Buffy Sparks says get creative, and you can come up with a free, imaginative FAB exercise!
Natalie Stringer asked on our Any Answers forum: "I am revising our training material and would be very grateful if anyone could recommend an F and B exercise or game."
Buffy Sparks recommends:
- Pre-prepare some credit card-sized pieces of paper with numerous objects (one object per card)
- Items such as felt-tip pen, ironing board, A4 diary, stapler and so on
- Laminate the cards and cut them out (makes it easier for you to use them again)
- Ask delegates to chose a card
- They now have 10 minutes to put together a 30-second sales pitch focusing only on the features, advantages and benefits of their item
E.g.: Feature of an ironing board = it has a rubber-mounted iron rest on the end of the board.
Benefit of this feature = it allows you to rest the iron without having to place it on the actual board.
Advantage of this = it means you don't burn your ironing board cover, leaves you space to fold the clothes on the board, makes it more ergonomically effective (which could then lead them onto another advantage and benefit).
And so on; most people tend to forget the advantage part which is hugely important, otherwise it turns into a features dumping session.
The more imaginative and creative the items the better, as it gets the group laughing and really joining in.
I usually award prizes for the best FAB, most creative, most zany etc..
John Stuart adds:
Similar to Buffy's idea, I used to print out a page from an estate agent or car dealer website describing a typical property or vehicle.
I would then get the participants to work in threes to say what the benefits of those features would be to different types of buyer (young person, professional couple, retired person etc.). What was good about this is that it got them to recognise the difference between features and benefits (what it is and what it does for the buyer) and also got them to understand that it is important for the sales person to listen and investigate the buyer's needs to be able to emphasise the right benefits - and also to identify where the offer might not even be appropriate to that person's needs/wants.
View the original posting:
Features and benefits exercises
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