Summary:Value is about the stuff consumers value when they’re trying to do a job. It’s the factors that make your product or service better than other peoples’ products or services.
The reason you’re here? Producing products or services that consumers really value. Only by producing things that people really love, can you make a difference to them, the greater a difference you provide compared to competitors, the more they’ll pay you.
Value never stays still, it is always moving forwards. So if you are not changing or moving forwards quicker than the rest of the world, you are going backwards!
Because providing value is the only reason any business exists, we are going to cover it from the consumer’s side in a separate article.
Let’s talk about what value is.
Value Lines, Value Factors, Opportunity Scores, Famous 4, Value Pains, Value Risks
These are the Units of Value we work on in business to create a new solution.
Each one of these is now discussed, and is of particular use in market research, and Value Creation.
There are other Units of Value such as the value proposition and brand that we use later in communicating value, but we won’t be covering these here because we are focusing on the Value itself. Additionally, there are Units of Value called Value Creators. These link to value directly, and are used within the firm to identify, create, communicate, deliver, support, monitor and measure and sustain value along the Company and Product Value Lines. We’ll cover these in a separate chapter.
Value Lines
Value Lines – The DNA of Value
The Value Line is how any Unit of Value is received or created. It’s like the DNA helix of Value, and can be the size of an entire company and industry or the size of just one action or something within the company – for example anything that helps your company create value such as an employee or policy will have a Value Line.
At one end of the scale, if we zoom right out, the entire market works off one big Value Line, and your entire company is a Value Line – because it makes value. At the other, as we go closer under the microscope, a product will have its own Value Line because it provides value. A department, a policy and an employee have their own Value Lines too – they all make value. Indeed, you may see each department and employment as a separate Value Line, as long as there is cohesion and coordination of them along the Company Value Line and the different Product Value Lines it has!
So let’s take a look at Value Lines from the receiver’s point of view
What is a consumer? A consumer is anyone that can receive value – in others words anyone that uses material goods – and that’s almost everybody on the planet. They don’t have to use what you make, they don’t have to know about it, they might buy it now or they may love or hate it, it doesn’t matter. They are still a consumer.
The DNA of value differs whether you are receiving value or giving value. This isn’t complex though, because the two lines, perfectly sync or match. It’s the perfect syncing or matching of these Value Lines that leads to perfectly optimised value between the company, its solutions and the targeted consumer – and this is your ultimate goal. What most companies don’t realise is that they are part of a far bigger plan – the perfect syncing or matching of their Product Value Lines with the Ultimate Solution for the targeted consumer.
This is the Value Line from the consumers side – The Consumers Value Line – and is the same for anyone that receives value.
Identify value – Create value – Look for value – Choose value – Get value – Use value – Evaluate value – Sustain value
This is basically the entire “consumer experience”. Now you know why companies like Virgin and Apple that focus on the entire consumer experience and do it so well are so successful!
People that use the Consumers Value Line could do so as a user, buyer, final decision maker payer, influencer, or several or all of these. Some may not complete the journey through the Consumers Value Line but will at least go through some of the notions as an eventual non user, non buyer, non final decision maker, non payer, non influencer.
Contrast the Consumers Value Line with an Industry Value Line, Company Value Line, or Product Value Line or anything that makes value -
Identify value – Create value – Communicate value (level and focus) – Communicate value (effectiveness) – Deliver value –Support value – Monitor value – Sustain value
The Value Line for anything that creates value always looks exactly the same.
Types of Value Line can therefore be
- Company Value Line – the Value Line of the entire company
This is what the company does at each part of the Value Line, and the Performance 14 along all of them. For our purposes here a company is a business unit that is financially independent and may or may not be a division of a larger corporation.
One or many Product Value Lines will flow from this Value Line. If there is only one Product Value Line, it will be identical to the Company Value Line.
- Product Value Line – the Value Line used by a company for a particular solution
This is what a company does at each part of the Value Line for a product. Exactly what a company does will be different for each product and what it does may be shared with other Product Value Lines as well.
- Industry Value Line – the Value Line used by an industry or part of an industry
This is the Value Line used by an industry. For example, the Supermarket Industry has two Industry Value Lines, one offline and one online, which involve very different use of the Performance 14 along them.
An Industry Value Line is a broad template that competing Product Value Lines follow – often they come from the same industry, other times they will not do.
- Value Creator Value Line – the Value Line for a specific Value Creator
As Value Creators make value, they too have their own Value Lines.
- Consumer Value Line
This is how people go about receiving value. This can be happening now, an ideal from consumers, or an ideal from within an innovative company that better meets the consumer’s ideal. There are thousands of Consumer Value Lines out there waiting to be discovered!
- Ultimate Value Line
The absolute best way that the Value Line could work base don the jobs and outcomes that consumers want to perform. Especially useful when looked at for Consumer Value Lines and Product Value Lines.
Matching The Value Lines
You can see how the two Value Lines of Value giver and Value receiver slot together in perfect harmony. The idea is that the Product Value Line perfectly reflects the Consumers Value Line.
Value Receiver – Consumers Value Line (The Consumers Different Experiences)
- Identify Value – What jobs and outcomes can’t I do or do well? What benefits do I need that I don’t have?
- Create Value – What would be the ideal solution for me based on what I know about other solutions and my own imagination?
- Look for Value – Where can I find out about solutions and get them?
- Choose Value – What provides me with the best value weighing up what I loves vs what I hate?
- Get Value – How soon and at what cost can I get it? Where from?
- Use Value – Now I use the value. What happens if I have problems, how do I get help?
- Evaluate Value – Did I get what I was promised? Am I still getting good value? What else is out there?
- Sustain Value – Do I need to buy again, update, modify or buy a newer solution?
Value Giver – Product Value Line (Fulfilling Consumers Experiences)
- Identify Value – What jobs and outcomes are important to people and how does what we do or can do compare to other solutions?
- Create Value – What solution would be ideal for them based on jobs and outcomes, other solutions and our imagination?
- Communicate Value – (focus and level) Who and where are the people that need to know about what we have and how can we find then we when need it?
- Communicate Value – (effectiveness) How can we show off the value we have the best so benefits minus detriments are perceived in our favour?
- Deliver Value – Can we get solutions to people quicker and cheaper?
- Support Value – Are we helping throughout ownership and use?
- Monitor Value – Are we giving what we promise? Are customers still getting good value? What do they think? How do we compare to other solutions?
- Sustain Value – How can we improve the value that we are offering?
How the Value Lines of Value receiver and giver slot together.
As a company it’s your job to try and optimise the two sides as best you can at all stages, plus do it better than your competitors. This and only this leads to the Product Value Line meeting the Consumers Value Line better – in other words – getting something better into the hands of consumers!
All the value is already out there, but it’s locked in people’s minds, imaginations, emotions and feelings. At the moment it has not been transformed into a tangible reality. Consequently, there are billions and billions of pounds worth of value that remains unfound and un-catered for by companies and their solutions.
Matching the Product Value Line to the Consumer Value Line is the only way you can deliver any value successfully, either on the outside – to consumers – or on the inside – to employees. It’s the only way you can serve. Successful execution of the Value Line is what your business is here to do. If any part at all is poorly done, the Value Line is broken and the value will ultimately fail!
Even a website page or product feature will have a Value Line. In both cases you have to identify what value the person will be after, create it, communicate it and deliver it, support it, then measure it and monitor it before sustaining it.
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