Although a Unique Selling Proposition (USP) is a real old-school term used by marketers and advertisers, it is still needed in today’s world of content marketing.

What is a Unique Selling Proposition?

Entrepreneur describes the Unique Selling Proposition as

The factor or consideration presented by a seller as the reason that one product or service is different from and better than that of the competition.

Whether you are marketing a product in a bricks-and-mortar store or whether you are marketing online content, it is important that you as the ‘seller’ point out to your prospective clients what your Unique Selling Proposition is.

So what exactly is a USP? Your USP is the reason people will buy your product instead of the guy next door’s. Your USP either makes you different to or better than your competitor. You need to point out to your prospective client exactly what it is that makes you different or better, or you will never make a sale.

Different or Better?

As a writer or content marketer you are going to have to put yourself in the shoes of a merchant and present your Unique Selling Proposition to your market.

So many people who decide to start blogging or write a book to sell, jump in and start marketing without a definite plan. They write a weekly blog post, connect to all the right social media sites and sometimes even buy Facebook, Google or some other form of advertising.

But some people are doing this all wrong; they are not showing people their Unique Selling Proposition.

When we enter the world of content marketing, we often hear that we should go look at what our competitors are doing and model our product that we put out to theirs. Wrong!

Although it is good to look at what your competition is doing, learn from their mistakes and take from them what is good and valuable, you are making a big mistake if you are just duplicating what your competitors are doing.

Some content marketers even look at a competitor’s advertising and many times make a real marketing 101 mistake: they model their advertising to exactly reflect that of their competition.

While you can always learn valuable lessons from your competition, you always need your own Unique Selling Proposition. In your Unique Selling Proposition you need to point out either what is different between your competition’s product and yours or why yours is better. Failing to do so, will see many prospective clients rather buy from a competitor because maybe they have been in the market longer and is better known or their product has a better know track record.

Especially when you are new to the market, it’s important that you utilize your Unique Selling Proposition to attract customers. Your USP is the reason they will buy from you!

How to communicate your Unique Selling Proposition

Once you have determined exactly what your Unique Selling Proposition is, it’s important that you communicate it clearly to your audience. Depending on what your USP is, there are various ways for you to get your message across.

Woolworths tells us that they are the fresh food people. Domino’s Pizza says if it’s not hot, it’s free. These are both prime examples of a company’s Unique Selling Proposition. While many stores sell fresh products, this is what Woolworths wants to be known for. And even if a million pizza outlets make sure their pizzas are hot, when you think hot pizza delivered to your door, you can’t help but think of Domino’s Pizza.

You can communicate your USP in your logo, your tagline, as part of your landing page on your website, in advertisements or anywhere else people come in contact with your business. It doesn’t matter so much how and where you communicate it, as long as you get the message across.

Whether your business is to sell your book or to be a content marketer who sells affiliate products, find your Unique Selling Proposition and make sure the world knows about it.