CONSIDER ELEVATING YOUR BENEFIT…IF YOU HAVE ONE

Elevating your benefit is a marketing move that should be under constant consideration. I am referring to the benefit that you may or may not have included in your critical sales message. In the branding world, that message is referred to as your selling proposition. In almost every product or service I have positioned, the benefit, if properly supported, has turned out to be the strongest trigger to cause consumers to purchase. However, as I plough through the world of consumer goods and services marketing, I rarely ever see benefits used in the selling propositions I encounter. I think it’s because business owners are so focused on their businesses they forget what’s in it for the purchaser…the benefit.

This shortage of benefits is good news for you. Even though you too are not likely using one in your current selling proposition, your competition is unlikely either. Let’s assume for the moment that one of you, either you or your competition, is using a benefit effectively. If it’s your competition, you are likely suffering at the effect of them having done so. If it’s you that is using a benefit…congratulations. In either case, now is the time to elevate.

A number of years ago, the children’s educational software category was dominated by a brand that used a benefit to drive its selling proposition, and in turn, its sales. The brand is Reader Rabbit and the selling proposition is based on the benefit its brand name infers. The benefit is essentially that your child will be more likely to engage in the process of learning if it is also being entertained by a rabbit. That selling proposition was very effective, and for a long time allowed the Reader Rabbit brand to dominate the category until a new brand was introduced that used a higher order of benefit. Let me demonstrate what I mean by a higher order.

Years ago I discovered that if you asked business owners or their consumers to tell you what the benefit is for any product or service, they will generally give you a performance attribute or a very low form of a benefit. If you then tell them to consider that they have that benefit in their lives, and again ask what the benefit of having that is, they will begin going up what I call a benefit ladder. At the top of all benefit ladders, no matter what the product or service is I’m happy.

That makes sense if you think about it. Here are two different ladders, one for cat litter, the other for allergy medicine. Start at the bottom of each, work up the ladder and you will get the point.

Here is what happened to the rabbit. I am going to say that the benefit for Reader Rabbit is SMART KID. At about that time a second marketing team, one I happened to be a part of, identified a new selling proposition that was based on the perceived mindset of parents. We launched a brand called Jump Start. The Jump Start positioning was based on the perceived benefit of a parent’s desire to give their child an advantage over other kids. I am going to say the benefit for Jump Start is PROUD PARENT. If we had the advantage of showing you a benefit ladder for the children’s educational software category, the Jump Start benefit is clearly elevated and above that of Reader Rabbit.

Sales for Jump Start Kindergarten, the initial product offered by this new brand, were extraordinarily strong. In short time, The Jump Start brand took over the category, and the Reader Rabbit brand became a shadow of its former self. This is an event that happened well over ten years ago. There is a double learning here.

The first is that of continually perusing the next elevated benefit. You should not only be looking for the benefit that will drive your product or service forward, you should be looking for the elevated benefit that will drive it beyond that. If you can get into this mind set, you will alter the success pattern of your business forever. If you are a small business thinking I have just disclosed a secret marketing tool commonly used by the big boys, I have a news flash for you. The big boys are too busy being tangled up in their every day marketing issues to stay present to this critical marketing distinction just like the smaller entrepreneurs. No one is minding the store where this marketing distinction is concerned.

The second learning illustrates this point very well. In the ensuing years, after the introduction, neither of these brands has attempted to elevate beyond the status quo. I cannot say why because I am not in contact with either brand. Perhaps neither brand has figured out what took place. Stay vigilant.

Cheers, 

Keith Chambers

Keynote Marketing Speaker
Creative Marketing Consultant
(310) 473-0010
www.chambersgroup.com

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LOOKING FOR AN ENDORSER

I’ve written about endorsements before but never experienced their power until last weekend. I’m normally an avid moviegoer but have been involved in so many other activities lately that I’ve not seen a movie for several months.

Friday afternoon a friend sent a text message asking if I wanted to join her to go see Knight and Day, the new Tom Cruise movie. Having been a victim of Mission Impossible where anything, no matter how ridiculous, was possible, I cringed at the thought of another Tom Cruise action film. When I asked for another suggestion, my friend explained that she was out running errands and the task of finding a great film was in my hands.

I quickly sent messages to my two sons who are usually great sources. No response. They were not wired up at the moment. I tried two additional friends, also to no avail. In the dead time that followed, I became aware that I was literally looking for a third party endorsement. It was only a few blogs back that I wrote about the potential power of incorporating endorsements into your selling proposition. That blog was with the idea of imposing an endorsement on your consumer, never thinking that they might already be looking for one much like I was at the moment.

The experience I was having was strictly two parties, the product (the movie) and me. I needed a third party to recommend a good movie and there were none around. My next move was to pick the local Landmark Theater. At least I knew the experience of the theatre would be great. I can reserve a seat, they have great snacks and there are no aggravating commercials.

Their site on the internet provided a listing of twelve movies. I started at the top and one by one clicked on the titles and began reading the write-ups on each. As I quickly realized I didn’t fully trust what I was reading knowing the natural tendency toward hype. I still needed that third party endorsement.

After working my way through the first eleven, I got relief on number twelve. I felt like I had found a friend. In fact I had. The film was titled Winter’s Bone, which told me nothing. The same was true of the write-up except for one thing. This film had won the 2010 Sundance Film Festival's Grand Jury Prize and the Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award. I confess, I am not familiar with either of those awards, but that was all I needed to make the choice. I booked it and guess what? It was great.

The learning here is that I have under estimated the power of the endorsement as a marketing trigger. The issue is finding the one that works for your product or service. You may be surprised how easy that may be given that consumers are so open to them. What you are looking for is one that has a certain, but not too much, familiarity.

I frequently include the Good Housekeeping seal in the work I do when I expose new selling propositions to consumers, but it seems to have lost its charm. I think it is so widely used it has lost its appeal. On the other hand I have created fake endorsements with what I thought were compelling names and they too have failed. What I know for sure is that endorsements are worth pursuing. What I have just learned is that in the corner of the minds of consumers, they are likely looking for them. If you have had any interesting experiences with endorsements that you can share, I would love to hear them.

              
Cheers, 

Keith Chambers

Keynote Marketing Speaker
Creative Marketing Consultant
(310) 473-0010
www.chambersgroup.com

follow my blog by clicking one of the links below

visit my site, www.pullbizbook.com