As most business owners have found out along the way, having a top notch product or service is not enough to be successful. Among the many factors needed for success, being able to communicate your business to your target market is vital.
How can you communicate in a way that brings results? By using benefit language that describes the results they will get if they hire you.
The mistake most businesses make is to talk too much about the features of their product or service, and not nearly enough about the benefits to the client. If a prospect takes the time to read your brochure or look at your advertising, what he wants to know is “what’s in it for me?”
Features describe how your product works, or what you do. Benefits describe the result the customer will receive from using your product or service. For example, in-home consultation may be a feature of a carpeting retailer, which means you get the result of making selections from the comfort of your home without have to drive anywhere.
If you’re having difficulties describing your business’ benefits try this: Take a major feature of your product and describe what will be the customer experience as a result of that feature. Sum up that experience in a concise sentence or two, and you’ve just written your first benefit statement.
Take a look at your marketing materials. They should be loaded with benefit statements. When your prospects are able to clearly conceive the benefits they’ll get from buying your product or service, they’ll line up quickly to become customers