Why your Benefits need to Scream out

Last issue ,we discussed why it is important to market the benefits of your products or service versus the features. If you haven’t read that article, I recommend you pop over and read it now.

This week, we’ll explore what you need to DO in order for your benefits get noticed.

We are barraged with marketing messages every day. The most reliable statistics put it at 500-1000 messages a day (the common statistic thrown around places them at over 3000, but it cannot be validated and I don’t like repeating stuff just because someone else said it).

That is a lot of messages.  I find the number both realistic and believable. We skim through newspapers, search with Google, surf myriad content sites, leaf through magazines, speed by billboards, walk past storefronts, glance at flyers, and vegetate in front of TV commercials.

We, the Consumers, are saturated with marketing messages

Interestingly, some of these “impressions” are mostly unconscious, we receive them without thinking about them. And there is a good case to be made that the less consciously we receive the marketing messages, the more we will be affected.

I am not going to argue in this article whether this is true or not. What I DO want to tell you, the small business owner, is that you do not have the time or the money to run campaigns intentionally “under the radar”, in this fashion. The typical business owner has too much of a need for *real* return on marketing investment to experiment this way. Personally,  I’d have to see or experience some strong, long-term metrics to change my mind about this.

So, given that we are barraged with marketing messages and we have an immediate need for a return on our marketing investment, what does that mean for your humble benefit-driven marketing?

It means you have to be a heck of a lot more direct, blunt and brash than you probably already are. Doug Hall, author and business growth expert calls it “being overt with your benefit”.

To stop people dead in their tracks, your message has to go on steroids.

Don’t confuse this with being over-the-top, bombastic or “used-car-salesman” loud. Not at all.

To create an overt benefit, simply take the generic promise of the benefit and add directness, bluntness and specifics to it. Here is a great example:

Last week, I spoke at the Community Business Network in Hudson. Among the lovely folks there, was a real estate agent. Her differentiation is that she has a background in design and therefore helps you stage your home as a value-added service. This is more or less how she introduced herself.

Now if you read the previous Get Real Results! e-zine, you know that “helping you stage your home” is a feature. We need to create a benefit-oriented statement from
this and and then we need to amplify it to make an impact. I asked her “what does that mean, exactly?”. She answered, “you can get more money when you sell your home”.

Wonderful — this is the benefit. Now, let’s make it “overt”.

“Could you find third-party statistics that show that a staged home
sells for, on average $10,0000 more, or higher?”, I asked.

“Sure”, she responded.

“Then from now on”, I said, “you tell your prospects that because of  your set of skills, your clients walk away with $10,000 more on average in their pockets”.

Blunt. Specific. Overt.

Assignment:

Your turn. Pull out a piece of marketing material and look at your benefit messages. Are they direct, blunt, specific?
What can you change to make them this way? If you were to examine the benefit you offer, what does it mean to your client tangibly and specifically? A “fast oil change” should be “under 30 minutes”. “Less fat” should be “30% less fat than other brands”. See how it works?

Can you go overboard with the bluntness? Yes. In our next issue, I’ll discuss what your marketing MUST include to avoid this.