How to Create an Effective Value Proposition

Starting a business comes with many unknowns, but the value of your brand shouldn't be one of them.

Before launching a venture, entrepreneurs should determine what market need their product or service fulfills, and what separates their offering from others. Without this differentiation and definition of opportunity, a new business isn't likely to succeed.

The same could be said for job candidates in a crowded marketplace. Strategic positioning matters just as much for individuals as it does for companies. Standing out requires clarity around what you offer, who you serve, and your unique strengths.

To communicate the need your offering fulfills—whether it's a product, service, idea, or skill set—and what sets it apart, you must create an effective value proposition.

Before diving into how to craft yours, here's a look at what a value proposition is and why it's important for you and your business.

What Is a Value Proposition?

A value proposition is a statement that conveys what a brand does and how it differs from competitors. It's typically developed as part of a broader marketing strategy and no more than a few sentences long. The initial proposition can be bolstered with statistics and facts that prove the brand's stated value.

Having a value proposition is important because it clearly and concisely communicates what customers can gain from selecting your brand over competitors. This statement can be used in several ways, including:

• On your company's website, to help convert potential leads into customers
• When pitching your company to investors
• As an answer to the question, "So, what exactly does your company do?"

As an entrepreneur, it's your job to be your organization's number one advocate and garner others' support. A short, clear value proposition can stick in the minds of investors, potential customers, friends, and relatives, ensuring your brand's value isn't lost in translation.

This concept also applies on a personal level. In the online course Personal Branding, Harvard Business School Professor Jill Avery defines a personal value proposition as a statement that articulates the value you bring to an important audience in your life, whether future employers, collaborators, or investors. Just like with a business, your ability to clearly communicate your unique strengths can shape how others perceive and choose to work with you.

To begin crafting your value proposition, start with an understanding of the jobs to be done theory.

Understanding Your Customers' Jobs to Be Done

The jobs to be done theory was developed by HBS Professor Clayton Christensen. It asserts that customers "hire" products and services to get "jobs" done, rather than purchasing them based on their attributes and buying behaviors.

"A 'job to be done' is a problem or opportunity that somebody is trying to solve," Christensen says in the online course Disruptive Strategy. "We call it a 'job' because it needs to be done, and we hire people or products to get jobs done."

One example of a successful brand that's used this framework is Warby Parker, founded in 2010 by Neil Blumenthal, Dave Gilboa, Andy Hunt, and Jeff Raider.

The eyeglass company got its start when one of the founders lost his glasses on a backpacking trip. Unable to swing the steep price of a new pair, he spent the next semester "squinting and complaining" to three of his friends, who realized they had been in similar situations.

"We were amazed at how hard it was to find a pair of great frames that didn't leave our wallets bare," Warby Parker states on its website. "Every idea starts with a problem. Ours was simple: Glasses are too expensive."

This statement describes the job to be done discovered by Warby Parker's founders. They realized people had a need to purchase affordable eyewear and, after some research, found there weren't many options in the market.

"Understanding that the same company owned LensCrafters and Pearle Vision, Ray-Ban and Oakley, and the licenses for Chanel and Prada prescription frames and sunglasses—all of a sudden, it made sense to me why glasses were so expensive," Gilboa explains in an interview with Forbes.

The team decided to take things one step further by adding a social justice component to their business model. For every pair of eyeglasses purchased, Warby Parker donates a pair to someone in need.

"There's nothing complicated about it," the company states on its website. "Good eyewear, good outcome."

This satisfies another job to be done: providing customers with a convenient means of helping others. This dual-pronged jobs to be done framework proved to be a success, as the team hit its first-year sales goal in just three weeks.

Warby Parker continues to build its value around jobs to be done and can expect its customers' needs to "purchase affordable eyewear" and "help others in a convenient way" to endure.

"Because a job to be done remains stable over time, it provides a North Star in innovation," Christensen says.

Just as customers seek solutions to problems, employers, collaborators, and clients hire individuals to solve specific challenges. The online course Personal Branding encourages you to think of your career through this lens: What are the consistent “jobs” others turn to you for, and how can you position yourself as the go-to solution?

When crafting your brand's value proposition, think about the job to be done it addresses. How does its value center on a persisting need you can fill in a unique way? It's this positioning that can allow your brand to provide the same value for customers as the market advances.

Creating a Value Proposition

You can use the jobs to be done framework as a starting point to craft your brand's value proposition.

Ask yourself:

• What is my brand offering?
• What job does the customer hire my brand to do?
• What companies and products compete with my brand to do this job for the customer?
• What sets my brand apart from those competitors?

For example, Warby Parker's founders could answer these questions as follows:

• Warby Parker offers affordable designer eyewear, including contacts.
• Customers hire Warby Parker to provide high-quality eyewear at affordable prices and give back to the community in a convenient way.
• All other eyewear brands compete with Warby Parker.
• Warby Parker's commitment to giving back to the community and its affordable prices set it apart from competitors.

Next, summarize your points in a clear, concise value proposition. Continuing the example above, Warby Parker's value proposition, as published on its homepage, is:

“Buying eyewear should leave you happy and good-looking, with money in your pocket. Glasses, sunglasses, and contacts—we’ve got your eyes covered.”

This value proposition is reinforced throughout the company's website, along with its stated commitment to social justice:

“Warby Parker was founded with a rebellious spirit and a lofty objective: to offer designer eyewear at a revolutionary price, while leading the way for socially conscious businesses.”

To ensure your value proposition is effective, consider running it by a few people unfamiliar with your business. If confusion arises, edit your statement to address those points.

Once you have a value proposition you're proud of, make it known. Publish it on your website, incorporate it into your marketing materials, and memorize it for sharing during networking events, pitch opportunities, and dinner conversations.

Thinking this way about your business can also sharpen how you communicate your professional value. In Personal Branding, Avery encourages adapting your statement for a specific audience and purpose. She shares a helpful framework in the course that includes four key elements:

• For: A particular target person or group of people
• I will make a difference by: Your specific claims to value that outline the unique, memorable, and meaningful difference you desire to make by staying true to your beliefs
• Among all: Delineation of your competitive set—others who compete with you to make this difference, and with whom you want to fit in and stand out
• Because: The reasons your audience should believe you can credibly deliver on your promise, such as your skills, personality traits, habits, experiences, social and cultural capital, or credentials

Here's an example statement:

For prospective investors, I'll make a difference by offering a transparent and forward-thinking perspective on optimizing artificial intelligence (AI) technology, among all experts on AI, because I have hands-on experience and a creative strategic plan to broaden AI integration. I'm deeply embedded in a network of the leading thinkers on AI. I have a PhD in machine learning, and I’ve worked at the forefront of AI research for the past 10 years.

This framework mirrors the business-level value proposition process and is especially useful for preparing for conversations where clarity and confidence in your unique value are essential.

Setting Yourself Up for Success

By positioning your brand as a solution to a job to be done, you can set your company up for success. Creating a value proposition is a reflective exercise that prompts you to take stock of the need your brand fills, who your competitors are, and how you provide a different experience from other products and services.

Condensing these reflections into a succinct value proposition can enable you to convert leads into customers, effectively pitch to investors, and communicate the value of your brand at scale.

Do you want to craft winning, innovative strategies? Explore Disruptive Strategy, one of our online entrepreneurship and innovation courses, to understand how to build businesses around unmet customer needs. If you're interested in learning how to position yourself more effectively, our marketing course on Personal Branding provides tools to define and communicate your unique value.

This post was updated on August 15, 2025. It was originally published on July 28, 2020.