Online Marketing Amsterdam

Perfectly align your brand promise with your customer’s needs

About Value Proposition Canvas (value proposition canvas)

The Value Proposition Canvas helps you understand exactly what your customer really needs – and how your brand responds to it. By systematically mapping customer needs and brand value, you discover where the real connection is. The Value Proposition Canvas consists of two main parts: the value map and the customer profile. This canvas provides guidance for developing a compelling proposition, clear communication and effective campaigns. Using the Value Proposition Canvas, you can create an appropriate service offering that optimally meets the needs of your customers.

The model was developed by Alexander Osterwalder. Value proposition design is explained using the Value Proposition Canvas.

What is the Value Proposition Canvas?

The essence of customer-centric brand thinking and customer jobs

The Value Proposition Canvas is a strategic model that consists of two parts: the customer profile and the value proposition. In the customer profile, you map out what your target audience is trying to accomplish (Jobs), what they are up against (Pains) and what they want to gain (Gains). Customers want to perform certain tasks; understanding these certain tasks is essential to properly understand their needs and challenges. Performing a particular task often involves experiencing or avoiding certain emotions. Within the customer profile, you distinguish between functional jobs (practical, physical tasks), emotional jobs (personal and emotional tasks aimed at experiencing certain emotions such as safety or relaxation) and social jobs (tasks related to expressing identity, status and enhancing personal appearance).

In the value proposition, you lay out how your brand responds to this – with products, services and benefits that fit perfectly.

Propositions where the customer profile and the value you deliver are a perfect match are the most successful. The best value propositions are created by the right combination of products or services and customer segments, creating an optimal fit and effectively solving customer problems.

This method provides a structured way to formulate sharp brand propositions, develop campaigns and drive innovation. No vague promises, but concrete brand value aligned with real customer insights.Tupped with the value of your own story, because that’s the key to truly growing your brand.

What to expect:

Workshop(s) with your team to uncover customer insights
Insightful mapping of pains, gains & jobs to be done
Customer profile describes in detail which tasks, benefits and pain points are relevant to the customer segment
Translation into concrete value elements
Review for relevance, distinctiveness and credibility, with the process helping to avoid false assumptions about customer needs
Handy summary for internal and external communication

The ultimate goal is to verify that the value proposition actually resonates with customers, by testing with customers actually whether the value is being realized.

Possible applications

Proposition work for new brands or products: The Value Proposition Canvas helps test the value proposition before launching a new service or product. It is essential to validate the value proposition of a new product by gathering customer feedback to minimize risk and increase the likelihood of success. The ultimate goal is to achieve a positive outcome for the customer, such as cost savings, ease of use or increased revenue.
Rebranding or repositioning
Campaign Development
UX and innovation projects
Internal brand anchoring

Our working method

Intake & brand exploration – We dive into your brand, mission, context and target audience.
Determine narrative structure – We choose the right narrative structure (beginning, conflict, transformation, vision).
Storyline and writing process – We write your brand story in an inspiring, strategic way.
Feedback & storytelling toolkit – We sharpen together, providing formats for application across all channels.

Why is the Value Proposition Canvas important?

Without a keen understanding of your target audience, you run the risk of developing communications, products or campaigns that don’t land. The Value Proposition Canvas forces you to put customer thinking at the center and take a critical look at your brand promise. What are we really solving? What value are we actually offering? A good value proposition creates value for a specific customer segment by addressing their needs and problems. The value proposition canvas is complete when both the value map and the customer profile are completed.

Brands that deploy the canvas make more relevant choices, communicate more clearly and convert better. It ensures alignment between strategy, creation and execution – and that’s essential in a time when brand experience makes all the difference. The value proposition canvas explained: it consists of two main parts, namely the value map and the customer profile, which together provide insight into how your brand creates value for the customer.

A well-developed Value Proposition Canvas:

Clarifies where customer and brand intersect
Strengthens positioning and proposition
Increases relevance and conversion
Creates foundation for marketing, innovation and storytelling
Makes your brand concrete, credible and customer-focused
Helps to use the Value Proposition Canvas to offer customer additional value and create value for both customer and organization

So the Value Proposition Canvas helps you offer customer additional value, get value created and thus make a difference.

Implementation: Putting the Value Proposition Canvas into practice

The Value Proposition Canvas is only truly powerful when you use it as a practical tool to realize your value proposition for a specific customer segment. Implementation begins with choosing the right customer segment to target. By focusing on a clearly defined target audience, you ensure that your proposition canvas has maximum impact and your value proposition actually matches your customer’s needs.

Start by gathering relevant customer insights, for example through interviews, data analysis or customer feedback. Use this input to carefully fill out the customer profile and value map. Work with your team to get all the customer jobs, pains and gains in focus and link them directly to the products, pain relievers and gain creators your brand offers.

You then translate the results of the canvas into concrete actions. Think about adjusting your products or services, developing new propositions or sharpening your communication. Test your value proposition in practice by presenting it to customers from the chosen segment. Collect feedback and measure whether you actually add the desired value and make a difference.

Keep using the value proposition canvas as a dynamic tool: regularly evaluate whether your proposition still matches changing customer needs and market conditions. By continuously optimizing, you increase the chances of a perfect value proposition and a profitable business model. This way you make the value proposition canvas an indispensable part of your success formula.

Customer Profile: Really understanding your customer

The customer profile is the basis of the value proposition canvas and provides a detailed description of a specific customer segment within your business model. It differentiates between the different tasks (jobs) your customer wants to perform, the good outcomes (gains) they want to achieve and the bad outcomes (pains) they want to avoid. By carefully mapping these elements, you get a deep understanding of what drives your customer, what they struggle with and what they really find important. The customer profile also shows how your products and services help customers solve problems and overcome obstacles that hinder them.

A well-developed customer profile helps you identify what your customer is seeking a solution for and what emotions, desires and frustrations are involved. Identifying undesirable outcomes, negative consequences, undesirable potential outcomes and negative emotions is essential to creating a good customer profile. In addition, distinguishing desired benefits, required gains and what the customer requires is important for developing a value proposition. Evoking desired emotions is also an important part of responding to customer needs. This allows you to develop a value proposition that actually adds value for a particular customer segment. By offering distinctive products or services that perfectly match the customer’s needs, you create a good value proposition that makes a difference in the market. The customer profile is therefore indispensable for designing a value proposition that is not only relevant, but also responds to the unique characteristics of your target group.

Value Map: making your value concrete

The value map is the second essential part of the value proposition canvas and makes your value concrete. The value map describes how the value proposition meets customer needs. In the value map you describe how your products and services meet the needs of the customer. You do this using three components: pain relievers, gain creators and products and services.

Pain relievers show how your product or service alleviates or eliminates customer pain points. Gain creators describe how your offering creates benefits and good outcomes for the customer. Finally, name the products and services themselves: what exactly do you provide, and how do they contribute to solving customer demand?

Completing a value proposition canvas well begins with sharply defining customer tasks and getting clear on what the customer wants to achieve. After all, creating is all about the right alignment between offerings and customer needs. The goal is to deliver added value. By carefully linking the value map to the customer profile, you ensure that your value proposition is not only attractive, but also actually matches the expectations and needs of your target audience. It is important to make explicit how your offering realizes benefits for the customer. This is how you turn your products and services into distinctive solutions that make a difference.

Gain Creators and Pain Relievers: Responding to wants and concerns

Within the value proposition canvas, gain creators and pain relievers are key to a value proposition that truly makes an impact. Gain creators are the benefits and good outcomes your product or service makes possible for the customer. Think time savings, convenience, status or unexpected extras that improve the customer’s life. Gain creators can also provide unexpected gains: additional benefits that the customer had not anticipated, but that further enhance the value of your offering. Pain relievers, on the other hand, address the pain points and bad outcomes that the customer experiences, such as frustration, risk or unpleasant side effects.

By properly understanding and applying these two concepts, you increase the value proposition potential of your offering. After all, a good value proposition is only created when the customer profile perfectly matches the value you deliver. It is therefore essential to thoroughly analyze the customer gains and customer pains of your target group. This way, you can not only respond to the customer’s needs with your product or service, but also remove their concerns and barriers. It is essential to align your value proposition with the wishes and needs of the customer. The result: a value proposition that is distinctive, fits perfectly and really makes a difference for your specific customer segment.

Reviews

Robin Jansen Hendriks, Local Minded

Deze creatieve professionals weten hoe het werkt! Een fijn team om mee samen te werken met echt veel online ervaring in huis.

Sonja Meijer

Echt super blij met het resultaat! Ze weten hoe het werkt en het zijn fijne mensen om mee te werken.

Eric Wiesmeier

Michael en Jasper zijn echt briljant! Mannen, dankjewel voor het hele proces van merkpositionering tot en met relaunch van onze website.

Odile Kransky-Jans

Oplossingsgericht is key bij OMA, de heren zijn zeer flexibel in het leveren van kwaliteit! Vooral sterk in video, pack-shots en Google Ads. Meerdere malen met OMA gewerkt o.a. voor Heineken.