1. Linking Features to Benefits - Fact Based Selling Technique

2. Intro
Key steps to the Sales Proposal that will benefit you in fact based selling include:
Probing to Understand Needs: asking the right questions to understand the true need of the customer.
Matching Solutions: linking the feature (the tools and ideas you have) to the benefit for the customer.
Negotiating to secure results: achieving your objective while delivering value to the customer.
Today, we will review the key step of matching “Features to Benefits!”

3. Learning Objective At the end of this training, you will be able to:
Isolate key features that can be translated into selling opportunities.
Identify key benefits that will meet your customers’ needs.
Link features to benefits to build a strong fact based proposal to meet your objectives.

4. Features & Benefits
Features to Benefits is an important skill in fact based selling. This is the opportunity for you to match your brand and custom solutions to meet the customers’ needs.
It is important to translate features of Labatt brands, ideas and plans into benefits from your customer’s point of view. There should be a clear link between the benefits of your proposal and your customer’s needs.
The benefits of your proposal (features) should be factual, satisfying the customer’s needs while assisting you in achieving your SMASH objective.

5. Features
Features are characteristics of our brands, ideas, and plans that will eventually produce a benefit for a customer.
Tell the customer about the product, service, or promotion.
Cause future favourable results; they are not the results themselves.
We describe features so customers understand how the benefits are produced. You should only communicate the features that support the benefits related to the customer’s priority needs.

6. Examples of Features
Review the following statements that emphasis features:
Labatt supports its brand through media advertising.
Budweiser will come in a special 18 pack for the summer.
This “Bud ‘n’ Burger” promotion recommends using P.O.S. material on each table to promote the special.
Product-related features
packaging
ingredients
easy to open pack
great new taste
Application-related features
easy to dispense
space efficient
Market-related features
market leader
fast market growth

7. Features Summary
Buyers do not buy features, they buy what those features do for them in terms of benefits.
What are some recent features that we can use in market?
You can change a feature into a benefit by asking ‘so what?’ or ‘what can it do for me?’ What are the benefits of the above features?
Budweiser Red Lights
Hop Series
Customized POS
Bud Light Lime-a-Rita
Aluminum Bottles
Answers to benefits from above features:
Budweiser Red Lights benefit: create exciting promo to elevate game time at your bar (feature), bringing in more customers and increasing sales during the game (beneifit).
Customized POS benefit: communicate custom specials (feature) that increase rate of sale resulting in more profit (benefit).
Hop Series Benefit: gain interest from the experimenter (feature) resulting in new consumers in bar or impulse/trial purchase at retail.
Aluminum bottles benefit:

8. Benefits
Benefits are future favourable results a customer gains from the features or characteristics of your brands, plans, and concepts.
Benefits will:
Sell the product by showing the customer how the feature will work for the individual customer.
Answer the customer’s question, So what?
Relate directly to the priority needs stated and agreed to in your summary of the customer’s scenario.
Examples of benefits that can be used in your presentation include:
Increased sales
Extends customer offering
Saves time
Saves waste
Yields more profit
Reduces costs

9. Example of Benefits For example:
Labatt’s media advertising sells product through your store for you.
Easy-cut case displays reduce labour costs by reducing setup time.
Promoting Budweiser with a dinner special increases impulse sales and means more total profit.
When stating features and benefits in your presentation, consider the following link phrases to connect features to benefits:
‘….so you get ’
‘…leading to ’
‘…which will give you.....’
‘…resulting in......’
‘…enabling you to....’
Guidelines
Check
Convert product/solution features into customer benefits
Features link to benefits that match the customer’s needs

10. Recent Features to Benefits
Linking benefits to features on slide 7:
Budweiser Red Lights: create exciting promo to elevate game time at your bar (feature), bringing in more customers and increasing sales during the game (benefit).
Customized POS: communicate custom specials (feature) that increase rate of sale resulting in more profit (benefit).
Hop Series: YOUR TURN: Link the feature to the customer benefit
On Premise
Retail
Aluminum Bottles: YOUR TURN: Link the feature to the customer benefit
Lime-a-Rita: YOUR TURN: Link the feature to the customer benefit

11. Benefits Summary Reinforce the key benefits:
Benefits are future favourable results, which sell your idea to achieve SMASH objectives.
Your customer will ask “Do the benefits relate to my priorities?”
Guidelines
Check
Go back to the needs
Demonstrate the key parts of your solution that address the needs
Use numbers, effectively and pictorially, whenever possible
Look for positive body language
Invite questions
Check agreement and understanding

12. “Do the benefits relate to my priorities?”
To answer this question:
Reiterate the benefits of your plan that relate directly to the customer’s priority needs.
This is to ensure that the customer fully understands your proposal and how he/she can benefit.
Here are some examples:
You said that you needed more customers. This plan increases customer count by 100 per week!
Your manager asked you to create store excitement. This unique promotion will appeal exactly to your target audience!
Your labour costs are high. This plan cuts labour costs by 10%!

13. Reinforcing Key Benefits
Here are some examples:
You said that you needed more customers. This plan increases customer count by 100 per week!
Your objective was to create store excitement. This unique promotion will appeal exactly to your target audience!
Your labour costs are high. This plan will cut labour costs by 10%!

14. Benefits Summary
Remember, you are not presenting any new information. Instead you are reinforcing the key benefits of your solution.
If your customer remembers only 3-5 things from your presentation, what do you want them to remember? This is what you should reinforce at this stage.
Guidelines
Check
Go back to the needs
Demonstrate the key parts of your solution that address the needs
Use numbers, effectively and pictorially, whenever possible
Look for positive body language
Invite questions
Check agreement and understanding

15. Summary You are now able to:
Isolate key features that can be translated into selling opportunities.
Example of a feature?
Identify key benefits that will meet your customers’ needs.
Example of a benefit?
Link features to benefits to build a strong fact based proposal to meet your objectives.
How would do you link a feature to a benefit?

16. It is your turn to “Shoot The Puck!!!”
Development is owned by Employees,
Supported by Managers,
And enabled by the People Department.
How are you going to apply what you learned today in trade?
Indentify trade tools and ideas that you have that can be used as features.
Link the features of your proposal to the benefit of the customer to achieve objectives!
Prepare each and every sales proposal with strong features that will benefit your customers!