Establish Their Needs
What are 'features' in terms of selling?
Features are the facts about your product or service: possibly what it's made of, where it comes from, and how long it will take to install. If, for example, you were trying to sell management consultancy, well, what exactly would you be doing? And this is where your product knowledge comes in; you know as much as you possibly can. And what you're trying to do is match your product to their needs. So emphasize the features that you think best meet your customers' or your clients' needs, and then you can sell the benefits.
What are 'benefits'?
Benefits are what they say they are really. They are the benefits of your features which the client will want. It could be for example that it's easy to use, that it's quick to install, that it's fashionable, that it's slimming, that it's keeping up with next door, because people always want to know what's in it for me, and so you sell the benefits and believe me, people buy benefits and not features.
What is 'selling up'?
Selling Up is advising your client, indeed persuading your client, that if they pay just a little bit more than perhaps they had first envisaged or possibly a little bit more than you had suggested in the first place, than that would better suit their particular needs. It may be, for example, that it's more durable, that it's more robust, it may be that it's made of a better fabric, or something like that. That's "selling up", it's adding value to your product, to your service, persuading the client that is the one that is right for them.
What is 'selling on'?
Well there's a very good example of that, you know when you go in and buy a pair of shoes nine times out of ten they try to sell you the cleaning product to go with it as well. That's selling on, its suggesting something a little extra that perhaps the client hadn't thought about. For example you could say, "Well would you like me to do the planting for you", if you happen to be in landscape gardening. Or you might say, "Would you like me to quote it for maintenance", perhaps you're installing somebody website or something, its adding something extra.
