Maria Elena Cruz Lopez on the Work Behind a Winning Value Proposition

A clear value proposition makes all downstream marketing and content initiatives easier.

Maria Elena Cruz Lopez is the Director of Digital Marketing at Harvard Business School, where she helps shape the digital experience for HBS audiences—students, alumni, and the broader business community—and works with marketers across the school to sharpen how they engage and measure digital efforts. She brings over a decade of experience building and scaling data-driven digital strategies, with earlier stops at MIT, Elsevier, and in book publishing.

In this episode, Maria joins Kristen to discuss the work behind crafting a winning value proposition.

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Watch the full episode here on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.

The Big Idea: The Value Prop Is the Last and Easiest Step in a Longer a Process

Maria traces her interest in value propositions back to her early career writing three-line book descriptions for Scholastic book clubs, where she had to capture a book’s essence in language that would make kids want to read it.

Her central argument is that a strong value prop is the last and easiest step in a longer, more challenging process—not a copywriting exercise done in isolation. If the upstream work is done well (market research to identify the problem, a clear understanding of the product as the solution, and connecting the product’s benefits to that solution in language the market understands), then writing the value prop becomes mostly polishing.

"If there's enough work behind a value proposition of having a great product that aligns with the market and is solving a problem, then writing it should be the last thing you do and, in a sense, the easiest thing."

Maria Elena Cruz Lopez

Director of Digital Marketing at Harvard Business School

Key Takeaways

A successful marketing campaign depends on a strong product. Marketers must work with product and research teams to understand the problem a product solves and who it’s for so that they can communicate that value.

Teams often neglect cross-functional, resource-intensive work like foundational messaging because its value isn’t immediately visible, but successful marketing relies on building a strong foundation before launching campaigns.

A blog post, white paper, or social caption is not the place to figure out what your company believes or who it’s talking to. Clarifying the value proposition up front makes all downstream content and marketing efforts easier and more effective.

Ways to Connect with Maria

If you’d like to connect with Maria, you can do so here:

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