Finding the Essence of Your Value Proposition
For those of you who know me, you know that I have a big place in my heart for the Walt Disney Company. Having worked for the “the mouse”, met the love of my life at Disney World, and gotten married on Disney property with a view of the castle in the distance, I believe in the “magic” that the Disney brand represents.
Learning from Disney’s New Marketing Campaign
Disney’s new campaign brilliantly highlights the “magic” that real people experience. Disney knows that when they exceed guests’ expectations, their guests want to share that story with others.
Avoid the Checkbox War
Disney World Marketing Video
Universal Studios Marketing Video
Marketing the “Magic” of Your Product or Service
If most organizations have the ability to market in this way, why don’t they?
Before you move your organization toward identifying and marketing your brand’s “magic,” you should get a handle on why you have not done so thus far. This will help to know what pitfalls to look for that might derail you along the way. Here are the big ones:
- You are busy. Understanding the deep-seated needs and problems of your audiences takes a tremendous amount of focus.
- It takes less time and energy to compare very apparent, surface-level product or service features than to routinely perform customer interviews, put together focus groups, and process survey data.
- Even experienced marketers fear making assumptions into the behavior and needs of their markets.
So, how can you rise above the noise, surpass your competition, and change the way your customers think about your product or service?
- Develop Personas. Have your team each give you 5 index cards with the name and role of a person who they have encountered in the market on one side, and a brief background of that person on the other side. Next, group the cards by role and name the persona. Examples include: “Doting Grandparent” or “Dan the Developer”. Have fun with this.
At a web-based B2B software company, I developed personas which included names like “IT Ed”, “Director Denise”, and “Board Member Bob.” Each persona has characteristics and a mini-biography developed by the team both as a fun exercise to get buy-in and to personify the audiences that you are trying to impact.
- Get Out of the Office. Spend time with customers and non-customers representing each persona. This step begins with shutting down your computer and ends with sitting down for an in-person conversation. You can never have enough data about your market and your customer’s behavior, preferences, and true motivation. Document your discussions in as much detail as possible when you leave the interview.
- Dig Deep in Your Conversations. Ask your customers and non-customers open-ended questions like, why they do what they do, tell me about a good day, and walk me through a bad day. Probe further into details of their answer using phases such as, “That’s interesting. Tell me more.” The data you bring back to the office will reveal the emotional responses that your offering has the opportunity to draw out. Don’t forget to review your personas and update them, or round them out, if necessary after your in-depth interviews.
- Be Consistent. One of the most important elements of marketing the “magic” of your product or service often slips through our fingers. Your organization must be committed and vigilant in marketing the essence of your value proposition in all of your messages, campaigns, and interactions. If you mix features and functionality messages in with the messages that touch the root of what your customers value, you may be seen as pandering and brand identify may be muddled. Your marketing will fall flat.
Making the shift to take advantage of your organization’s “magic” takes leadership. The execution of both your brand promise and the messages that come out of this approach cannot be spotty. Senior management must believe in the value proposition and its impact on your market in order to effectively change the conversation and reposition your organization in the eyes of your target audiences.
What Might This Look Like?
Are you highlighting the emotions the VP feels when she is able to successfully deliver the report and presentation to the board of directors, or the emotional response of a manager when she can attend her kids soccer game rather than having to work on the weekends?
Are you highlighting the feeling a family gets when they rescue a dog, the relief felt by a family in poverty that does not have to worry about finding their next meal, or the emotional response of an association member who finds success and recognition in their career through their affiliation with the organization?
I 100% agree with the marketing the "magic" points and feel that they can be applied in all industries. Well put together Josh
fantastic post with great insight! thank you very much!
its about what the customer will FEEL about it… not the product, service, price, or anything else!