Why selling a products benefits is easier than its features:

My first lesson in benefit-driven advertising.

I was about 13-years old at the time. In the midst of everything I was discovering about myself, I also learned the one fundamental law of all great advertising: sell benefits rather than features. This law is often overlooked in about 90% of the marketing I see even to this day.

My 5’ 1” tall mom, who was in no way, the least bit interested in cars, always drove the fastest hottest cars on the market. Thinking of what my future first hand-me-down car would be when I turned sixteen, I asked her if I would be getting her Firebird 400.

“Hey Mom, will I be getting the Firebird when I can drive?”

“No way,” she answered.

“Why? Why do you need such a cool fast car anyway?” I was pleading.

Now mind you, her primary interest in life was shopping and going to the beauty parlor. (Hey, I grew up in Penn Valley- a posh suburb of Philadelphia.) “When I get on the expressway, I don’t want a truck hitting me in the ass,” she explained.

She wasn’t buying the 400 horsepower, 400 cubic inch engine with 4-barrel carburetors, 3-speed gear automatic gear shift, or 0-60 in 5.5 seconds. She couldn’t care less. She was buying the peace-of-mind that insured that when she got on the expressway, she wouldn’t get rear-ended by anyone. She was buying the benefit. Period. Story over. In your ad, sell benefits, not features.

Oh, yeah, I got the hand-me-down Corvair.