How To Use Benefits For Your Marketing Success 💪🏻

​​In a crowded, BLOODY noisy marketplace, it's tempting to tout every possible feature and attribute of your offering or marketing. But customers don't buy features—they buy benefits. I know this firsthand from working with Samsung and training people all over the UK on what I’d like to HOPE is still within their training modules. Trust me it REALLY does work! They buy the positive outcomes and experiences they believe your product or service will deliver at the end of the day and is pretty simple stuff #norocketscience here 😉

So, as usual, I hear you all saying “Just bloody break it down for me Kent” 😂

So, Here’s My 3 Main Types of Benefits 💪🏻 

1 - Functional Benefits: These are the practical ways the product helps the customer, such as saving time, reducing costs, or solving specific problems to the user. Examples include a car's fuel efficiency or a software's compatibility with existing systems to better the UI - user experience.

2- Benefits: The benefits are about how the product makes the customer feel about themselves or how they believe others will perceive them, or, even how I like to think they feel about themselves using the product. Using the product might make them feel successful, sophisticated, environmentally conscious, or part of a desirable group. We all love being apart of a bandwagon to some extent, right?! Apple's sleek designs and Patagonia's commitment to sustainability provide symbolic benefits for customers per their brand requirements.

3- Experiential Benefits: These are the pleasant sensations or emotions the customer experiences while using the product, such as excitement, comfort, or even…nostalgia. Disneyland delivers powerful experiential benefits through every aspect of its theme parks. I should know, I went there and filmed a documentary with Make A Wish Foundation and it was epic! Even products as simple as cinnamon rolls can evoke positive experiential benefits.

The most effective marketing often incorporates multiple types of benefits. For example, a luxury car (everyone that knows me my dream smile machine was my MK7.5 Golf TCR) and the company might emphasise functional benefits like performance and safety, symbolic benefits like prestige and success! Even…experiential benefits like the thrill of driving and the comfort of the interior bucket seats. Car girls n guys, oh we do a love bucket seat that sucks you in around those corners!

Which Should You Prioritise 🤷🏻‍♂️

One technique to help you decide is called "laddering."

At least from what I see from our more American audience anyway…

Start by asking a customer why they like a certain feature of your product. When they answer, ask why that reason is important to them. Keep asking "why" to dig deeper until you uncover the underlying benefit they truly care about. Without annoying them of course!

For example, imagine you're marketing a graduate school program. Using this as an example as I am currently thinking about taking a teaching degree in training others…whatcha think, would I be a good teacher? 🤷🏻‍♂️

You might ask a prospective student why they're interested in earning a graduate degree. They might say they believe it will help them get a better job. Ask why getting a better job is important to them. They might explain that a better job will give them financial security. What you’re doing here is probing to understand why financial security matters to them. You might ultimately discover that what they really care about is being able to provide a stable, comfortable life for their family. That sense of providing for loved ones is the core benefit to emphasise in your marketing tactics. Get it? C’Mon I know you guys do, you’re a SMART bunch!

Market Segmentation 👥

Segmenting your market based on benefits allows you to create more relevant, targeted messaging. As a conversion-based marketeer I like to think, this is a KEY element of my success, but also, for a TON of clients, I’ve worked with over the years too. Maybe it’s me? But aren’t you just sick of those Instagram messages from people who have like 1M followers trying to sell you ‘reach’ to a ton of ROBOTS?! That isn’t segmenting, it’s the complete opposite and honestly doesn’t EVER get you results. Instead of trying to be everything to everyone, you can focus on the two or three benefits that matter most to a specific segment. Or, you’re targetting conversion metric that you want to focus on to gain you what I like to call “warm-based leads”.

For example, in the home insurance market, one segment might care most about comprehensive coverage, even if it costs more. Another segment might prioritize the lowest possible price, even if it means accepting some gaps in coverage. And, we all don’t want to focus on the bottom-of-the-barrel customers, but some do! A third segment even be might be willing to pay a little extra for the convenience and personal touch of working with a dedicated agent. YOU KNOW… that thing that is almost unheard of nowadays called ‘great passionate customer service’. Each of these segments will respond to different marketing messages.

Prioritize Marketing By Segment 🧲

Once you've identified your key market segments, it's time to choose which segment(s) to focus on and get you’re ‘lead magnet’ groove on with. Consider these factors:

Segment size and growth potential— How large is the segment, and how quickly is it growing? Larger, faster-growing segments may be more attractive. However, are they just a phase like TikTok - Y̶o̶u̶ k̶n̶o̶w̶ I̶ h̶a̶t̶e̶ T̶i̶k̶T̶o̶k̶ 😂

Competitive landscape— How many competitors are already targeting this segment? What unique benefits can you offer that competitors can't match? Or, compete with you in terms of advertising or keywords etc.

Your capabilities— Do you have the right products, services, skills, and resources to serve this segment well? If not, what investments will you need to make?

Alignment with your brand— Does serving this segment fit with your overall brand identity and values? Will it enhance or detract from your brand?

Based on this analysis above, choose one or two priority segments to focus on first. Hopefully, as ever, I HOPE this will help you become more successful in your methods! 💪🏻

Q&A

• So, are you ready to harness the power of using beneficial marketing tactics for your business?

• Do you have any pain points I can help you with smoothing out?

• What do you think you could utilise from any of the points above and how would it impact your business?

Whenever you’re ready, here’s how I can help you:

1. Book a {10 MINUTE} Business Power Call with me, to arrange working together to make your social media videos stand out online as I tweak your approach, and analyse how to improve your current video, business strategy or marketing.

2. Don’t have time to create great videos yourself? Focus on your business, whilst we focus on creating the videos that you’ve always dreamed of. Get in touch to find out more.

Until next Friday, love to you all!

My Partner Services
Sky Adsmart  | Cheekymonkey Marketing  |