The Difference Between Features or Benefits – And Why You Care

Do You Know The Secret To Get Other People To Do What You Want?

It doesn’t matter whether you are trying to accomplish something at work, get your kids to do something at home, or sell something online, you need to start by considering why they would want to do what you want.

This is not magic, and it’s not sneaky or manipulative. It is simply tapping a key component of human behavior that inspires other people to WANT to do what you want.

It is simply a matter of thinking a bit from the other guy’s perspective and then showing them how they will benefit by helping you. Imagine you were in their situation, position, or predicament, and think “What would I care about?”

The answers to that question are “benefits”.

If you can then present your proposal, recommendation, offer, or request in terms of benefits your audience cares about, they will be much more likely to buy into your suggestion.

Let’s take a simple example. If I ask you to buy the book, “Think & Grow Rich”, you might be uninspired. But if I explained how an exercise in this powerful little book gave me an idea I turned into a monthly $10K income and now I can retire from my job, you might be more interested in reading it.

So How Do You Identify The Benefits of Something You Want To Sell?

Well, you can brainstorm ideas, you can ask yourself “why would I buy this?”, and you can imagine you are your target customer and ask yourself “why would I buy this?” And all of these would be good things to do.

But there is another great way to determine the benefits of a product or service by starting with listing the features, and I have a free online tool that will help you with this method.

Before I explain how to use this technique, let me quickly define features versus benefits.

Features are what the product is, what it does, and what it has. For example, a few features of a pencil might include the following: it is yellow, it has 6 sides, it writes, and it has an eraser.

Benefits are what the features do for the customer or user. For example, the yellow color makes it easier to find. The 6 sides help keep it from rolling off the table. The fact that it writes lets you jot down what you want at the store so you don’t forget, write stories to entertain others and strike out something you don’t want someone else to see. And the fact it has an eraser means you can correct errors, remove marks you don’t want others to see, and change your mind about what you wrote.

Stated another way … Features are the “What” and Benefits are the “So What”.

Okay, so a pencil is yellow … So what? … Well, it makes it easier to find.

The pencil is a #2 pencil … So what? … It is the right darkness for forms a computer can read. It is soft enough to make your writing dark enough to easily read and yet it is firm enough you can write a lot before having to sharpen the pencil.

You can use this kind of analysis on just about anything you want to sell.

Let’s take just a few more interesting examples…

What might be a benefit of a boat that has two 250 horsepower engines?

The feature is “two 250 hp engines”. A benefit might be “you can pull 6 skiers at a time” or “you get across the lake to where the fish are … before the fish get there!”

What might be a benefit of a bubble gum pink Ford Mustang?

The feature is “bubble gum pink”, and a benefit might be “it is really easy to find your car in the parking lot”. Another benefit might be “when people see you coming, they KNOW it’s you.”

The Feature/Benefit Technique

When you want to identify the benefits of a product or service, first make a list of all the features you can identify. Then write down at least one benefit for each feature. And remember, each feature might offer more than one benefit. For example, the fact that a pencil can be sharpened (feature) means you can write in crisp fine lines, draw pictures with intricate fine-line detail, and make the pencil stick in soft drop-ceiling tiles.

Once you make your list of features, simply ask yourself “So what?” for each feature. Once you finish the list, you will undoubtedly have lots of good benefits in your list. Now, you can analyze the benefits from the perspective of your target audience and determine which benefit(s) are most important.

Want to test your new skills?

Here is a list of features of a simple pencil. Feel free to add more features if you wish, and then think of at least one benefit for each feature:

-It is yellow
-It has 6 sides
-It is a quarter-inch thick
-It has a graphite core
-It is rated as #2
-It has a blue imprinted label
-It has an eraser
-The eraser is attached by a metal band
-The pencil writes
-You can make marks with the side of the graphite core
-It can be sharpened
-It is made of wood
-It gets shorter when sharpened
-It weighs about 1 ounce
-The eraser is pink
-The metal band is gold-colored
-You can buy them in packs of 1, 3, 6, or 12

Now, what if the pencil were round instead of six-sided?
What if the pencil was a third-inch thick instead of a quarter inch?
What if it was plastic with 10 refillable graphite capsules inside?

Here’s Another Example:

Let’s say I wanted to tell you about an awesome webinar by John Thornhill that shows you how to create an online sales machine using John’s top 5 ways to get free traffic (visitors to your sales machine). Well, those are all features . . . free, webinar, reveals how to create an online income, and proven free traffic techniques . . .

What might the benefits be?

How about these benefits… You will see exactly what to do to set up your stream of income, and once you set it up, you can let it run completely by itself while you use the extra income to cover bills, pay off your mortgage, send your kids (or yourself) to college, have more time with your family, take exotic vacations, retire early or quit your job, get the feeling of independence and achievement, and eliminate the worry about the economy, running out of money during retirement, or obtain complete peace of mind.

Once you figure out these benefits, you can pick the best ones for your audience and promote those benefits.

By the way, John really does have this seminar available. If you would like to see it, click here and I’ll include 2 additional free mini-courses on how to apply John’s concept to high-commission, high-ticket products (ranging from $997 to $20,000) and how to get buyer traffic for a penny (or less) per visitor!

In other words, with these two free mini-courses, you can use John’s concepts to sell for big money instead of low-price affiliate products. And the penny-per-click traffic means you can get big sales fast! All you have to do is stop by https://theinternetmarketingsource.com/partner

Want To Try Some Examples On Your Own?

You can pick something and write down all the features yourself and then write the benefits. Or you can visit this page for a cool little video about features versus benefits, a few suggested practice examples, and a free online tool that will help you identify features and benefits.

This is a guest post from 
Bryan Stoker, if you would like to be considered for a guest post please contact me.