Improve Your Sales And Marketing With Powerful Benefit Statements

Posted on by Jennifer Bourn | Updated:
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What is a Benefit Statement?

A benefit statement is a clear and concise statement that communicate the benefit of a product, program, or service to the reader.

I’m sure you have heard experts preach the successes that come from marketing with benefits and not features. The problem is, when you’re creating content, often the features feel like benefits because you believe wholeheartedly in what you’re selling and you believe every part of the project is important.

For prospective clients, however, they don’t care about the features until they understand the benefits.

Think about it this way:

  • Do you get excited to read the owners manual for anything you buy? Doubt it.
  • Do you always read the instructions for assemble-it-yourself toys or furniture before getting started with assembly? Rarely.

Bottom line: In the features vs. benefits marketing debate, benefits will always win because marketing with features is boring. Prospective clients instead want to know how your services will help them or how it will make their life easier.

When thinking about what a benefit statement is, keep in mind the client’s point of view: “What’s in it for me?”

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Learning how to market using benefit statements instead of feature statments aout products and services.

How to Market With Benefits

For example, when marketing with benefits, ask yourself if it will:

  • Save them money?
  • Make them more money?
  • Save them time?
  • Reduce effort?
  • Make things faster?
  • Create more opportunities?
  • Make them feel smarter?
  • Eliminate fear?
  • Position them as an expert?
  • Grow their business?
  • Be more convenient?
  • Reduce stress?
  • Increase confidence?
  • Provide more freedom?
  • Eliminate frustration or struggle?

When you market with features, you make prospects do all the work to figure out how your product or service will benefit them, and when they have to work at making a buying decision, your conversions will suffer.

Give your customers, clients, and prospects an easy, no-brainer buying process. Do all the work for them so they are completely clear about the value that you are providing to them.

Learning how to sell benefits.

3 Steps To Sell Benefits

Ultimately, you are selling the final destination the benefits allow clients to reach. You can do this in three simple steps:

  1. Know what action you want them to take: Will they experience, discover, develop, transform, overcome, achieve, create, build, or capture?
  2. Know your ideal clients’ main problems: Think like your prospects. Put yourself in their shoes, get in their minds, and get to know their problems, struggles, frustrations, and needs as if they were your own.
  3. Know what result is going to occur: Communicate exactly what results they can expect if they say yes and take action. Whenever possible, quantify the results with numbers.

The formula for powerful benefit statements:

Action + Problem/Need + Result = Benefit Statement

How to use benefit statements in client communication.

Using Benefit Statements In Client Communication

When creating benefit statements, start with listing the feature, the benefit of the feature, and the end result.

Then, turn the result into the problem and decide what the logical next step is.

Finally, write your powerful benefit statement.

Here’s an example of how a benefit statement works with a made-up business owner. Use this example benefit statement to help craft your own:

Problem: I am on information overload. I am not sure what I should be doing to market my business, if I am doing the right things, or if I could be doing it better. I feel scattered and unsure of myself, which makes it hard for me to market my business.

Feature: A crystal clear plan outlining what to do to market your business.

Benefit: You know exactly what to do, when to do it, and how to do it.

Result: No more frustration and struggling to figure out what you should be doing to market your business effectively.

Apply the benefit statement formula:

Action + Problem/Need + Results = Benefit Statement:

Sample Benefit Statement

When creating your first benefit statement, use this sample template:

Action

Create a Simple Strategic Marketing Plan.

Problem/Need

The exact information you need to take purposeful and confident action.

Results

Market your business and attract at least three new clients in the next 60 days.

Benefit Statement

Create a simple Strategic Marketing Plan with the exact information you need to take purposeful and confident action to market your business and attract at least three new clients in the next 60 days.

Get Started on Your Benefit Statement Today

Creating a benefit statement doesn’t have to be painful. In fact, using the example and sample benefit statements above, creating your first one is extremely easy. It starts with understanding your client’s problems and ends with your benefit statement communicating how your products and services create lasting results.

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About the Author

Jennifer Bourn

Jennifer Bourn is founding partner at Bourn Creative a full-service design and development company specializing in WordPress. With twenty years in the industry under her belt, she is an award-winning designer who consults on branding, website strategy, and content strategy. Jennifer speaks often, delivering workshops and keynote presentations, co-organizes the Sacramento WordPress Meetup and WordCamp Sacramento and writes regularly about freelancing, client services, blogging, marketing, websites, and branding. Learn more at the Jennifer Bourn website.

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