Sailing Through The Clutter

Competition can be a daunting concept. In the never-ending quest for profitable growth and the elusive “market share,” facing up to the fact that there are, depending on where you do business, dozens or even hundreds of competing businesses essentially doing the same thing you are can be unnerving. Operators and marketers are forever in search of something about their business that is different from all of the others that clutter the customer’s decision-making process.

In the pest control business, where what we do is increasingly being viewed by customers in commodity terms, it’s more important than ever for growth-minded companies to find some valid point of differentiation from everyone else. Granted, before worrying about getting whole bunches of new customers, a necessary first step is to deliver knockout service and hang on to the customers you already have. The customer you have is always more valuable than the one you’re trying to get. But “quality” and “dependability” are not points of differentiation. They are claims we make, goals for which we strive, and are subjective at best.

YOUR UNIQUE SELLING POINT. Marketers have come up with a term for that which separates one business, product or service from the rest. It’s called a Unique Selling Proposition, or USP. If you want to try an interesting exercise, take a look inside your own personal world at the products and services you choose to purchase. Look closely. Now, ask yourself, why did you pick the ones you did? What was the dominant reason you chose “A” over “B”?

You’ll probably find that price was seldom, if ever, the main issue. When there is no discernible difference in products or services, price becomes the determining factor. It is at that point that a product or service has attained (or fallen to) commodity status. Our challenge is to take a service that is approaching commodity status in the minds of consumers and find that unique characteristic which separates ours from the rest. It’s not easy, but it’s being done every day, very effectively, in our industry.

So, what’s your Unique Selling Prop-osition? It’s impossible to be totally objective about something like this, but when you stack your business up against your three or four major competitors, what is it about your business that truly differentiates it? Look hard, because there IS something. Just hope that it’s something positive!

About 16 years ago, Sears Termite and Pest Control developed a truly singular USP and has exploited it to the envy of (and imitation by) operators throughout the world. “Once-A-Year,” although not a term originated by Sears, has become almost synonymous with the Sears name.

“Research clearly indicated that the less frequently customers had to have us inside their homes, the better they liked it,” says Sears president Charles Steinmetz. “We developed a viable protocol, tested it, and when we saw the results, took it to market. Thankfully,” he adds, “customers embraced the concept and we’ve been successful with it.”

Sears’ “Once a Year” is a classic USP in that it immediately, simply, and understandably differentiated Sears from the overwhelming number of businesses providing monthly or even quarterly service.

LIKE A LIGHT BULB. A Unique Selling Proposition should not be something the customer has to search for or is difficult to comprehend. A great USP has the effect of a light bulb going off above the head of the customer. He or she understands it immediately. And hopefully, the customer appreciates the unique proposition enough to make an affirmative decision based on it.

The only flip-side to Sears’ success is that there are now hundreds of companies offering some form of once-a-year pest control service. This year, Sears “branded” theirs with the name Duragard, to once again differentiate it from the others now in the marketplace.

At Massey Services of Maitland, Fla., the USP can be found in how the company defines what it offers in terms of service. Massey doesn’t do pest CONTROL. Massey provides pest PREVENTION. And, like Steinmetz and Sears, Massey Services developed a service protocol around the simple idea that the company PREVENTS pests from getting into the home in the first place. “That way,” says Harvey Massey, president of Massey Services, “we don’t have to control them later.”

It’s a simple but powerful distinction.

An interesting characteristic of both Massey’s and Sears’ Unique Selling Propositions, is that even though customers were receptive to them, the programs took time to take hold. “Our program, developed around a chemical approach away from liquids and surface applications, spoke to customers’ concerns,” said Steinmetz. “They didn’t want malodorous chemicals and neither did we. And they didn’t want us coming inside and spraying every month.”

Massey agrees, but goes one step further. “People are concerned about their living environments,” he says. “We were able to explain to a customer that we would take care of any existing problems first. Then, if we did our job properly, by inspecting, monitoring and correcting, outside, we wouldn’t have to service inside their homes quarterly, semi-annually or even annually. They’ve responded positively to that. In fact,” Massey adds, “we have more than a few customers whose homes haven’t required inside service for several years.”

Both Massey and Steinmetz developed classic USPs, but had to completely retrain their service teams to deliver on their promises. That’s what took the time. “We developed our program in 1982,” says Steinmetz. “But it didn’t really take off for almost three years after that.”

“We coined the term, Pest Prevention, in 1990,” says Massey. “It was probably 1995 before we really refined it and obtained the buy-in of our people.”

The lesson, obviously, is that once you identify and begin the process of differentiating your business from others, you need to exercise patience and dedication. The payoff is almost never immediate.

IT TAKES TIME. “Differentiation is a process, not a destination,” says Todd Persons, president of Persons & Brinati, an Orlando, Florida-based marketing services company. “And it takes as many forms as there are companies, products and services.”

Persons cites an old but familiar USP from the soft drink industry. “Remember the “UN-Cola?” he asks. “Seven-Up wanted to distance itself from brown competitors Coca Cola and Pepsi Cola in a simple, yet dynamic way. What better way than by identifying itself as the UN-Cola?”

There are as many stories of differentiation in marketing as there are products and services. In the laundry detergent business, where differentiation has been an ongoing issue, Cheer differentiated itself from dozens of fundamentally similar competitors simply by coloring the product blue. Some years later, Whisk differentiated itself by liquefying its product. Today, laundry detergents come in all kinds of colors and virtually every major player has a liquid version on the shelf.

Add a scent to your product. Immediately, you’re different from a range of otherwise similar unscented products. Change your tooth “paste” to a “gel.” Bang, you’ve developed a USP.

Of course, just because you have a Unique Selling Proposition doesn’t mean you’re going to find immediate or overwhelming success in the marketplace. Who can forget “New Coke”? And remember the airline called Brannif? They painted all of their planes pastel colors, so as to differentiate the physical aircraft from all of the other airlines in the world. Nobody cared.

WHAT’S YOUR USP? As it applies to the pest control industry, it could be any of a number of points. And they could be points of substance or points of style. We’ve already discussed Sears’ “Once a Year” and Massey’s “Pest PREVENTION.” Both of these are substantive points of differentiation. There are others, such as longevity in business or possession of a proprietary product or service. Style points of differentiation could be a team of especially sharp, well-groomed service people, a snappy or interesting looking fleet of service vehicles (Brown Exterminating, for example), or a charismatic/celebrity spokesperson.

Developing a USP is usually not as simple as an edict handed down from senior management. Think about assembling key members of your organization for a “focus group” of sorts, to see if you can agree on what your company’s USP is or might be. You’ll know immediately if you’re on to something if you can get genuine buy-in on all levels of your company. Remember, people tend to affirm that which is in their interest, and what will be in your interest as an owner or manager might be different than what is in the interest of a service technician, administrative worker, service manager or sales person.

Once you’ve identified or settled on a USP, how do you promote it? If you don’t share your USP with the marketplace, you’re like the guy who winks at a woman in a dark room. He may know what he’s doing, but nobody else does. Incorporate your USP into every communication device you have. Sales materials, advertising, signage, vehicles, etc.

Make sure you explain to the marketplace the benefits of your USP. Just telling them about a particular feature that differentiates you from the rest of the industry won’t matter if you don’t also let them know how they will benefit from it.

This is where your USP moves from the abstract to the tangible. You can’t just say that you’re different and expect the message to take hold, either with your people or with the marketplace. You have to invest in it, and that means training, or more precisely, re-training, your people and spending hard dollars to change your marketing materials. If you’re truly committed to your Unique Selling Proposition, the rubber is now meeting the road!

How do you know if your USP is effective? Remember that Chuck Steinmetz and Harvey Massey needed years of patience and perseverance before seeing their Unique Selling Propositions really take hold.

Incrementally, you’ll probably notice acceptance of a valid USP externally before you see it internally. That’s because, as we said earlier, your customer’s interest may supersede the interests of your employees.

If your USP is truly effective, a couple of things should happen. First, customers should acknowledge the difference during the selling process. Feedback from your sales people should be consistent in this regard. Second, you should start to be noticed by competitors. This may take the form of having your USP becoming a target of their sales efforts.

A “classic” service business USP conflict occurs when a large, national organization competes with a smaller, local business. The larger company will position themselves as having more resources, broader experience and will, in essence, play the “size” card: bigger is better. The smaller business will talk about its roots in the community, its “personalized service” and will counter the USP of “size” with the USP of “relationship.”

What happens if your Unique Selling Proposition is copied? It’s not “if,” but “when.” Since many USPs are not really able to be patented, know going in that when yours begins to gain acceptance, others will at least allege to do the same thing.

More and more companies are calling their service pest PREVENTION instead of pest control. And “once a year” is no longer unique by any means. As Orlando marketing guru Todd Persons said earlier, differentiation is an ongoing process. You can’t rest for long on your laurels.

In closing, businesses can grow and prosper without a Unique Selling Proposition. It happens all the time. Hard work, doing the job right, meeting your customers’ wants, needs and expectations, recruiting and retaining quality employees — all of these traits can ensure that you’ll keep the customers you have, grow as the result of a steady flow of referrals and, if you manage and operate your business properly, produce a healthy profit. If, however, you can add the element of a Unique Selling Proposition, something that clearly distinguishes your business from those with whom you most aggressively compete, then the future is yours.

Bud Brewer is director of marketing for Massey Services, Inc. of Maitland, Fla.