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Firstly, apologies if you're a vegetarian.  This is NOT meant to offend, but to make you think.

 

If you had to sell bacon - would you (a) tell people where it came from (ie a pig), how it went through the processing plant and packaging plant, what kind of lorries it got transported on, and the style of the nice white shelf with the plastic grass that it sits on in the supermarket?

 

OR

 

Would you (b) paint them a picture of scrummy, juicy bacon sizzling in frying pan (can't you just smell it?), thick white, buttered bread at the ready to satisfy their hunger (even if it does nothing for their cholesterol levels!).

 

Hopefully you answered (b).

 

In fact, this a real life example from the marketing world (from a few years back admittedly) and you will probably have seen the resulting ads for a well known brand of bacon.  "Sell the sizzle, not the bacon" is now a well known marketing phrase, to remind marketers to sell the benefits of a product, not the features.

 

Talking about the features is a mistake many people fall in to.  You can get head and shoulders above your competitors if you understand the difference between features and benefits, and only tell your customers or prospects about the benefits.  (HOT TIP: only tell them the benefits in relation to their particular circumstances or problem).

 

What's the difference?

 

A FEATURE is something factual, and normally, fairly un-emotional.

 

For example:

• You print all your business cards on 400gsm stock

• You can hold coaching appointments over the phone

• You photograph weddings

• Deliveries are made via courier

• The ingredients in your home made skin creams were picked by resident garden gnomes in the light of a full moon

 

 

A BENEFIT is something that relates to your product or service, but that directly benefits your customer and, most probably, impacts them emotionally.

 

For example:

• Your business cards will show the quality of your brand and service

• Your coaching appointments can be easily fit in around your other commitments

• Your special day will be captured forever by our experienced team and recorded for posterity in our beautiful, hand made leather albums

• You’re guaranteed to get your order the next day, whatever the weather

• Your skin will look and feel 20 years younger

 

People buy benefits, and in particular the benefits that affect them personally and on an emotional level.

 

They might be quite interested in the features AFTER they have purchased your product or service, but up until that point you should only ever be talking to them about the benefits of your products or service.

 

Have a look around you at all the advertising that goes on in magazines, newspapers, on TV, on billboards, at bus stops - and you will see two types of advertising.  You'll see the type that is designed to build their brand (not a subject to expand on in this article)...a good example are the well known brands that flash in large neon displays above such places as Piccadilly Circus in London and Times Square in New York.  The second type is the type of advertising that is designed to SELL.  Look at these. They will be everywhere.  But look at the messages in the ads.  They will all focus on the benefits of the product to its target market.

 

If you've worked out who your target market is, and you work out what the benefits are that you're offering, all this "marketing stuff" will start to make some sense to you!

 

"In the factory we make cosmetics; in the drugstore we sell hope."

Charles Revson