Unique Selling Point

This is an article inspired after reading BL's "What makes you different" in sgentrepreneurs

Let's face it, there are tons of companies offering products (when I mention product, read as "products and service" ) in the market out there. In the world of entrepreneurs and investors, it's pretty important for anyone looking to startup to fully understand where they stand on the competitive radar in their industry.

Below is a kind of list on some of the pointers I gleaned over interacting with successful entrepreneurs, investors and from doing good ol' reading:

1. What is my Unique Selling Point (USP) ?
   This is what sets you aside from the rest. In existing industries, one useful technique from the book Blue Ocean Strategy is to examine all the factors that make up your product, cut back on those which are not important and find new factors which can push you to another playing field.
   
2. Are there competitors with the same USP?
   If so, go check up the word "unique" in the dictionary and try from No. 1 again.
3. I can't seem to find competitors!
   If you hit this, be very very afraid. Because it means that either you haven't dug deep enough in your research or you are trying to meet a non-existent demand. Try harder.
   
4. VC - "But I have seen this exact idea crash before!"
   In this scenario, you would hope to have already done your homework on that failure as case study or be able to explain how your USP is different and will substain and scale your idea.
   
5. How do I continue to stay ahead of the pack with my USP?
   This is a pretty good question and it seems so far that the only answer to this one is to continue to innovate and evolve. Case in point, just think of how far Google would have gone if they only stuck to perfecting their search engine?
6. Most importantly - Does your USP make a difference to your consumers?
   Back to the product-centric VS customer-centric argument. The best product in the world, packed with a gazillion features, that does not have a demand makes for a pretty lousy business idea.
   

Definitely not a complete listing so do drop me a comment if you think anything's missing!


(PS: Guy Kawasaki has a good post on Cialdini's Influence on his blog)