Build a benefit and proof sheet

You will produce a reference sheet of features, benefits and proof that you can draw on for every piece you write.

Every time you write something new, you face the same questions. What should I say first? Which benefit matters most? How do I back it up? If the answers live only in your head, you will reinvent them each time and probably end up with whatever comes to mind first. This exercise puts the answers on one sheet you can open beside your voice-of-customer file. Together they are the writing kit the rest of this course draws on.

Allow about 25 minutes. You need your voice-of-customer file from lesson 1.4, your so-what chains from lesson 3.1 and the specific claims you rewrote in lesson 3.2.

Step 1: set up three columns

Create a table with three columns: feature, benefit in the customer's words, and proof. Add a narrow fourth column for a tally, which you will fill in step 3.

The feature column holds what the product has or does, stated plainly. The benefit column holds what changes for the reader, using a phrase from your voice-of-customer file wherever one fits. The proof column holds the evidence that makes the benefit believable, and where that evidence lives.

Step 2: fill in at least eight rows

List every feature you can think of, then run each through the so-what chain from lesson 3.1. Stop at the reader's life and check the wording against your file. If a customer said it better, use their words.

Then add the proof. Use the five kinds from lesson 3.2: reviews, numbers from your records, credentials, guarantees and demonstrations. Be specific about where it is: "Google review from parent, June, permission given", "attendance spreadsheet, 2024", "lesson video on Instagram".

Here is part of Priya's sheet.

Feature: classes of six. Benefit: "she stops making the same careless mistakes", from two enquiries. Proof: a parent review naming this, used with permission, plus a short video of a tutor checking working.

Feature: Saturday morning slots. Benefit: "we can't do weekday evenings, both of us work", from four enquiries. Proof: the timetable itself.

Feature: weekly progress note to parents. Benefit: "I only find out when the results come back", turned round, from three enquiries. Proof: a sample note with the child's name removed.

Feature: tutors with at least three years of upper primary experience. Benefit: "someone who knows how school teaches it now", from one interview. Proof: tutor profiles on the website.

Feature: free trial lesson. Benefit: "worried it's another expensive thing he hates", answered, from two enquiries. Proof: none needed beyond the offer, but the terms must be clear.

She wrote three more rows, for the centre's location near the MRT, its fixed termly fee and its holiday catch-up classes.

Step 3: rank by how often customers mention it

Go back to your voice-of-customer file and count how many times each benefit, or something close to it, appears. Write the count in the tally column and sort the sheet from highest to lowest.

This ranking tells you what to lead with. The benefit at the top is the one most of your readers care about, so it belongs in headlines, the top of your landing page and the first line of your ads. Benefits near the bottom are still useful for answering specific objections further down a page.

Priya was surprised by her order. She had always led with tutor experience. Her customers mentioned it once. The Saturday slots and the careless mistakes came up far more often, and the progress note came third. Her homepage had not mentioned the progress note at all.

Step 4: flag every benefit without proof

Some rows will have an empty proof column. That is normal, and much better to find now than after a customer asks.

Mark each one, and beside it write how you could get proof. Most gaps can be filled within a few weeks. Ask two happy customers for a review that mentions the benefit. Start counting something you have never counted. Film a short demonstration. Write down a guarantee you are willing to honour.

Until you have proof, use the benefit carefully. You can describe what you do and how it works, but avoid stating a result as fact. Priya had no proof yet for "she'll feel calmer in the exam", so she kept it off her page and asked three parents whether they had noticed a change.

Step 5: keep it with your voice-of-customer file

Save the sheet next to your voice-of-customer file, in the same folder or as a second tab in the same spreadsheet. From now on, when the course asks you to use your writing kit, it means these two files. Update the proof column whenever you collect a new review or count, and re-rank the benefits when you add to your voice-of-customer file each month.

A finished sheet has at least eight features, each with a benefit in the customer's words, ranked by how often customers mention it, with the evidence named and every gap flagged with a plan to close it. Start with the features you would normally list first, and expect the ranking to rearrange them.

Complete the three-column sheet for at least eight features, rank the benefits and list how you will gather proof for the unproven ones.

Course

• Content and copywriting that people read