Much as I admire Paul Sloane’s work in general, his February column “What is your Blackpool Tower?” seems nothing more than Rosser Reeves’s old concept of the USP repackaged.
Maybe being different in some way – any way – is essential, but the ideal solution is being different in a way that benefits the consumer.
As a junior copywriter at O&M in the ’70s I was told the best example of a headline USP was “Bloggs’s beer gets you p*ss*d quicker”. Blackpool may have a tower, but is suffering badly in attracting holiday makers, as I found out at a council briefing.
Maybe a better expression of the ideal differentiation is “Only we can offer the consumer this real benefit”.
The Heineken campaign Sloane mentions was a clear demonstration of the phenomenon that customers equate awareness with quality. Given the choice between two brands the one with the highest awareness will always win, all other things being equal. I wonder how Heineken would have competed against Bloggs’s beer with a similar budget?
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