Benefits, reality distortion fields, and talking so your right people can hear you
In the world of marketing and copywriting, ‘What’s the benefit?’ is a mantra. It’s the question every service or product has to answer, in one way or another, to convince us to hand over the cash – What’s this going to do for me? Why should I care?
The buzz cut queen of marketing, Naomi Dunford, has a typically to-the-point post explaining the difference between features and benefits (the two are often confused), and how to work out the benefits you deliver. In brief:
If you don’t know [if it's a feature or a benefit], drill down. Ask why whatever it is you’re thinking about is important to your customer. When you arrive at an answer that even a three-year-old could understand, you’ve found your benefit…
Web design
Feature: Knowledge of PHP, AJAX, JavaScript, etc.
Benefit: You get a pretty website.
Seems straight forward…
What if you’re talking benefits, but your ideal customers just aren’t getting it?
One possibility is that you are stuck in a reality distortion field, a term I lifted from a post about the Apple iPad (via @gwenbell):
[There's a] reality distortion field at work, though, and everyone that makes a living from the tech industry is within its tractor-beam. That RDF tells us that computers are awesome, they work great and only those too stupid to live can’t work them.
You know what it feels like to be on the receiving end of this, don’t you? To be the one who doesn’t ‘get it’?
What if I put it like this:
You’re in a reality distortion field. It’s created by your intimate, direct knowledge of how and why the thing you do is so awesome. You’re talking about benefits from within that field. And your ideal customers who aren’t getting it? They’re on the outside.
That doesn’t mean your benefits aren’t real or valuable
Let’s be clear about this. Because as a passion-driven entrepreneur you might become very disheartened at this point and conclude that if people aren’t getting it, there must be something wrong with what you’re offering.
You may think that people just don’t want it.
Maybe they don’t.
However, I spend a great deal of time talking with clients who are offering something wonderful and useful, and who do have very satisfied customers, so they know they’re delivering something that their right people want. But, the value is being lost in translation when they try to communicate with potential new clients.
What’s going wrong?
Honestly, there is so much to be said about communicating benefits and your value in a way your people can hear and understand. I expect to come back this topic again and again in the future. For now, let’s focus on just one translation problem that arises from your reality distortion field.
The benefits you’re talking about are important to you, but not to them.
With any service, particularly those provided by coaches, consultants and creative professionals, clients are likely to experience a bunch of great benefits. You really want to focus on just a few to create a clear and compelling message.
But what you perceive as the most important (from within your field of knowledge and experience), isn’t necessarily the ones that are most valued by your people.
Hint: Most often, they respond best to those benefits that are immediate, significant and easily understood.
Again, it doesn’t mean your other benefits suck. More likely, your people simply can’t relate to those benefits from where they are right now.
Very. Common. Disconnect.
You’re talking about how at the end of the process (or even beyond) they will have, or be able to do, x, y and z. Right now, their mind is tangled up with pressing problems. And from that place of pain and stuck they can’t even imagine, much less care about, x, y and z.
You’ve got two options here:
Stay in your reality distortion field. Dig in. You know that this particular benefit is the most important. Try to convince your people of that.
OR
Step out. Find the meeting place at the core of your business. Give information you believe will be useful to them right now. Don’t get caught up in your own narrative. Be absolutely present, but present without ego.
Give your right people enough to hang on to, without overwhelming them
It’s not about showcasing your skills or expertise for the sake of it. Don’t overwhelm your people with everything you could possibly achieve together.
Use your awesome knowledge of what you do, and your interactions with your ideal clients, to focus on what’s really important to them. So they can hear it, relate to it, understand it, and get excited about it.
Be willing to let go (not entirely, but enough to meet you people where they are) of your ‘pet’ benefits. The ones you really care about, but that your ideal clients simply aren’t able to see right now.
These benefits might continue to happen in the background whether you talk about them or not, and they may even end up being really valued ’surprise bonuses’ that your clients recognise and appreciate by the end of the process. Excellent – who doesn’t like a surprise bonus?
The key to breaking out of your reality distortion field
Listen.
Make sure you are listening to the right people – your ideal clients.
Let them tell you what’s the most important benefit. Listen carefully. You will rarely hear what you need to hear in a formal way (in a testimonial or otherwise) like this:
Client: The thing I valued most about our work together was…
Instead, listen carefully for moments of spontaneous exuberance and clarity that emerge throughout the process. Such as:
Client: Wow, I’ve never thought of that… This is fantastic because now I can…
Or they may say nothing specific. You may just notice their energy level lift as you explain a particular approach, or work through a particular problem.
Pay attention to these moments! Really. Listen. All the information you need to connect with your ideal clients is there – offered up by your own people – don’t allow it to get lost in your reality distortion field!
