What is a value proposition in one sentence?

A value proposition is a plain statement of the result a specific customer gets from your product or service and the reason they should get it from you over anyone else.

What is the difference between a value proposition and a mission statement?

A mission statement says what the company exists to do. A value proposition says what a particular customer gets, in their terms, and why it beats the alternatives.

What is the difference between a value proposition and a unique selling point?

A unique selling point is one claim that sets you apart. A value proposition is the whole promise of outcome, proof and reason to choose you, and a USP can sit inside it.

How long should a value proposition be?

It should be short enough for a senior buyer to repeat accurately to a colleague after one hearing, which in practice means one or two sentences backed by a few proof points.

Does a B2B company need more than one value proposition?

In practice yes, because each buyer role and each segment weighs outcomes differently, so a company tends to have one core proposition with a few variations for the people who sign, use and pay.

What is a value proposition? Definition and B2B examples

Definition

What a value proposition is.

A value proposition is the plain statement of the outcome a particular customer gets from your product or service and the reason they should get it from you over the alternatives. It is written in the customer's terms and names the result they want, the change they will see and the evidence that you can deliver it. A good one can be repeated accurately by a senior buyer to a colleague after hearing it once, and that is the test to hold yours to.

The parts

What it has to contain.

The customer. Say who it is for, clearly enough that the wrong customer can tell it is meant for someone else.
The outcome. State the result as a change in the customer's business, in words they would use themselves.
The reason to choose you. Explain why this outcome should come from you over the incumbent, the cheaper option or doing nothing.
The proof. Give evidence that survives being checked, such as named customers, numbers with a source or a method the buyer can see.

Often confused with it

What gets mistaken for a value proposition.

A mission statement. A mission statement says what the company exists to do, while a value proposition says what the customer gets.
A unique selling point. A USP is one claim that sets you apart, and it can sit inside a value proposition as part of the whole promise.
A tagline. A tagline is written to be remembered and a value proposition is written to be believed, so they are seldom the same sentence.

Examples

What good looks like in B2B.

The strongest B2B value propositions read like a sentence the buyer would say about you. This structure works well:

For a named customer type, who has a specific problem, we deliver a measurable result, unlike the obvious alternative, because of something the buyer can verify.
An enterprise software vendor: "For regulated banks replacing a core ledger, we cut the migration from three years to eighteen months, because the last four migrations we ran finished on time and their names are on the reference list."
A consultancy: "For technology companies whose sales teams each tell a different story, we give the whole company one story customers understand, and the teams we have done this for have closed more than $1bn of new revenue."

Leave out adjectives. Words like innovative and best in class describe nothing a buyer can check, so buyers skip over them.

B2B examples

B2B value proposition examples by type of company.

These are written the way a buyer would say them to a colleague. Each one names the customer, the result, the alternative and the proof. The companies are composites, so the numbers are illustrative and the shape is the point.

Cyber security vendor. "For mid-sized UK law firms that cannot staff a security team, we run detection and response around the clock for less than one analyst's salary, and no client of ours has had a reportable breach in four years."
Payments provider. "For online retailers losing sales at checkout, we lift approved transactions by three to five points without raising fraud, because we route each payment through the bank most likely to approve it, and the uplift is visible in your own dashboard within 30 days."
IT managed services. "For manufacturers running plants on 20 year old systems, we keep production running while we modernise, because we have moved 60 plants without an unplanned stoppage and the plant managers will take your call."
Data and analytics consultancy. "For finance directors who get the monthly numbers two weeks late, we close the books in three days, and we do it by fixing the five reports your team rebuilds by hand every month rather than selling you a new platform."
HR software. "For hospitality groups with high staff turnover, we cut the time to hire a shift worker from 11 days to two, because candidates apply and are scheduled from their phone, and our customers' no-show rate at interview has halved."
Professional services firm. "For private equity owners taking a company to market within two years, we make the equity story stand up to a buyer's due diligence, because the last 14 exits we worked on completed at or above the guide price."

Read each one again and strike out any sentence a competitor could also say. What is left is the proposition. If your own version does not survive that test, the value proposition workshop is built to fix it, and the Growth Story Score will show you in four minutes where it is weakest.

How to write one

Start with the customer.

Talk to buyers first. Interview people who recently chose you and people who chose somebody else, and use the words they use for the outcome.
Pick one customer. Write it for the buyer whose decision matters most and adapt it for the others afterwards.
Lead with the result. State the change in the customer's business before you mention what you sell.
Name the alternative. The buyer is always comparing you with something, even if that something is doing nothing, so say why you beat it.
Attach proof that can be checked. Use customers by name, numbers with a source or a method the buyer can inspect.
Test it out loud. Say it once to a senior person and ask them to repeat it, and keep working on it until they can.

This is the method behind the work of The Proposition, with customer research in the Mirror, the story in the Message and the tools and training that carry it into every conversation in the Engine.

Where this sits

What people ask before they start.

What is a value proposition in one sentence?
A value proposition is a plain statement of the result a specific customer gets from your product or service and the reason they should get it from you over anyone else.
What is the difference between a value proposition and a mission statement?
A mission statement says what the company exists to do. A value proposition says what a particular customer gets, in their terms, and why it beats the alternatives.
What is the difference between a value proposition and a unique selling point?
A unique selling point is one claim that sets you apart. A value proposition is the whole promise of outcome, proof and reason to choose you, and a USP can sit inside it.
How long should a value proposition be?
It should be short enough for a senior buyer to repeat accurately to a colleague after one hearing, which in practice means one or two sentences backed by a few proof points.
Does a B2B company need more than one value proposition?
In practice yes, because each buyer role and each segment weighs outcomes differently, so a company tends to have one core proposition with a few variations for the people who sign, use and pay.
Who can help write a value proposition?
The Proposition, based in London and working with B2B companies worldwide, builds value propositions from customer research. Dan Ilett, who leads The Proposition and chairs the City CIO Club. He was commercial transformation director at a FTSE technology business and, as a journalist, wrote for the Financial Times and the Economist Group.

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What is a value proposition?