What are you selling?

More often than not, when asked what you sell, do you talk about the product or the benefit?

It’s a fairly obvious route to go down when discussing sales, but common sense is not that common so I’m going to go through it anyway.

People don’t buy products – they buy benefits. In the words of Dale Carnegie – “imagine everyone you meet has a sign across their forehead saying What’s In It For Me?”

People buy for one of 5 primary motivating factors:

• TIME (Save or get back)
• MONEY (Save or Make)
• HEALTH (Improve)
• SECURITY (Make them feel safe)
• STATUS (Look better than the neighbours!)

When you look to pitch your offer, think in terms of what they need – not what you need. If you give them what they want, you’ll get what you want. If your customer buys to save time, talk to them in terms of how they’ll save time and maybe, what they’ll be able to do in that time.
People don’t buy washing powder because it cleans at 30 degrees. They want a better life and that’s what they buy – it occurs at less than 30 degrees and that’s the factual stuff – always talk about benefits and back them up with facts.