6 2.4 Communicating the Value Proposition

Once you know your target market, you must have a compelling way to communicate your value proposition. This requires the marketer to answer a number of questions:

• What is value? Each customer will weigh the benefits and the costs of an offering differently and determine whether it is providing value. It is important to understand how customers perceive value.
• What is the value this offering provides to the target customer? You hope that you have selected target customers that view the value that you provide favorably, but the marketer has to test and refine the assumption that the offering is actually providing value to the target customer.
• How is the value provided different from the value that competitors provide? Each time a competitor shifts its offering(s), that change will have an impact on the perceived value of your offering. In a competitive marketplace, it becomes important to understand and react to changes, but also to identify the value that you provide that is most difficult for others to copy.
• How are you communicating the promise of value to target customers? With so many marketing channels and messages all around, customers have a very short attention span. The marketer has to grab that attention and communicate value to customers in only a few seconds.