Multi-Sided Value Proposition Compass
Track every participant's value and anticipate what each will need next
- Difficulty
- Advanced
- Time to result
- ~ongoing to results
- Steps
- 7
- Confidence
- 96%
Shu's competition model begins by naming every participant in the marketplace rather than treating only the buyer as the customer. For Deliveroo, that includes consumers, riders, restaurants, and grocery partners. The team defines and closely measures the value proposition for each group in two directions: whether it is stronger than competing alternatives and whether it is improving on its own terms. Strategy then looks beyond today's stated requests to infer what each participant may value in the future. In food, Shu believes reliable transactions are necessary but insufficient because discovery, restaurant stories, reviews, and other emotional context shape choices. The practical discipline is to protect the functioning core while testing deeper forms of value. Competitor monitoring remains an input, but the compass is participant value rather than imitation.
Origin
Extracted from The Diary of a CEO
Core principles
- 01Competitor attention should not replace customer attention
- 02Every marketplace participant has a distinct value proposition
- 03Absolute improvement matters alongside relative position
- 04Future needs may emerge before customers can state them clearly
- 05Transactional reliability and emotional value can coexist
How to run it
- 1
Map every participant
List the groups whose continued participation is necessary for the platform to work, including workers and suppliers as well as buyers.
Pro tip Treat each group as a customer of the operating model, as Shu does with riders, restaurants, grocers, and consumers.
Watch out Optimizing one group while degrading another can weaken the whole marketplace.
- 2
Define current value
State the concrete outcome, experience, and tradeoffs the platform currently offers each participant group.
Pro tip Use participant-specific language rather than one generic platform promise.
Watch out A company slogan is not a measurable value proposition.
- 3
Measure both directions
Compare each proposition with relevant alternatives and track whether it improves on an absolute basis over time.
Pro tip Use both competitive and internal trend measures so a weak category does not set the ceiling.
Watch out Beating one competitor does not prove the participant experience is good.
- 4
Study future needs
Explore emerging behaviors and unarticulated needs that participants may value before they can request a finished feature.
Pro tip Combine field observation, reviews, behavior, and partner conversations.
Watch out An executive prediction about the future remains a hypothesis until tested.
- 5
Protect the reliable core
Preserve the dependable transaction or service that gives participants a reason to use the platform today.
Pro tip Treat reliability as the foundation on which richer experiences must sit.
Watch out Emotional or social features cannot compensate for failed fulfilment.
- 6
Test deeper value
Run bounded experiments that add discovery, context, connection, or another future benefit without compromising the core.
Pro tip For food, Shu points to restaurant stories, reviews, and content as possible inputs to a less transactional experience.
Watch out Do not present one founder's vision of future behavior as established demand.
- 7
Rebalance continuously
Review the scorecard as competition, participant expectations, and market penetration change.
Pro tip Use competitor moves as evidence to investigate, not instructions to copy.
Watch out A static value proposition will drift as every side of the marketplace evolves.
In the wild
Shu describes today's delivery apps, including Deliveroo, as largely transactional. He argues that food also carries emotional and social meaning, and suggests that restaurant stories, generated content, and the platform's reviews could help customers learn and choose, not merely place an order.
→ The idea gives Deliveroo a future product direction while Shu explicitly acknowledges that the company does not yet deliver that experience well.
Common mistakes
Serving only the buyer
A marketplace depends on workers and suppliers whose value and treatment affect the service available to consumers.
Using competitors as the whole strategy
Shu pays attention to rivals but centers the participant value proposition and its absolute improvement.
Skipping reliability for novelty
Richer emotional experiences still require the basic transaction to work dependably.
Is it for you?
Best for
It is best for marketplace leaders balancing consumers, workers, suppliers, and other partners in a competitive category.
Not ideal for
It is not ideal when the team lacks basic evidence about current users or uses imagined future needs to excuse a weak core service.
From the transcript
“it's really about what is our consumer value proposition and is it better than the competition”
“they're all customers at the end of the day that's how we think about it”
“you need that reliability but you also need that emotional connection”
From the episode
Deliveroo Founder - From £0 to £5 Billion: Will Shu