Sell Features, Not Benefits!??!

Scenario: You're selling a product that, while pricey, is superior to everything else that's available in your market. You've got a hot prospect who actually called you (!!!) to set up a meeting to discuss the possibility of buying. You're at the meeting, and have just greeted the prospect, who's clearly both friendly and receptive.

What's your best opening move?

• MOVE #1: Sell Benefits. You know your product will have a major positive impact on the prospect. If you point out all the benefits, you'll build the momentum that will result in a sale!
• MOVE #2: Ask Questions. You think you know why the customer called you, but you're not entirely certain. It make slow down the sales cycle a little, but it's best to be certain what the prospect wants!
• MOVE #3: Sell Features. You know that the prospect is already interested in your great product. All you need do is fill in the details, and you'll give them the information they need to decide to buy!

If you don't know what's important, spraying and praying EITHER benefits or features will only confuse the prospect and may even create objections that weren't there before.

I know whereof I speak on this one, because I recently experienced this exact scenario from other side of the selling table.

Last Saturday, my wife and I took a tour of a family health club. We had a very good idea of what we were looking for and why we might want to join. We called them up and set up an appointment to take a tour of the facility.

During our initial conversation in her office, the sales rep asked exactly two questions. "Do you live in this town?" and "Do you work for a large corporation?" Both questions were utterly irrelevant to whether or not we were going to buy.

The rep then proceeded to give us the tour, accompanied by a monologue of features and benefits. Because the tour followed a standardized path, my wife and I saw all sorts of things that didn't interest us in the least, and brushed over stuff that were in our primary area of interest.

For example, neither my wife nor I play tennis, yet we got an exhaustive tour of the tennis facilities. On the other hand, I practice martial arts. The rep mentioned a martial arts class exactly once -- in a long list of "other classes" that are given at the facility.

Meanwhile, my wife wanted to know what classes come with the membership and what classes cost extra. She tried asking five different ways... but rather than an answer got a tour of the sauna and steamroom -- and heard about all the benefits associated with them.

What's crazy about this is that we actually have a sauna/steamroom in our own house, which my WIFE NEVER USES!!!
The tour took about an hour. All the while, I'm holding my tongue, because I want to stop the rep from talking and coach her sales technique. But I promised my wife I would keep my big mouth shut, and so the droning continued. And continued. And continued.

So, finally it's done. The rep takes us back to her office and... (wait for it...) hands us some brochures full of more benefits.
Argh!!!!!

Our heads are so full of freakin' benefits that even thinking about joining seems like a lot of work and effort. My wife's comment as we left the building: "Maybe I can find out about the free programs on the website."

Consider how that situation might have gone If the sales rep had asked us some simple questions like: why we wanted to join, what kinds of activities interested us, where are we currently exercising, what kind of classes we've taken, etc.,

The sales rep could then have customized the tour to answer our questions and emphasized what was meaningful to us. And then we could have been closed.... easily. Because we walked into the building ready to buy.

But rather than buying, we walked out confused and not sure... all because we got an earful of benefits and features.

Pitching either benefit or features without knowing what's of value to the prospect is worse than useless. Sometimes it's simply flushing an easy sale right down the toilet.