The ideology behind why features tell, but benefits sell
Do you think there's any truth to this? Do features only tell, and benefits sell? Well, let's see why we should focus on benefits rather than features as the great marketing wizards, David Ogilvy and Steve Jobs proved to be the best examples leveraging this method.
Features vs Benefits
As you know, features describe the attributes of a product or a service. It answers the “What" - exploring the functionalities and persuading prospects about what it does. On the other hand, benefits sell the result. It explains the “Why" - focusing on the result 'that customers' yield.
When pitching a product, getting a little obsessed with the product's features, and explaining it in detail is natural. And we're not saying it's wrong to position the features that distinguish your product from your competitors. But before that, it's important to think about what end-users want. Everyone is looking for simple solutions that could solve problems, and make things better. Benefits convince the users to listen to your pitch, as it is more focused on providing them solutions to their business problems.
So, where does the feature description fit in your narrative? Once convincing your audience about the benefits, showcasing the features intrigues and engages them. Let's assume you are looking for better ways to store and automate your customer information. You find a descriptive blog suggesting efficient ways to manage your leads data. It also gives a footnote about how a CRM could solve your problem. Now that you've got the solution, you start to compare different CRM solutions and their features to see which best fits your business. It applies to your target audience as well. By first convincing your audience briefing the benefits and then leveraging the features closing a deal proves to be an agile method to win more sales.
Feature and benefits of iPod
In 2001, Apple launched its iPod, the mp3 song player that changed the way we listened to music. Steve Jobs introduced the iPod as, "1000 songs in your pocket". Had he emphasized more on the feature stating, “We are presenting iPod - the largest storage, mp3 digital media song player", it wouldn't address the "Why', and it wouldn't have caught the imagination of the consumers the way it did. The pitch rightly positioned the benefit, making the product a huge success. More than 400 million iPods sold and transformed Apple into one of the most valuable companies in the world.
How to reposition features as benefits?
So far, we understood the importance of prioritizing benefits over features. Now, we will see how to transform features into benefits.
'Talk' to your customers through your writing
“If you’re trying to persuade people to do something, or buy something, it seems to me you should use their language, the language they use every day, the language in which they think. We try to write in the vernacular” - David Ogilvy.
The father of advertising, David Ogilvy was one of the most successful advertisers during the 60s. His notions regarding marketing and advertising played an incredible role in promoting big brands, and are relevant to this date. He emphasized that understanding your customer pain points helps you to talk the way your customers talk. When you identify their problems, you can easily draft content that is more relatable to them. It addresses their needs. When you tailor your content to your customer's pain points, you wouldn't have to chase after them, they will come to you. To identify their challenges, here are some platforms you could explore:
Market survey - By surveying your target customers, you directly interact with them to find out what is lacking and how you can slide in the gap.
Review sites - Your own user community site and other relevant review sites like Yelp, Trip Advisor, and Am track customer complaints.
Social media - Social media is a powerful tool to draw public’s attention. Perform social listening to check if there are any customer complaints about your competitors.
Keeping a tab on some of the platforms mentioned above will help you to understand your customer pain points and lets you optimize the sales pitch that best resonates with them. Gathering this data is only the first step. Deep analysis into niche areas using these data points enables you to profile and pitch to your customers better.
Ask so what
To 'talk' to your customers through your writing, just ask, "So what?", a simple yet powerful question that flips your features into benefits. This strategy aids in simplifying the content and answers the purpose of the product. Let’s see some of the examples:
Mp3 song player with 5 gigabytes storage
So what?
1000 songs in your pocket
SEO page optimization
So what?
Rank first in google
Portable wireless BlueTooth speaker
So what?
Carry the speaker anywhere you go
1.5 ton, 3 Star spilt AC
So what?
Bring Antarctica to your room
Analog, water-resistant watch
So what?
Be playful without removing your watch
When your content passes the 'so-what' test, it indicates that your draft is customer-friendly and focused. Feature or benefit is not the dispute. Both should be used wisely to craft a selling content.
Access your files securely from anywhere
Centralize Knowledge. Transform Learning.
All-in-one knowledge management and training platform for your employees and customers.
New to Zoho Recruit?
Zoho Developer Community
New to Zoho LandingPage?
Zoho LandingPage Resources
New to Zoho Survey?
New to Zoho CRM Plus?
Deliver unforgettable customer experiences
New to Zoho CRM Plus?
Deliver unforgettable customer experiences
New to Zoho Marketing Plus?
Everything you need to run your marketing
New to Zoho Marketing Plus?
Everything you need to run your marketing
New to Bigin?
Topic Participants
Shaveethira G
Sticky Posts
10 simple e-commerce marketing tips to boost sales
Congratulations! You've finally set up that e-commerce store you've been thinking about for a long time. Hopefully it wasn't too difficult. Even if it was, the effort will be totally worth it when you start seeing some orders come through. Now that the store is live, let's take a look at some marketing tips you can apply for sales growth. 1. Avoid cart abandonment If you've ever shopped online, you might have added a product to the cart but then decided not to purchase it. This is known as cart abandonment.Marketing in a post COVID-19 world!
Consumers across countries are increasingly spending more time on a wide variety of digital activities, right from online grocery shopping, to video conferencing, to tele-medicine. There is a good chance that you performed one or more of the following activities during this lockdown, thanks to COVID 19: Cooked a meal Made a TikTok Video Signed up for a remote learning session Consulted a doctor online (or ordered medicines online) Shopped for groceries online A study by Hunter, a food and beverageInbound Marketing 101: The Foundational Blocks of Inbound Marketing Strategy
According to a behaviour survey, 68% of the buyers use sources such as blogs to evaluate the product even before considering it. Before buying a product, we do a lot of research to learn more about the product through communities, blogs, social media,How Zylker doubled their webinar registrations!
Webinars are good educational resources to gather qualified leads for your product. But what if your visitors are dropping off from your webinar landing page without signing up? What more could you do to convert visitors into registrants? This is theThe ideology behind why features tell, but benefits sell
Do you think there's any truth to this? Do features only tell, and benefits sell? Well, let's see why we should focus on benefits rather than features as the great marketing wizards, David Ogilvy and Steve Jobs proved to be the best examples leveraging
New to Zoho TeamInbox?
Zoho TeamInbox Resources
Zoho CRM Plus Resources
Zoho Books Resources
Zoho Subscriptions Resources
Zoho Projects Resources
Zoho Sprints Resources
Qntrl Resources
Zoho Creator Resources
Zoho CRM Resources
Design. Discuss. Deliver.
Zoho Show Resources
Get Started. Write Away!
Writer is a powerful online word processor, designed for collaborative work.
Zoho CRM コンテンツ
-
オンラインヘルプ
-
Webセミナー
-
機能活用動画
-
よくある質問
-
Ebook
-
-
Zoho Campaigns
- Zoho サービスのWebセミナー
その他のサービス コンテンツ
Nederlandse Hulpbronnen
ご検討中の方
Recent Topics
Feature Request: Improve Category Page Sorting for "Out of Stock" Products
Hi there, I'm writing to request a new feature that I believe would significantly improve the user experience in my online store. Currently, on category pages, products are sorted by popularity. However, when a popular product goes "Out of Stock," itPOSTMAN - There was an error in evaluating the Pre-request Script:Error: Cannot read properties of undefined (reading 'json')
I am beginning the journey to learn how to use the API for Zoho Sign. I am getting the following error when I try to use postman. To walk you through how I am getting this error... I wanted to start with a simple GET and expand my learning from there.How do i integrate shipstation with zoho inventory
Wanting to set up my own delivery driver in ship station so we can get real time tracking of where the package is but then i want it to automatically update zoho inventory packages/shipments how can i do thisInvalid value passed for salesorder_id
Hi, I am using sales return API, details are given below: API: https://inventory.zoho.com/api/v1/salesreturns?organization_id=700571811 Post Json Data: { "salesreturn_number": "", "date": "2020-11-12", "reason": "Testing from API", "line_items": [ { "item_id":Create Invoice and Invoice Items from Sales Order via API
Currently, when creating an Invoice associated with a Sales Order via the API, it appears that I must manually include all of the items (line_items) even though they are already part of the Sales Order. My question is this: is it possible to raise an Invoice via the API based on all of the information associated with a Sales Order--such as the items? In other words, do I always have to manually include the items (line_items) when raising an Invoice via the API when the Invoice is associated withOutlook 2013 Calendar Syncs but "Related To" Field in Zoho is blank
Outlook 2013 Calendar Syncs but Related To Field in Zoho is blank I expect the "Realted To" field to be populated with the calendar participantsExport a Course
Is it possible to export a course from Zoho Learn to a SCORM file?Add and Remove Agents from Departments and Groups in Zoho One
Hi Zoho Flow Team, We hope you're doing well. Currently, Zoho Flow provides an action to add an agent to a group in zoho one, but there is no action to remove an agent from a group or a department. Another action that we find missing is the option toConsumer Financing
Does Zoho currently have a payment gateway (such as Stripe, Square, etc) which offers financing for customers? So, let's say the estimate we give the customer is greater than what they can afford at the time, but we can sell the service now, letting themIntégration de la gestion des Passkeys dans Zoho Vault
Zoho Vault est depuis plus d’une décennie une solution fiable pour les entreprises : pour la gestion, le partage et le stockage des mots de passe. En 2018, nous avons fait un pas en avant en proposant la connexion unique (SSO). Nous sommes fiers de franchirScan & Fill with double quote key/value pairs
Hi, An old Ticket moved to a Topic/Idea: I love the idea of the new Scan & Fill as it nearly covers my previous request for a QR Scanner to read a multi-part QR Code. My QR Codes are hard-coded as below: {"key1":"value1","key2":"value2","key3":"value3"}Analytics SQL Queries should allow # as comment
# and // are very common for commenting in SQL. Not sure why analytics only allows /* and */ for commenting. Especially when # grays the line as if it's being commented out. This should be added for sure.SalesIQ Operator Activity Reports in Zoho Analytics
I'm busy building a dashboard in Zoho Analytics and I want to include SalesIQ stats in the dashboard, but I'm unable to get the statistics mentioned in the attached image. Any idea where I can get the stats for Operator Activity?No longer can indent
Hey there! Is it just me or were we used to be allowed to used tab or indent when writing. It’s not working right now, has this always been the case?Free webinar alert! Seamless Transition with Lossless Migration: Zoho One + Zoho Mail
Hello Zoho Mail Community! 🚀 Attention IT Admins and Email Administrators! Are you planning to migrate your organization's email to Zoho Mail within the Zoho One ecosystem? 📧 Join our exclusive webinar, Seamless Transition with Lossless Migration: ZohoAdd Resource to Export
The Export Data feature does not include a column for the Resource field. Without this column, Zoho Bookings cannot be used by any business for resource-based services or event types e.g. room bookings, equipment bookings. It seems to be an oversight,Mandatory field via deluge code
I would like to ask you if it is possible to make a field mandatory via deluge script. For example, if I have a decision box and I click on it then I want a single line field to be mandatory. If uncheck the decision box then to do the single line as optional. I think it is not possible to do that and I have to do it via validation in 'on validate' field.Revenue Management: #1 What does it mean to "recognize" revenue?
Earning revenue isn't just about collecting cash from your customers. It's about recording the income correctly and consistently. Revenue recognition is the process of deciding when and how to record revenue in financial statements so that they reflectPower of Automation :: Auto-Populate Integration Field in Projects with CRM Account Data
Hello Everyone, A custom function is a software code that can be used to automate a process and this allows you to automate a notification, call a webhook, or perform logic immediately after a workflow rule is triggered. This feature helps to automateZoho Forms and ChatGPT - populating a field using AI.
I have a form where I would like the user to enter a response or query, and have another field populated using AI. For example, user enters Field 1, AI populates Field 2 in response. I want to be able to wrap some additional instruction text around thecampo tag para api
debo conectarme a una api de zoho inventory y ocupo tomar el campo tag para poder asi jalar el articulo que cuente con el campo correcto en tag ejemplo que tag existen carro y avion que cuando busque los articulo con tag carro arroje solo estos por masUploading file as attachment to Zoho CRM
Hi, I am trying to attach a file to a Zoho CRM contact using Zoho Flow. Right now, I try to do it through the “Upload File” field in Zoho CRM (In my screenshots, it’s called Téléchargement du fichier 1). Here is what I tried: Case 1: Webmerge document The Flow is called “Custom Function” (see screenshot 101). Step 1: Creating a Webmerge document (screenshot 99) Step 2: I use “Update module entry” to upload the created file. I upload Webmerge’s “Document” in my “Téléchargemet duZia Answer Bot - Create Ticket
Surprisingly, the current iteration of Zia will try to answer a question and unless you have "transfer to SalesIQ chat" enabled, it won't create a ticket for the user or offer them a method to create a ticket. We don't want it to create chats for us,meassure leads phases
Hi, I need to create a table to meassure the time that a lead stay in blueprint phases. the phases are first contact, second contact, lead spam, contacted, appointment. any idea? I have attached an exampleIn the Custom Module I have 500 Records , this 500 record only want to view to the specific user only example user A ,
In the Custom Module, I have 500 Old records that should only be visible to a specific user, for example, User A. Any new records created from today onwards should be visible to Record owner in the Custom Module. Pls help how i achive this .How to reply to thread via API
We have built a webapp for our customers that uses the Zoho Desk API to enable each customer to view their full list of tickets, view individual tickets and raise new tickets. The Zoho Desk API doesn't have the ability to reply to a ticket/thread. RepliesSending merged mail templates for signatures fail since today
We have ZOHO one, we use merge templates in CRM to edit in ZOHO Writer, and from there send it for signature through zoho sign. This all worked up until today, suddenly we read in the log that the merge is succesfull but the sending for signature failed.Feature Request - Make Lead List Larger and Adjustable
Hi LandingPage team, I recently started using LandingPage and I am happy to share my feedback to help improve the app. I've noticed on the Leads page, there is no option to make the columns wider. It would be great if the comlumns expanded to fit theZoho Projects - Pin Recent Projects
Hi Projects Team, It would be great if I could "pin" projects on the Recent Projects list in Zoho Projects. We have some internal projects which we regularly have to add time and some regular client projects. It would be great if I could pin those projectsZDK Error
I get this error when trying to trigger a CRM Function from Client Script: Uncaught (in promise) ZDKError: {"code":"NOT_ACTIVE","details":{"api_name":"activate_client_from_prospect"},"message":"api is inactive for the given custom function","status":"error"}"Disbursing product components in phases, monitoring them, and displaying only the final product."
i have a product composed of multiple components, and these components will be delivered to the customer in batches. However, the final invoice should only show the finished product. How can I issue (or release) the components and track their deliveFollowed Subtasks doesn't show up in the Subtasks Section
I have a task assigned to me now in the same task, there's a subtask and I am added as the follower on that task Even though I am a follower I still don't see that in the subtasks section The view permission for the profile is Related It's supposed toTip #39- Strengthen account security with Multi-factor Authentication (MFA) – ‘Insider Insights’
Securing your organization's data begins with verifying that only the correct individuals have access to it. One of the simplest yet most effective ways to accomplish this is to enable Multi-factor Authentication (MFA) within Zoho Assist. MFA introducesAutomate timeout chat tracking with Workflows in SalesIQ
With our feature-packed Nova release, Workflows has become one of the most powerful tools in Zoho SalesIQ. They let you automate follow-up actions when key events occur, such as when a chat ends, a visitor leaves a bad/good rating, or a lead is updated.Mass edit / Mass update products
Hi, Is there any way to mass update or bulk edit product fields in Zoho Inventory?Automatic Verification of IMAP Integration Status
Our sales staff have their O365 email integrated with CRM, over time this integration requires re-authentication via the UI. I can manually check the integration status by accessing Settings -> Channels -> Email -> Email Sharing -> "Configuration Type"Tip of the Week #68– Share and access files faster with Zoho WorkDrive extension.
Have you ever wasted time searching for the right file to attach to your emails—or worried whether the right people could access it? Without proper sharing settings, files might end up inaccessible to teammates or, worse, visible to people who shouldn’tCV-Library: The Newest Source Booster in Zoho Recruit!
We’ve expanded your sourcing toolkit — CV-Library, one of the UK’s largest and most trusted online job boards, is now available as a Source Booster in Zoho Recruit. This gives recruiters instant access to millions of UK-based candidate profiles, all withoutIs there the possibility to book less than 250 customer portal users?
If you use the Creator, which is included in Zoho ONe, you can create a customer portal and give access to a maximum of 3 external people / customers, right? On the Creator website I saw that you can add 250 users for 100€/month. However, we don't needDisplay Parts custom fields in the Work Order
Hello, I see that is it possible to add custom fields in the Parts module. Would it be possible to also add those custom fields in the Work Order Module under Parts? This would be very useful for customer who want to showcase more information about parts.Next Page