Use this simple 2-in-1 value proposition to beat your competitors
Find the 'little problems'
Hey Part-Time Creator,
Take this newsletter and apply it to your business daily; it’ll help you build your business smarter. This is a free post. If you’re a busy professional with an ambition to sell a product or service on the internet:
Many subscribers expense this newsletter. It works out at about $0.50 per growth hack.
I’ve been suffering with my teeth lately.
They never bother me. But out walking the other day, a gust of wind caused me to grab my mouth — what was that? My front teeth were aching in pain.
Weird, that’s never happened before.
The next few days, I found myself winching and hiding from the cold air. At the beach, I put my hood around my mouth to shield from the wind; at dinner, I was quiet; on walks, I spent half the time with my hand around my mouth.
In the last few days, the pain from my teeth has been a constant source of frustration.
But luckily for me, I knew the solution. I just had to go and buy it.
From the moment that gust of wind hit my teeth, Sensodyne toothpaste was the only thing I thought about buying. You see, it’s moments in your life that cause you to buy a product or a service.
In many ways, a brand's job is to be there, ready and waiting when those moments come.
Why did I think about Sensodyne?
Because it does 2 *jobs* in 1 one, it cleans my teeth (solves the problem there) and is for sensitive teeth (so it solves a second problem there).
The technique: 2-in-1 value proposition — let’s get into it.
(This newsletter comes with 2 GPT prompts to help you find your ‘wide’ problem and then a super-GPT to find your 2-in-1 value proposition.)
Step 1: Solve a *wide* problem
You can solve any problem you like.
But of course, the problem you pick is the problem you’re going to spend a lot of time thinking about, so it makes sense to pick a problem with:
A sizeable market (lots of people have this problem)
One that you care about and genuinely want to solve
A market that pays you to solve the problem (it’s a business after all)
Sometimes, I like to think about a ‘problem’ as a function of time.
So there are things that I call *daily* problems that happen to a huge part of the population on a daily basis, and there are things that I call *occasional* problems that happen less frequently.
Usually, you can charge more for infrequent problems (because people are only paying once or monthly), but daily problems have a ‘guaranteed’ market because it’s something people are trying to solve daily — aka it’s causing them pain every day.
Let me give you an example.
Something like HelloFresh attempts to solve a daily problem because everyone has to eat, and meal times are a rightttttttttt pain for most people. The people that can afford to spend a little more on meal times can then pay for convenience.
HelloFresh is an example of a 2-in-1 value proposition, but more on that later.
Something like a JustEat is an example of where you can charge more for an infrequent problem, but people are probably not eating JustEat daily. Charge more, but only for an occasional treat.
Here are some examples of *wide* daily problems that you could tackle:
Food & nutrition
Personal hygiene
Fitness
Dog walking
Communiting
Watching TV
Cleaning
*I’ve added into the GPT prompt at the end a prompt for finding daily problems you can solve.
The beauty of solving problems like these is that your brand becomes part of the customer’s life—it makes it part of their daily habits, and you know as well as I do that if something becomes a habit, it’s hard to break.
That means you’re locking a customer in for the long-term, and businesses that do that grow because they can focus on acquiring new customers, knowing that (in the main) once they’re in, they’re not going anywhere (obviously, unless you mess it up).
So the first step is to find a wide problem you care about (if you’re struggling with that, scroll to the bottom of this newsletter and use the prompt).
Step 2: Find an underserved market within the *wide* problem
Here’s the deal: Most problems exist as a *big problem*, but within them, there are lots of little problems.
For example, the daily problem of eating something (ideally good for you) to solve your hunger problem.
The big problem: I need to eat because I’m hungry, and I need nutrients for energy
Underneath that, though, there are a load of associated problems that you can choose to solve, and by doing so, you divide the market and give yourself an edge.
Here are some ‘little problems’:
I don’t want to try new recipes because I’m worried they’ll be bad
I want to eat organic food, but I struggle to find it
I don’t want to spend hours in the kitchen
I don’t have the time to do the food shop
I don’t know what to cook each night
You see how one big problem is the core, overarching problem, but within that, there are lots of little problems that can, if you choose to be, be your golden ticket.
And that brings me onto Sensodyne.
Big problem: I need to clean my teeth
Little problem: My teeth feel sensitive
So if I’m in the population of people that clean their teeth every day and have sensitive teeth, I’m buying Sensodyne. Why? It’s the only brand (to my knowledge) on the market that is widely available and is directly targeted to sensitive teeth.
Step 3: How can you leverage this idea?
Let’s take an example we’ve not talked about here.
So, I’ll paint a picture.
You’re a new dog parent (welcome to the world, Fred the bulldog), and you’re apprehensive that you’re not doing the right thing. You’re not sure if you’re feeding Fred right, if you’re giving him enough exercise (maybe too much exercise) if you’re leaving him too long, if he’s happy.
So you start researching about the things that you are concerned with, but the information is everywhere, it’s contradictory, and it’s not good enough.
You’ve got a background in writing, so you decide to start a weekly newsletter.
Big problem to solve: feeling like a confident, component new dog mum.
Little problem: I feel like I’m not giving my dog sufficient nutrition.
So I might start a weekly newsletter called: Puppies Guide to a Healthy Life — take care of your dog’s health and wellbeing from day one.
You see, big problem, little problem.
The 2-in-1 value proposition.
Step 4: A word of warning
There are two things to be mindful of here.
First, don’t pick a little problem that doesn’t make sense in the context of your solution. So, for example, in the dog newsletter example above.
I nearly started with the little problem: my dog is overweight.
However, then I ran a thought experiment (and it’s always worth doing these to sense-check your line of thinking). If my dog is overweight, that indicates I’ve had my dog for a little while, puppies are not typically overweight.
But remember, this is about Fred and new dog owners.
So, by starting with the little problem of an overweight dog, we isolate the exact audience we are trying to target.
The second thing to be mindful of is trying to do too much.
Don’t try to be all things to everyone because it rarely works. A jack of all trades in the market is just seen as a master of none. You need to be known for something. Ideally, a 2-in-1. You have a main function, but your offer is catered to a certain person.
That’s it.
Trying to do much more dilutes your brand; you start to become that restaurant that serves every cuisine on the menu and does them all poorly. Pick a thing and stick to it.
Your GPT prompts
If you’re struggling to figure out what *wide* problem you can solve, use the prompt below: