Phillips prides itself on its energy efficient lighting solutions, but ensuring that its value statements effectively highlight ‘sustainability’ as part of its brand promise is a challenge. As an expert in creating effective claims and communication, SKIM filtered numerous potential claims and developed a robust research approach to enable Phillips to test and build its communications with input from its customers. Robin de Rooij, Senior Research Manager from SKIM, and Harro Koot, Global Market Intelligence Manager from Philips Lighting, shared this highly interactive session where attendees learned how to develop winning claims.

1. Creating Winning
Value Statements
Presenters:
Harro Koot, Philips
Robin de Rooij, SKIM

2. Philips Lighting’s performance in terms of sustainability is very good, driven by constant innovations to create
cleaner, more energy efficient lighting solutions.
However, Philips is not getting the recognition for the efforts it puts in, as perception of sustainability is relatively
low, putting it in the ‘silent hero’ segment of the market.

3. Philips would like to increase this perception by communicating on sustainability in a way that appeals to its
customers and provide guidance in innovations in those areas that are perceived to be sustainable.

4. In an internal creative workshop, Philips employees from many different backgrounds got together to write
potential value statements to articulate efforts in sustainability to its customers.

5. The output was a huge set of statements covering a range of benefits. However, the team had limited knowledge
of what makes a successful value statement and did not know how to cut back statements to get to the best one(s)

6. Philips wanted to perform a quantitative study with SKIM to test among its (potential) customers which statements
would work best, but testing all the materials was impossible.
The challenge was therefore to use a structured approach to get to the best shortlist of statements to test!

7. Category D Category E Category F
Category G Category H Category I
Category A Category B Category C
At SKIM, we firstly clustered different claims together, grouping recurring topics in the long list, such as ‘energy
saving’ and ‘reduction of harmful materials’. Bringing some order to the chaos.
Next, we identified the most relevant articulations in these area’s together with Philips: 1) Endorsement, 2) Benefit
/ Performance 3) Heritage. With heritage being particularly close to the heart of many Philips employees.

8. Category D Category E Category F
Category G Category H Category I
Category A Category B Category C
This way we knew we could cover all the important (benefit) areas that Philips wanted to know about and provide
structure in the results of the quantitative test that would follow later, for a better understanding of what works.
Within each subset of statements, however, we needed to cut out a lot of statements and make sure we only
tested the very best, without risking removing statements that may have a lot of potential.

9. Category D Category E Category F
Category G Category H Category I
Category A Category B Category C
To help us distinguish the good from the bad, we use the guidelines to good value statements we’ve determined
through a meta-analysis across many studies we’ve performed on value statements across categories.
By checking whether claims met all the requirements for good value statements as defined in our guidelines, and
adjusting value statements where needed, we ensure we ended up with a very strong shortlist.

10. Rather than give these guidelines away, we would like to ask you to put yourself in our shoes and pretend you’re
the consultant. Which value statements would you say have the most potential for Philips in the market?

11. Value
statement 1
Value
statement 1
We will show you 2 different value statements at a time and ask you which one you think is best, then we will
reveal which one would perform best based on our guidelines and explain in more detail why.

12. High quality light,
low energy use
Designed
for quality,
sustainable
lighting
Which of the following statements do you think is best? Why would you expect this statement to perform better?

13. High quality light,
low energy use
Designed
for quality,
sustainable
lighting
Based on our experience, we would say the value statement on the left would probably perform best.

14. Promise Value
Why? This statement performs best because of the clear promise of value to the customer. “Designed for Quality”
does not directly imply that the product is of high quality, while low energy use is far more clear in the value it
promises than “Sustainable lighting”. The best value statements are able to deliver value in multiple areas that are
seemingly contradictory, offering a solution to a dilemma.

15. Reduce your
lighting costs by
up to 80%
Reduces your
lighting costs
responsibly
Which of the following statements do you think is best? Why would you expect this statement to perform better?

16. Reduce your
lighting costs by
up to 80%
Reduces your
lighting costs
responsibly
Based on our experience, we would say the value statement on the left would probably perform best.

17. Be specific
Why? This statement performs best because it is more specific in the value that it delivers. A great way to be
specific is by putting a number to it, although you should be careful to keep it credible. However, alternative ways
to make the value more specific – for instance by painting a very clear picture of the desired situation and making
it come to life for the customer – can be just as effective.

18. The leader in
energy saving
lamps
Saves more
energy than any
other lamp
Which of the following statements do you think is best? Why would you expect this statement to perform better?

19. The leader in
energy saving
lamps
Saves more
energy than any
other lamp
Based on our experience, we would say the value statement on the right would probably perform best.

20. Set yourself apart
Why? This statement performs best because of the way it sets itself apart. The best way to do so is not by just
saying you are the best, but by articulating the value that you can deliver that another can’t. Stating superiority
over other brands may be considered bashing, while comparing to your own products can be seen as weakness.
The most effective way of really stating superiority outright, is by comparing to the category as a whole.

21. Avoid pitfalls
Be positive
Avoid Humor Be Respectful
Avoid Jargon
Finally, there are a number of pitfalls to avoid when writing value statements. A negative connotation, difficult
language and a condescending tone can completely drown out all the value you might be able to offer. And
although there is a place and time for humor, value statements are not this place, as they need to clearly
communicate the value of your product or brand to drive choice.

22. Set yourself
apart
Be specific Avoid pitfalls
Promise
value
We were able to use these four major drivers of successful value statements as a guideline and a structure to
determine which statements on Philips sustainability to test with (potential) customers, and which ones were
unlikely to succeed anyway.

23. This framework allowed us to be confident in getting from our long list of statements to a short list that covered all
of the most important areas for Philips, while adhering to the needs of good value statements.
This in turn ensured that Philips was confident with the list of value statements and the fact that we were able to
determine what would be the “best of the best” in our follow-up quantitative study.

24. High quality light, low energy use
Saves more energy than any other lamp
90% of consumers prefer energy saving lamps
from this brand
Reduce your lighting costs
by up to 80%
The quantitative study we performed allowed Philips to set up best practices when communicating about lighting
sustainability for all their country teams, to ensure communication on the most relevant aspects of sustainability.

25. For Philips, a traditionally inside-out company, heavily innovation and R&D driven, this has been a small step on its
journey towards becoming more customer focused

26. By listening to the aspects and innovations in sustainability that truly matter to the customer, Philips is becoming
more of an outside-in company that can then communicate and continue its developments in areas that are most
relevant to its customers.

27. Drop by at our booth E261
to find out how to optimise
your communication
Presenters:
Harro Koot, Philips
Robin de Rooij, SKIM