SPIN Selling 101 Features vs Benefits: How To Identify Them And Write A Simple Compelling Sales Copy

During this week's meeting with a friend and colleague, we discussed his new sales campaign and difficulties he faced. In the process of breaking down his sales technique and script, we went back into the basics of features vs benefits and noticed the pitch was misidentified, therefore not receiving the impact it should have been. 

So in today’s blog, I would like to give our readers a quick SPIN selling 101 lesson on “Features vs Benefits” and how to sell by correctly identifying what are the benefits and features of your service/product. This technique will not only be effective for live sales, but also translate to online sales copy advertising and marketing.

The bold description of each word are as such:

Feature is simply a part of the service or product, usually with a positive affect/intention. 

Benefit is what actual positive impact the product or service will provide to the customer.

Now oftentimes, sales preach the phrase “sell benefits, not features” but that’s not entirely true, since features are ultimately what would provide the benefit. The way I personally think of the two, Benefit gives the reason why while Feature is the how. When used together, the combination creates a compelling sell that is hard to refuse. 

Let’s use decaf coffee for example, the features could be: 

-Crowd tested to have indistinguishable taste from fully caffeinated coffee amongst popular brands

-98% less caffeine by volume

-Authentic coffee

But when consumers are asked why they like decaf, their answers are more likely to be:

-Satisfies the coffee craving 

-Can enjoy the taste of coffee again without heartburn

-A trusted alternative with same ingredients

In this case, you can see that the features are the factual descriptions while the benefits are a more organic response to how a problem may be solved. 

So next time when you are selling a product or service, look for a conversation and tackle the benefits before presenting the features. Such as, “Would you like to enjoy coffee once again without bearing the pain of heartburn? Our crowd tested 98% decaf…”. Using this classic technique of utilizing “why”  and “how”, you are able to create a strong sell when used correctly and major benefits are identified. 

Try this exercise on your product or services! 

First identify what is the basic need that the product or service needs to provide, then identify what are its features. Lastly, identify what are the potential benefits. 

Happy marketing and contact us if you want to learn more!