Mommy…what’s a USP?

Posted by Graeme Davidson on January 20, 2008

The Unique Selling Proposition (also Unique Selling Point) is the marketing concept that was first proposed as a theory to explain a pattern among successful advertising campaigns of the early 1940s. It states that such campaigns made unique propositions to the customer and that this convinced them to switch brands.

Today, a number of businesses and corporations currently use USPs as a basis for their marketing campaigns

Origin

In the early 1940s, Ted Bates & Company carried out extensive market research on successful advertising campaigns. In particular they identified two desirable attributes: the penetration and the usage pull.

The pattern they found among campaigns that produced a high usage pull was the basis for the theory of the USP. It may also be known as the unique selling point.

Definition

In his book Reality in Advertising, Rosser Reeves (Chairman of the Board at Ted Bates & Company) gives the precise definition as it was understood at his company:

1. Each advertisement must make a proposition to the customer: “buy this product, and you will get this specific benefit.”
2. The proposition itself must be unique - something that competitors do not, or will not, offer.
3. The proposition must be strong enough to pull new customers to the product.

However, Reeves warns against forming a USP based on what he calls “The Deceptive Differential” - a uniqueness that is too small or too technical for customers to observe the differences in actual practice.

Examples

Some good current examples of products with a clear USP are:

• Head & Shoulders: “You get rid of dandruff”
• Olay: “You get younger-looking skin”
• loreal: “Because you are worth it”
• Set Wet: “Very very sexy”
• Red Bull: “You get stimulation of body and mind”
• Ronseal: “You get exactly what it says on the tin”

Some unique propositions that were pioneers when they were introduced:

• Domino’s Pizza: “You get fresh, hot pizza delivered to your door in 30 minutes or less — or it’s free.”
• FedEx: “Your package absolutely, positively has to get there overnight”
• M&M’s: “The milk chocolate melts in your mouth, not in your hand”
• Wonder Bread: “It helps build strong bones 12 ways”

Criticism of USP theory

The perception of something being a USP is somewhat contentious. In the examples above, Head & Shoulders is not the only product on the market that will get rid of dandruff, neither is Domino’s the only pizza delivery chain with a similar thirty-minute guarantee. In both instances, the specific product may be viewed to be a market leader due to its innovation of the original USP, yet has stopped being viewed as unique in the public eye. In other words, what was originally a USP has become merely a perception of superior quality, something quite different.

In the example of Ronseal, “[doing] exactly what it says on the tin” could be argued to not be a USP at all but merely a clever advertising slogan implying reliability or honesty; most or all products do what they imply they will on their packaging.