#64: How To Crush Competition With Value Not Features

#64: How To Crush Competition With Value Not Features

Read Time: 3 min

Today, I’ll provide a simple framework for how you should think about selling and positioning the value of your product in comparison to your competitors.

If you can stick to the framework that I provide and use that as leverage to sell against the competition, you will come out ahead. As stated in many issues. People buy for 3 reasons. (1) They believe you’re competent. (2) They believe you're an authority, and (3) they believe you can deliver on expectation. You deliver that experience through a process of not selling features but by solving problems through value.

A common error I see with many founders is trying to outsell features over their competition. When prospects evaluate vendors, they typically look for four things. The goal of this issue is to unpack each one.

Competition is for losers. If you want to create and capture lasting value, look to build a monopoly.

~ Peter Thiel



When we work with clients, we look to articulate these four pieces of information clearly to convey value and distinguish ourselves. These are the needle movers. Let’s examine each.

1. Speed

2. Effort

3. Efficiency

4. Economics

Speed
Customers want to see an immediate lift in their workflow. Their lives should be better and easier almost immediately after using your product. We live in a world of instant gratification customers expect immediate results when using your tech, a concept I call "Time to Wow." Delivering fast, noticeable benefits right from the start wins them on first impressions, reduces churn, encourages referrals, and provides an edge over other vendors they might be evaluating. To do this right, you have to design an intuitive onboarding experience, focusing on core features, gathering user feedback, and tracking performance metrics.

Effort
The lift for a customer to move from their existing workflow to yours should be as light as possible. The bigger the lift, the longer the sales cycle is, and the higher the chance they don’t close. Some tech, like big enterprise software, is hard to get around this, but what you do to compensate is to make sure you have an ironclad onboarding and ramp up for training the team. You should do 90% of the lifting for them. If that means it requires a lot more effort on your side, then that’s what needs to be done.

Efficiency
A prospect comes to you because they are in pain. The current way they’re handling a workflow is most likely inefficient, or perhaps they know something is not working but don’t know what it is. You need to identify where the source of pain is coming from and convey how much more efficient it is than what they are currently doing. A good rule of thumb has to be 10x better in order for them to be motivated to move forward, which I don’t subscribe to. You just have to be better and cheaper, require less effort, and be faster. In other words, I can buy a piece of software for $12k to do data entry admin work in comparison to paying a full-time employee $45k.

Economics
Your product doesn’t always have to be the cheapest option, but it must significantly improve the customer's current situation to justify its cost. Prioritizing value over features is crucial, as businesses are willing to invest in solutions that deliver transformative results, such as Increased Speed, Higher Efficiency, Higher Revenue, and Substantial Cost Savings. Especially with software and AI solutions, the ability to streamline operations, provide actionable insights, and automate tasks can lead to huge savings and an advantage over other players in the space. The key is to ensure your product delivers unparalleled value, making it an indispensable investment rather than just an expense.

One last important note. The only way you will win deals “consistently” is by executing the discovery, demo, scoping, and POC correctly. If not, the factors of speed, effort, and efficiency will not matter.

That’s it for today!

See you all next week.



Darren

P.S. If finding PMF and scaling to $1M in ARR through founder-led sales is on your radar, book a call with mehere

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