Is it time to UP your UVP? Those of us who don’t spent most of our time in the world of marketing might not recognize that UVP stands for Unique Value Proposition — in other words, what your business offers that is unique and is of value to your target customers. 

Olga Mizrahi is a “change agent” — a consultant who helps companies transform themselves to be more effective and successful. She has worked with businesses of various sizes, and writes a blog, ChunkOfChange.com that urges businesses owners to “focus in while reaching out”.  (She also has made a video on creating a UVP, in case you don’t have one.)

Sell Local, Think Global is a brand-new book by Mizrahi, published by Career Press. It includes “50 Innovative Ways to Make a Chunk of Change and Grow Your Business”.  Her goal is to provide low-cost, DIY ideas that will help small businesses move forward.

Mizrahi says, “I decided to write Sell Local, Think Global because I saw that there was a need for a business advice book that really gets to the heart of many issues important to small business owners. Entrepreneurs are busy building a business; they don’t have time to sift through mountains of data and options every time a new decision must be made. So I try to offer concrete tools and processes to simplify and streamline, taking overwhelm out of the equation and emphasizes truly easy ways to make small changes that add up big-time for business owners and executives.”

The book focuses on making use of UVP concept and translating the store’s unique message into effective use of SoLoMo (“social/local/mobile) media, website design, offline marketing and e-commerce.  Each chapter includes five tips (adding up to the promised 50), a commentary by Dr. Norah Dunbar, a case study and “Do This, Not That” advice. Dr. Dunbar is a professor of communications at the University of California – Santa Barbara.

If you don’t have time to read the book all the way through, the format makes it easy to flip through the chapters to find what you feel you need help with — for example using video effectively in your social media, or responding to positive and negative reviews.  Mizrahi says, “Each tip in Sell Local, Think Global is a small but significant tweak” — and if even one works for you, the book is a good investment of $16.

Happy Retailing,

Carol “Orange” Schroeder