing in the market?
✔ Unique selling proposition (USP): What is their USP and how is it different from yours?
✔ Company outlook: Are they poised for growth or taking a loss? Consider mergers, acquisitions, and hiring activity.
✔ Customer experience: What are their customers saying about them in social media? Are they able to deliver on all promises?
Putting together a competitive analysis chart like the one in Figure 2-3 can help you quickly see where your strengths and weaknesses are in relation to your competition and help you focus your efforts.
Illustration by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Figure 2-3: An example of a competitive analysis chart.
Identify one or two competitors and write their name at the top of a column. Begin by ranking your product or service from 1–5 against the competitive factors on the left. Then, do the same for your competition. When you’ve completed the chart, note which company has the advantage in each area. Play up those areas where you have a distinct competitive advantage in your presentation and find ways to shore up or have a ready response for those areas where you aren’t as strong.
Creating a Presentation Plan Checklist
As you prepare for your presentation, there are a lot of moving parts to keep track of, including logistics, research, audience members, message development, visual aids, rehearsal, technology, and so forth. Dropping the ball in one area can have major repercussions in others.
Use this checklist to uncover vital information as you begin planning your presentation. Check off each point as you get the data or perform the task and keep it up-to-date so that you don’t miss anything.
Chapter 3
Tailoring Your Value Proposition to Fit Your Audience
▶ Comprehending why value is critical
▶ Creating a strong value proposition
▶ Tailoring your message based on the decision-maker’s role
▶ Weaving value throughout your presentation
In an age where you can customize anything over the Internet or order any one of 87,000 varieties of drinks at your local coffee shop, to deliver your presentation in only one flavor is a recipe for disaster. Today’s decision makers want to do business with salespeople who exhibit a clear understanding of their issues, not a one-size-fits-all solution. Delivering a message focused on what is important to the prospect, as opposed to what you have to sell, allows you to create value and rise above the competitive noise to become a preferred vendor.
Value serves as the organizational principle around which your presentation is constructed. It helps you determine what out of the entire pool of information you’ve collected to keep and what you can leave on the editing room floor. Although simply throwing as many features and benefits into your presentation as possible and hoping that some – or any – hit home is tempting, this type of data dump presentation is a waste of time for both you and your prospect. After a prospect feels you aren’t addressing his unique needs or challenges, you have few options to keep him engaged – 87,000 features notwithstanding.
This chapter helps you understand the often-confused differences between features, benefits, and value. You discover how to create a compelling value proposition and tailor it to address the varied needs and objectives of the decision makers and key influencers in your audience. I include several examples of value propositions and help you find out where to highlight value within your presentation to drive home your message.
Understanding Why Value Is King
Of course you didn’t set out to sell a commodity, but if your prospects don’t see a significant difference between you and your competitors other than price, you may as well be selling sugar, wheat, or pork bellies. Many salespeople put together beautiful, interesting presentations only to end up competing on price because they failed to establish value.
The meaning of value shifts over time so it’s important to understand what makes value important in today’s economy and how to make a clear distinction between value, features, and benefits.
Value, the importance, worth, or usefulness of something, isn’t a new concept. However, in the past decade it has become front and center in the sales spotlight for the following reasons:
✔ Multiple choices: The days of having the only game in town are long gone for most companies and salespeople. Even new product innovations and service categories often only enjoy a brief honeymoon period before finding themselves facing renewed competition.
✔ Similar features: Although your product or service certainly has some unique qualities, often many variations of the same feature are available – or soon will be available – in the market that can also provide a solution to your prospect’s challenge or help them achieve his goals.
✔ Feature overload: Especially with complex products, the sheer number of features to compare when evaluating a solution can overwhelm even the most hearty prospect and cause decision fatigue, a proven condition which can result in irrational or unpredictable buying behavior due to the depletion of willpower. Refer to the nearby sidebar, “Examining decision fatigue.”
✔ Similar messaging: Maybe your product is completely unique, but the competition has done a good job of positioning its product in a way that makes it look or sound similar to yours, thus effectively blurring the lines of distinction in your prospect’s eyes. Ultimately, value isn’t about reality, but about your customer’s perception of reality.
I was booking a stay in New York through a travel agent. She quickly identified several properties within my price range, near my destination, and within my budget. Comparing the availability of rewards programs,