Why USPs are a waste of time and what you should be doing instead

You have to admire Ajmal Mushtaq.

The man behind the incredibly successful Mushtaqs of Hamilton Indian restaurant and takeaway provides advice for business owners that flies in the face of what countless marketing experts have said in the past.

A unique selling point (or ‘USP’, as most refer to it)? It’s an utter waste of time, he says (well, he’s a little more explicit than that, but it’s the same sentiment).

At this point, you’re probably already frowning, and I understand why. Throughout our working lives, we’re told that you need a USP.

Why?

• It’ll make you stand out from the competition
• It’ll provide the perfect answer to any form of objection during a sales meeting
• It can form the backbone of every marketing campaign you run
• It’ll ensure longevity and the ability to grow your business bigger than every competitor
• It’ll win you awards, headline space and recognition from the most important people in your industry

There’s just one issue with all of the above. Although having a USP is certainly useful, it can take forever to find one. In fact, you might spend years searching for a USP only to eventually discover that there isn’t one.

Mushtaq tells us he did that for three years - years he feels were “wasted”.

What about the most successful products out there?

Let’s look at some of the most successful products out there today and I’ll give you my take on why they don’t have a USP.

iPhone

Launched in 2007, Apple’s take on the smartphone has grown to stratospheric popularity and made the company one of the richest on the planet.

Remove the beautiful design and hype, however, and it’s just a phone. It has countless competitors, some of which are cheaper, more functional and arguably more innovative.

Angry Birds

I could have listed so many smartphone-based games in this list - but that illustrates my point.

Angry Birds is far from unique. It’s a fun, free game that pretty much anyone can pick up, play and become addicted to. There are thousands out there which are just the same.

Harry Potter

J. K. Rowling’s tale of the wizard boy Harry Potter has expanded far beyond a bunch of books. It’s now a successful film franchise, theme park and merchandise empire.

But it’s still just a story about a kid who’s a wizard.

Coca-Cola

The age-old debate: which coke do you prefer?

• Pepsi?
• Coca-Cola?
• Sainsbury’s own?

Do any one of the products above have a USP? No!

Ford Focus

If you’ve driven a Ford Focus you’ll know it’s an unremarkable, yet incredibly safe, practical and reliable car.

Yet, so many other cars are like that, aren’t they?

Amazon

Ok, so this isn’t strictly a product, but it’s arguably one of the most successful online shops of the digital age and something pretty much everyone comes into contact with (directly or indirectly).

It’s far from unique, though. Amazon just sells stuff online; you can buy pretty much any of its stock from elsewhere, sometimes cheaper.

So… why are those products so successful?

Every single product I’ve listed above is astronomically successful not because they have USPs, but because they do almost everything better than the competition.

This brings us back to Mushtaq, who says that the secret to his success comes from dropping the search for a USP and instead focusing on doing everything better than the competition.

That’s what the teams behind the products above did. And they’ve made bucket loads of money because of it.

How to do everything better than the competition

Woah, that’s a serious heading, isn’t it? Surely, that’s the holy grail of business ownership?

It’s actually entirely achievable, if you have the right mindset and if, as I’ve hopefully proved today, you realise that searching for a USP is a total waste of time.

The key lies in breaking your business up into its constituent elements and making sure every single one of them is done to the best of your ability and far better than the competition.

Here’s how:

1. Review every single task in your business

I’m a big believer in breaking big things up into chunks in order to make them more digestible, and you can do that with your business.

Spend as long as you need to write down every task that enables you to get products or services out of the door. From the customer journey, to order processing, development, client support - everything.

Don’t worry - it’ll be a big list, but a list which will become your bible for how to beat the competition.

2. Look at how the competition approaches each task

Now you have your list of individual tasks, take a look at your competition. How do they approach each one?

Clearly, you won’t gain direct insight into every single task they undertake, but by scouring online reviews and asking friends to play customer, you’ll quickly start to get a feel for where the competition are performing badly or missing opportunities to delight customers.

3. Set goals for how to better the competition at every single task

You should now know where you can beat the competition. This is good news, because it means you can start setting goals for how you’ll beat them at every single task.

This isn’t easy and it won’t happen overnight, but if, for instance, you run an e-commerce business and discover that the average delivery time from your competitors is three days, work out how you can do it in just one.

4. Iterate, improve and review - constantly

Making small gains in those individual tasks might seem like a long-winded method for becoming the most successful business in your sector, but the more tasks you smash, the more they’ll add up to a something much bigger which is light years ahead of the competition.

Just make sure you don’t standstill. Your approach to every one of those tasks will need to evolve as your industry, customers and competitors change; this isn’t a fire-and-forget business strategy.

Wrapping up

Stop looking for that USP - it doesn’t exist!

Who else agrees that it’s far more sensible to spend your time providing a better product and service than your competition by breaking your business down into its constituent elements and nailing each one?