Increase Your Sales in 5 Minutes

By Al Hanzal
Posted Saturday, January 29, 2005

Increase your sales—in five minutes. This article is the third in a series of five articles probing the five critical points influencing how you find a steady stream of customer for your business.

Customers Buy Benefits

You want more sales? Customers buy for one reason. They buy because your product or service has a benefit they want. Telling your customer your product has a 10 year warranty is a product feature. Telling them that in over 400 roofing jobs last year, there were no leaks, no call backs and no broken tile is selling the benefits your customer wants. Sell customer benefits and you will increase your sales.

Why You Sell Features

Bottom line, selling features is easier. Features are the visible things you see about products and services. Features are the things you see, touch, feel and smell.

Selling features is your self-interest. The products and services are your life-blood. You live with them every day. You know them inside and out. You love talking about them!

Identifying the benefits each customer wants it tough work. Customers are unique. Each buys for his or her own reason. It is easier to talk about common product features rather than uncover unique customer benefits.

Your Five Minute Exercise to More Sales!

The five minute exercise is called “SO WHAT.” When you complete this exercise, you will change your from selling product features to selling customer benefits. Remember, customer benefits are what sell! Here is how it works.

You create a five minute dialogue between a pretend customer and yourself. It’s important to speak this conversation out loud. Start with one of your most popular business features. Explain the feature to your pretend customer. Then listen as the customer says, “so what?” Now answer the customer’s so what question. Then listen as the customer says, “so what?” to your response. Again answer the customer’s so what question. The customer again responds with a “so what” question. Keep doing this dialogue until the customer no longer asks you a “so what?” question.

Now, you have identified a customer benefit!

Check Out This Example

This is how an insurance agent used the exercise. I asked him, “What distinguishes you from other agents?” He told me, “I find the cheapest and best policy for my customers.” I responded, “So what?”

He said, “Well, unlike other agents, I customize each policy for my customer.” I said, “So what”.

He answered, “As part of my program, I promise to keep my customer informed about any policies changes that may benefit them in the future. “ I asked “So what”.

He responded, “The customer has the security of knowing that they have the best program and best costs for their insurance.” I said, “So you are guaranteeing me that I can go to bed at night and not worry that I am paying too much for my insurance?”

“Exactly,” he exclaimed, “That is the security I provide each customer with my insurance program!”

By using the SO WHAT exercise, the agent moved from selling the “cheapest rates” (business feature) to providing the customer the security of knowing he will always have the best rates (customer benefit).

Which agent would you buy from; the one with the cheapest rate or the one that provided you with security about your rate and policy?

Conclusion

Now, you have a simple way to make more money by improving your sales at no additional costs! Use the SO WHAT dialogue with each of your business features and start selling customer benefits. For a special report that shows how the five critical pieces work together in getting more customers for your business, Send an email to al@hanzal.com with subject line, “Special Report.”

About the Author
Customers have been using Al Hanzal's materials to improve their sales and marketing skills. al@hanzal.com