Your search for your consulting USP starts firmly up your own ...

This was in response to a question from the CEO of a consulting organisation, who asked me "How do we articulate our consulting USP?"

We've all read too many marketing books and swallowed the USP dream whole. I will be flamed by every marketer out there, but in my view the search for a USP in a consulting business is at best pointless, and at worst a counterproductive deadly time and energy sink.

The USP is not your goal

The USP is not your goal. It is a means to an end, a way to attract clients and deliver something exceptional to them.

If you look at it from your clients' perspective, the vast majority are really looking for the following:

• Value. They want help to solve a particular problem, or exploit a particular opportunity. They want this help in a way that they get more out of it than they pay for it. If you're dealing with a non-myopic business owner, then that means a big ROI. If you've been cursed to end up with a typical procurement team, then that likely means minimal cost to just get the job done.
• Credibility. They want a safe pair of hands that will deliver what they're looking for. So they need to believe that you can deliver what they're looking for. (It goes without saying that you should believe this too!)
• Relationship, trust and experience. You're going to see them a lot during your engagement. They want to work with someone they like. Someone they can trust to not bail out, let them down, or exploit their dependency when it all goes a little hairier than planned. Ideally, they'd also like the whole thing to be an experience they enjoy.

Note that "uniqueness" doesn't feature in that list. Your uniqueness is neither here nor there. Your ability to do the above 3 things exceptionally well and better than the next gal/guy is what will make the difference.

But I have a USP!

Don't get me wrong. I'm not against USPs. If you have a genuine USP (meaning it passes the criteria below), then you should milk it for all it's worth, ride it like a rented mule, and all other metaphors for making the most out of it.

But before you do that, make sure it passes the following test:

1. Most important - is your unique thing really relevant for your client? Or is it just something that makes you feel special? Your client wants a solution that does the job for them, not your USP.
2. Is it truly unique? Or even nearly unique? And is it unique in a relevant way (see 1 above).
3. Can you deliver it consistently? Your USP is a promise, just like your proposal is. If you say that's what you are, and you don't live up to it, your reputation will spread far beyond just the client you've just let down.

If it doesn't pass those tests, then what you have is a different kind of USP, namely a Useless Selling Proposition.

So if not USP, then what?

So, if like most consultancies, you don't have a genuine USP, don't waste your money, energy and time trying to invent one. If you have a genuine candidate to be your USP, it will be obvious to you - it won't come as a result of a 3 month marketing agency engagement.

Until then, if your focus is on growing your consultancy, it would be far more impactful to spend your time looking at the 3 things your clients buy from you:

1. Value;
2. Credibility;
3. Relationship, trust and experience.

Value

This comes down to 2 things.

1. Focus hard on how you can deliver unfeasible value to your clients. Build a framework or process that helps you figure out how to deliver enormous value.
2. Then figure out how to articulate your value as clearly and quickly as possible, and drive that message as far up your prospect or client's organisation as is relevant. Which, if you're a technology consultancy, is usually 2 levels higher than you think, and if you're an agency, probably one level up.

Credibility

Credibility revolves around your ability to confidently and compellingly articulate how you're going to unleash value for your client. In my books, that also has to be on the basis of fact, not hope. You need to not only be able to deliver, but make your client believe that you can.

So credibility entails not only knowing what you're talking about, but inspiring trust that you do in those that you talk to. Put bluntly, if your prospects don't think you can do what you say you can, they won't buy from you.

Trust, Relationship and Experience

The most consistent feedback from our clients at Conchango (NMA ranked no. 2 Full Services Agency in the UK, that I was on the board of) was that we never let them down, even though any accountant looking at some of our projects would've probably told us to stop and do something else. But that trust we earned with our clients was essential especially as we took on challenging projects.

But we never led with it or said that it was a USP. It would be ridiculous to tell someone that you're unique because you can be trusted. But the fact that we had countless clients who would vouch for how we stuck with them through their most challenging ambitions, meant that references really paid off.

Your clients are businesses, but they're also people. They want to know you will do right by the business, but they also want to enjoy working with you. At the very least, they don't want to actively dislike their consulting partners.

So don't be a jerk. And if you're leading a consultancy and have no social graces, then for God's sake hire someone who does and make them your client-facing leaders.

Don't be unique. Be really bloody good.

I remember when we were looking for funding to expand, we talked to a private equity firm (i.e. another professional services firm). The terms they offered us were worse than if we'd gone to the bank for a loan. So in their pitch meeting to us, I asked what was special about working with them, why we'd want to take those terms when we were actually already in a financially stable and strong position.

After looking at his colleagues for inspiration, The managing partner earnestly leaned over the table and said "I think you'll find when you work with us that we're a really passionate company!".

Now there's a USP straight out of an episode of The Office.

Don't be that managing partner.

If you've ever been involved in product selection, you'll have witnessed a 23 year-old pre-sales guy genuinely believing that the latest feature he's showing you in their software is something that no other product has. And you'll have seen the feature, often done better, elsewhere.

Don't be that spotty 23 year-old.

Your clients can, and will, call BS if you claim uniqueness when really, it's not that unique. They will usually know your competition's claims better than you, as they'll have been at the receiving end of them.

Don't try to shoehorn uniqueness into your consultancy. Spend all that time and energy instead on building relationships and being really, really bloody good!

And make your quest for uniqueness be about how you can deliver something unique for your client and how you can build a unique relationship with them.

Don't lead with your uniqueness. Lead with how you're going to make them unique.

(The full article, along with other views on building and leading a tech consultancy or digital agency is on my website, Value Led Consulting.)