Your Features Aren’t Benefiting Anyone. Or Are They?

I’m not getting paid by the word here so I will try to keep today’s post short and sweet.

We’ve all heard different people’s perceptions on features versus benefits when trying to sell a product or service but have you ever heard the quote that “someone’s perception doesn’t have to become your reality”?

What I’m saying is let your customer or prospect base, produce the reality that you will live and thrive in as a marketing and sales aficionado.

Too many times in today’s always changing society people want to give a definite answer or theory instead of actually using their “marketing” skills to produce, test, benchmark, adjust, test, benchmark. It sounds corny but it really all goes back to the second of the three M’s of marketing:

Message. Market. Method.

Understanding your audience or for the sake of this post your target MARKET is the most critical component of trying to market or sell a product or service; which leads me back to features and benefits. Picking between features and benefits actually comes down to your markets digestive system more than anything.

If your target market likes to digest their information in a form of “what’s in it for me” than the benefits option is a clear choice. However, if they believe more in an analytical digestive path where they want the most CDs or DVDs in an album without actually considering how the content benefits them than the features option is your best bet.

Again, from my experience, selling and marketing with benefits has been the most beneficial but my target market is / could be significantly different than yours or your business’.   Never completely write off an option or sales path before first testing it and tracking your results. You could be wildly surprised with the results.

Let us know of a time when you tried something new and the results blew you away!