Of all the small business practices and marketing techniques you can employ to add efficiency and effectiveness to what you are doing, the most important (and the least considered) is a good benefit statement. Yes, your benefit statement is even more important than your elevator speech. How many people do you meet on an elevator anyway?

I do not mean a mission statement, vision statement, statement of intent or anything like that. These all focus on what you will do. They are not client centered. To the client, they sound just like promises, which means they may sound like just promises. Even Captain Hook would say “Bad form. Bad form.” to such self-centered utterings.

I may mean “value proposition,” although I seriously dislike words and phrases meant to say one thing, but their high-fallootin route to that lose the meaning along the way. Plain language works best with me…and with most customers too. Besides, proposition (a proposal offered for acceptance or rejection) allows too much iffyness and causes value to lose some of its importance as the critical word. No, benefit statement says it best.

Benefit statement: your declaration of the benefit(s) your clients receive working with you.

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Think of a benefit statement as a client focused mission statement. A good benefit statement will attract more business than a good mission statement.

Your benefit statement is your first declaration and should focus—as marketing does—on the buyer. For the buyer, your benefit statement declares or directly implies “This is what you get.”

Stylistically, your benefit statement will work better when you include two factors:

(a) it should be a true statement, and
(b) it should be a feel good statement.

Include these two factors and you will probably have a bang-on statement that you will be proud to lead with in your marketing efforts.

Do not confuse your benefit statement with your tagline or other standard marketing phrases. Your tagline may be expressed in your benefit statement, but your benefit statement can stand alone. It should also stand first.

You have heard benefit statements for a long time. “With two you get egg roll” is a classic example. “Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.” This says that when there is a disaster or calamity that requires the help of good neighbors, State Farm will be there as a good neighbor. That is the brand, and there is measurable, documented truth in the State Farm claim.

Of course, the context or setting in which the claim is made gives it oomph. Reading the State Farm words probably made you recall the jingle, the situation of the State Farm television ads or something you know well about the company. That’s not by accident.

You can create this overall effect with context too. It won’t come overnight, but it will come in time. Start thinking and playing with words and ideas that convey your truth as it benefits your clients, and you will be on your way to crafting a dynamic benefit statement.

It is difficult to explain the context surrounding sample benefit statements of advisors whose businesses are only known locally, but here are a couple to whet your appetite to create your own.

I don’t know if Columbus Life has an official benefit statement, but We respect your independence is true and embraces their attitude about how they deal (fairly) with the independent advisors who choose to do business with them. It is a company that is fair all the way around, from customer to producer. As a few of their top advisors are my clients, I say this with certainty.

A financial advisor client of mine who is fee only and very Christian, uses From financial wisdom, better stewardship to attract a certain clientele to his business as a CPA and financial advisor.

A wonderful client and friend of mine is grappling for new words to state what benefit her now refined market would understand right off the bat. Her truth is sympathetic and empathic caring resulting in action, but how to express that in a way elderly women best understand it in the context of my client’s environment is the quest. It will come in time. It may come from the market in a moment of surprise clarity. Who knows better than her clients what benefits derive from working with Lorry?!

Themes have also opened the mind to create a truthful benefit statement. Managing the money managers has long been a theme I proposed. If there is real truth in your doing this and it is the primary thing you do for clients as you should this awesome responsibility, then think this one through. Keeping the complex simple is another theme that you might want to springboard from to create a benefit statement.

So you see, there is no formula or standard way to put together your most important marketing pronouncement. If there were, you’d have a pretty standard way of announcing yourself and a pretty weak way to differentiate yourself from the other advisors you compete with.

The crux of this matter is that you must create a benefit statement or lose the first best method to deliver your message and to differentiate yourself. Think of it this way: Would you like to announce yourself as the one and only… right off the mark, or be relegated to just one of many…? If not the one and only, then at least the one who does what the prospect wants, clearly and succinctly stated.

When your benefit statement leads your marketing mix into the battle for prospects’ attentions, you increase your odds to be heard. If your message cannot be heard above the din of the crowd, the crowd will pass you by.

You don’t have to be sick to get better.

Questions? Email jhmco@melchinger.com

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This newsletter is designed and distributed by Kirk Lowe of Freedomarketing. Content by John H. Melchinger – The Marketing Coach™