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particular company. Ultimately, a value attribute (or a collection of them)
prompted you to keep your wallet closed. For example, here is a list of attributes
that have caused me NOT TO BUY:
The product label looked like it was designed using MS Paint.
There was no story behind the company.
The company advertised like a BRO-marketer.
The reviews were bribed. (
I got this product at a discount in exchange for an
honest review.
)
The product had an unwanted ingredient: Aspartame, Red 40,
etc.
The product was packaged in plastic.
The service required a credit card before trying.
The user interface was clunky.
In each of these cases, the value skew wasn’t strong enough to compel
buying. Instead, another company received my money.
ENGINEERING VALUE SKEW
To dominate markets and win sales, engineer a value skew. It starts by
identifying the value array and its attributes. Here’s how:
First, examine both your product and its industry with the goal to identify
every value attribute, no matter how seemingly insignificant. Remember, you
don’t know what’s important to your customer, so brainstorming every one is
the best practice.
The first attribute group is its primary attributes: your product itself,
deconstructed down to its core components. Is there any one component or
ingredient that you can improve?
For example, consider a knife. Seems like a simple product, right? Not
exactly. It has many primary attributes within its deconstruction: the spine, the
bolster, the handle, the tip, the thumb rise, the handle scale, the front quillion,
the grind, the edge, the heel, the tang, and the rivets.
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Each component
represents an opportunity to skew value. Our rivets are titanium! Our tip edge is
solid gold!
If you sell food or a personal product, every ingredient is a value-skewing
opportunity. My friend started his personal-grooming company based on this
method; he read common ingredient complaints he discovered on a men’s
forum.
The second attribute group is its secondary attributes, which consist of the
product’s marketing and delivery to the customer. This would be your website’s
design, order processing, photos, company story, customer service, shipping,
refund policy, telephone (or lack thereof), sales copy, reviews, social media posts
—
anything that could make or break a sale is an attribute.
HOW SKEWING VALUE ATTRIBUTES ENLARGES YOUR MARKET
I rarely go to the movies. I hate fighting with strangers over dirty and
uncomfortable seats, the crowded aisles, and overall, the entire experience.
However, recently my local theater made a big change.
They widened the aisles and replaced the dirty seats with spacious automatic
recliners. On top of this, they started offering online seat reservations. Each of
these improvements skewed value—better convenience, comfort, and ordering—
and it turned me from a once-a-year moviegoer into one who went several times
per month.
You see, your job is to identify
every
value attribute in the global pool, with
the explicit intent to uncover skewing opportunities. The more attributes skewed
without disrupting other skews (say price), the more sales you will win.
For instance, I used to drink a pre-workout supplement called Pre Jym. Over
the years, I must have given the company hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars.
However, in late 2015, I stopped taking the product, despite my chronic use.
Why? The product uses Sucralose and is artificially colored with Red 40. These
are two big NO-NO attributes in my value array. I stopped buying and money
ceased to flow.
However, if the founder of Pre Jym was reading this book, he’d see an
opportunity to skew value. The natural replacement for the artificial coloring
“Red 40” is beet juice. Replacing Red 40 with beet juice would have no impact on
the product in terms of effectiveness or cost. This change, by itself, skews value
and compels new buyers to buy. Why? Because NO ONE on planet Earth would
cry, “They removed the Red 40 and now I’m not buying!” And now the product
could claim, “No Artificial Colors”—a benefit skew that might attract a new pool
of buyers.
Likewise, if stevia or some other natural alternative replaced Sucralose, the
folks at Pre Jym would win my money back. And again, another pool of potential
buyers sensitive to artificial ingredients would enlarge the market size.
Wherever you can skew value within a product’s pool of attributes, you stand
out and cast a bigger market tent. The bigger the skew, the more attractive your
company becomes to the consumer. Unfortunately, most business owners aren’t
aware of this powerful relationship. Instead they fall for one of six value myths
and, ultimately, fail the Commandment of Need.
A skewed value attribute expands markets without alienating others. For example,
when your business endorses a political ideology, you both expand (those for) and
alienate markets (those against.)
VALUE SKEW: THE 6 MISAPPROPRIATIONS MYTHS
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