Customers are always asking, “What’s in it for me?” This is another reason why it is important for salespeople to focus on benefits rather than features.
Sometimes salespeople are so enthusiastic about the features of their products that they forget to explain what the products will do for their customers. Customers might not care about all the wonderful features of your products, but they will care about how your products will solve their problems or make their lives easier. If we suspend disbelief for a moment, imagine that tomorrow someone invented a machine that woke you, got you out of bed, dressed, and fed you before taking you to work and doing your work for you.
If it then took you home in the evening, made you dinner and did all of this while providing sparkling conversation before tucking you into bed at night, ready to repeat the cycle the following day and kept you fit and healthy into the bargain, it would be worth investing in, without a doubt. But would you buy it if all you knew about it was from a sales pitch which described it as having a “24/7 facilitation setting” and being “usable in a range of locations”? The technical terms which are listed as specifications in the manufacturer’s literature will certainly be enough to convince people who are technically minded and have been scouring the industry magazines for a period of time looking for the right model, but for many people there is only one question: “What’s In It For Me?”
That question should be answered in a few sentences at most, setting the customer’s mind at ease and allowing them to put any follow-up questions that they may have. The likelihood is that they aren’t buying it for any of a whole list of reasons, but for one specific one. The fact that they show some basic ignorance of what else the product does means nothing in terms of their being prepared to pay the agreed price, so battering them over the head with “tech talk” is self-defeating.
