benefit hypothesis example

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• Benefit Hypothesis

A concept that suggests that people are more likely to accept a change if they can see the potential benefits it will bring. Product Glossary Benefit Hypothesis Also called: Benefit Theory, Positive Outcome Theory, Positive Consequence Theory, Positive Reinforcement Theory, Reward Theory, Reinforcement Theory, and Reinforcement Hypothesis See also: Forced Analogy , Hypothesis Statement , Objectives and Key Results , Powers of Ten , Problem Statement , Benefit Hypothesis Relevant metrics: Conversion Rate, Retention Rate, User Engagement, Cost per Acquisition, and Customer Lifetime Value In this article What is Benefit Hypothesis

Benefit Hypothesis is a concept used to describe the idea that a product should be designed to provide a benefit to the user.

It is based on the assumption that users will be more likely to use a product if it provides them with a benefit. The benefit can be tangible, such as a monetary reward, or intangible, such as increased convenience or improved user experience.

The benefit hypothesis is used to guide product design decisions, as it helps to ensure that the product is designed to provide a benefit to the user. It is also used to evaluate the success of a product, as it helps to determine whether the product is providing the desired benefit to the user.

Where did Benefit Hypothesis come from?

The term “Benefit Hypothesis” was first coined by evolutionary biologist Robert Trivers in 1971. Trivers proposed that the evolution of altruism, or selfless behavior, could be explained by the idea that individuals could benefit from helping others. He argued that if an individual helps another, the other individual may be more likely to help them in the future, thus creating a mutually beneficial relationship. This idea has since been expanded upon and is now used to explain a variety of social behaviors, such as cooperation, reciprocity, and even the evolution of language.

Exploring the Benefit Hypothesis

The Benefit Hypothesis is a concept that suggests that social interaction can have a positive impact on individuals. This hypothesis is based on the idea that people are naturally social creatures and that social interaction can be beneficial to their mental and physical health. It is believed that social interaction can help to reduce stress, improve mood, and even increase life expectancy.

The Benefit Hypothesis has been studied extensively in the fields of psychology and sociology. Studies have shown that people who engage in regular social interaction are more likely to have better mental health, better physical health, and even longer life expectancies. This is because social interaction can provide a sense of belonging, support, and companionship, which can help to reduce stress and improve mood. Additionally, social interaction can provide a sense of purpose and meaning, which can help to increase life satisfaction.

The Benefit Hypothesis in Product Development

Identifying what customer needs and expectations are can often be a challenge, especially in a crowded and rapidly changing market. The Benefit Hypothesis is a valuable tool for product developers looking to create products that truly deliver value to their customers.

The Benefit Hypothesis is a hypothesis that states the benefits that a product provides to its customers is the primary reason for its success. In other words, the more benefits a product provides, the more successful it will be. This hypothesis is based on the idea that customers will choose products that offer the most value to them, and that this value is determined by the benefits they receive from using the product.

Applying Benefit Hypotheseses

Using the Benefit Hypothesis in product development is a straightforward process that involves four key steps:

• Identifying the target customer and their needs - This step involves understanding who the product is being developed for and what their needs and expectations are.
• Determining the potential benefits of the product - This step involves considering the potential benefits that the product could provide to its target customers, such as improved efficiency, convenience, or savings.
• Creating a hypothesis based on potential benefits - This step involves creating a hypothesis that states the benefits that the product will provide to its target customers and how these benefits will be delivered.
• Validating the hypothesis through testing and research - This step involves testing the hypothesis through user research, customer feedback, and other methods to ensure that the product truly delivers the benefits that were promised.

Benefits of using Benefit Hypotheses

• Allows for a more comprehensive understanding of how people make decisions . The Benefit Hypothesis provides a framework for understanding how people make decisions by considering both the costs and benefits of a given action. This helps to explain why people may choose to do something even if it is not in their best interest.
• Helps to identify potential areas of improvement . By understanding the costs and benefits of a given action, the Benefit Hypothesis can help to identify areas where improvements can be made. This can help to inform decision-making and ensure that the best possible outcome is achieved.
• Provides a more accurate picture of decision-making . By considering both the costs and benefits of a given action, the Benefit Hypothesis provides a more accurate picture of how people make decisions. This can help to ensure that decisions are made in a more informed and rational manner.

Challenges of applying Benefit Hypotheses

• Establishing a clear definition of the term . The Benefit Hypothesis is a complex concept that can be difficult to define in a concise and accurate manner. It is important to ensure that all stakeholders understand the concept and its implications.
• Determining the appropriate level of benefit . It can be difficult to determine the appropriate level of benefit that should be provided to stakeholders. This requires careful consideration of the potential costs and benefits associated with the implementation of the Benefit Hypothesis.

The Apple iPhone was developed based on the hypothesis that customers would value a device that combined the functions of a mobile phone, music player, and internet browser in one device. The iPhone was a huge success because it delivered on this promise, providing customers with a device that offered unprecedented convenience and functionality.

Starbucks has applied the Benefit Hypothesis to its business model by offering customers a wide variety of coffee and tea products at competitive prices. This has allowed them to build a loyal customer base and increase their market share. By offering customers a wide selection of products and services, Starbucks has been able to create a competitive advantage over other coffee and tea retailers.

• What is the purpose of the benefit hypothesis? Hint The purpose of the benefit hypothesis is to identify and analyze the potential benefits of a proposed policy or program.
• What are the potential benefits of applying the benefit hypothesis? Hint Potential benefits of applying the benefit hypothesis include improved decision-making, increased efficiency, and cost savings.
• What are the potential risks of applying the benefit hypothesis? Hint Potential risks of applying the benefit hypothesis include unintended consequences, inaccurate data, and inadequate evaluation.
• What are the potential implications of applying the benefit hypothesis? Hint Potential implications of applying the benefit hypothesis include changes in public opinion, changes in public policy, and changes in public behavior.
• How will the benefit hypothesis be evaluated? Hint The benefit hypothesis will be evaluated by assessing the potential benefits and risks associated with the proposed policy or program.
• What data or evidence is available to support the benefit hypothesis? Hint Data and evidence to support the benefit hypothesis can include economic analysis, cost-benefit analysis, and other forms of research.
• How will the benefit hypothesis be implemented? Hint The benefit hypothesis will be implemented by developing a plan to identify and analyze the potential benefits and risks associated with the proposed policy or program.
• What are the potential unintended consequences of applying the benefit hypothesis? Hint Potential unintended consequences of applying the benefit hypothesis include unintended economic, social, and environmental impacts.
• How will the benefit hypothesis be monitored and evaluated? Hint The benefit hypothesis will be monitored and evaluated by assessing the outcomes of the proposed policy or program.
• What are the potential longterm effects of applying the benefit hypothesis? Hint Potential long-term effects of applying the benefit hypothesis include changes in public opinion, changes in public policy, and changes in public behavior.

You might also be interested in reading up on:

• Forced Analogy
• Hypothesis Statement
• Objectives and Key Results
• Powers of Ten
• Problem Statement
• Influence : The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini (1984)
• Predictably Irrational : The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions by Dan Ariely (2008)
• Nudge : Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness by Richard Thaler (2008)
• Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman (2011)
• Freakonomics : A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner (2005)

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The ART of SAFe

Applying Lean and Agile techniques at scale to bring about effective, sustainable improvement in Culture, Execution and Business Results

Monday, January 8, 2018

Effective feature templates for safe, introduction, how much detail is needed, and by when.

• Prior to WSJF assessment
• Prior to PI Planning

Feature Canvas

New Product: “The current state of the [domain] has focussed primarily on [customer segments, pain points, etc]. What existing products/services fail to address is [this gap] Our product/service will address this gap by [vision/strategy] Our initial focus will be [this segment]”

Existing Product: “Our [service/product] is intended to achieve [these goals]. We have observed that the [product/service] isn’t meeting [these goals] which is causing [this adverse effect] to our business. How might we improve [service/product] so that our customers are more successful based on [these measurable criteria]?”

“We believe this [business outcome] will be achieved if [these users] successfully achieve [this user outcome] with [this feature]”.

Sample Completed Canvas

A glimpse at how you might visualise your next WSJF estimation workshop

Detail beyond the Canvas

• User Journeys:  Some framing UX exploration is often very useful in preparing a Feature, and makes a great support to teams during PI planning.  
• Architectural Impact Assessment: Some form of deliberate architectural consideration of the potential impact of the feature is critical in most complex environments.  It should rarely be more than a page – I find a common approach is one to two paragraphs of text accompanied by a high level sequence diagram identifying expected interactions between architectural layers.
• Change Management Impacts: How do we get from deployed software to realised value?  Who will need training?  Are Work Instructions required?  

Tuning your Template

Who completes the canvas/template, 29 comments:.

Awesome work Mark! We have created some for clients too that we can't share. :-(

Thanks for sharing Mark - these are really useful. I really like the hypothesis statements for features and think that this is a major enhancement in SAFE 4.5. I wrote a blog post about it here: http://runningmann.co.za/2017/09/25/the-power-of-feature-hypotheses/ that you might be interested in.

These are awesome Mark. Thanks for sharing

Thanks for sharing your experience on this area with the community Mark. Feature Templates are a very common requirement for Agile practitioners, maybe you can persuade the SAFe community to include an artefact like this in the framework.

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This is great! Do you have the template format available so we don't have to replicate?

great stuff, how would you differentiate this from SAFe Epics

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Nice blog Mark How can I get a downloadable version of this Canvas?

I think you can make video about it. If you want to promote your channel on youtube you can buy youtube subscribers for it

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Essential phases

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Good design is actually a lot harder to notice than poor design, in part because good designs fit our needs so well that the design is invisible, serving us without drawing attention to itself. Bad design, on the other hand, screams out its inadequacies, making itself very noticeable. —Don Norman, The Design of Everyday Things

Design Thinking

It goes beyond the traditional focus on the features and functions of a proposed product. Instead, it emphasizes understanding the problem to be solved, the context in which the solution will be used, and the evolution of that solution.

Note:  This article focuses on the tools and practices associated with implementing design thinking. It should be read along with the Customer Centricity article, which focuses on the mindset and impact of customer centricity.

Traditional waterfall approaches to product development are sequential: requirements are defined; then, solutions are designed, built, and delivered to the market. The focus tends to be on the most apparent problems. Often, success is determined by implementing a solution that meets the requirements instead of the needs of the user, resulting in products and services with unusable or ignored features that frustrate users and fail to meet the business goals of the enterprise.

Design thinking (Figure 1) represents a profoundly different approach to product and solution development, in which divergent and convergent techniques are applied to understand a problem, design a solution, and deliver that solution to the market.

Design thinking also inspires new ways to measure the success of our efforts:

• Desirable – Do customers and users want the solution?
• Feasible –  Can we deliver the right solution through a combination of build, buy, partner, or acquire endeavors/activities?
• Viable – Is the way we build and offer the solution creating more value than cost? For example, in a for-profit enterprise, are we profitable?
• Sustainable – Are we proactively managing our solution to account for its expected product-market lifecycle?

Successive applications of design thinking advance the solution over its natural market lifecycle, as shown in Figure 2.

The Problem Space and the Solution Space

In Figure 1, the core processes of design thinking appear visually as a ‘double diamond’. This represents the focus on thoroughly exploring the problem space before creating solutions. The activities associated with exploring the problem are elaborated as follows:

• Discover – The discover phase seeks to understand the problem by engaging in market and user research to identify unmet needs. This creates fresh perspectives that drive innovation. Unlike research that confirms or refutes a hypothesis, the inquiries associated with the discovery phase occur without preconceived notions about how users should work. Instead, it focuses on how users do work . An essential research technique is Gemba, also known as, “going to the place where the work is done.”
• Define – The define phase focuses on the information gathered during the discover phase, using convergent techniques to generate insights into the specific problems and/or unmet needs. These create opportunities for the enterprise and new product development. Results of this phase typically include personas and empathy maps (described further below) that focus the product team on the kinds of solutions the customer would view as desirable. Epics and Features capture the perceived changes needed for existing products and solutions.

With a clear understanding of the target market and the problems it’s facing, the enterprise can move towards designing a solution, the second diamond of design thinking. These are:

• Develop – The develop phase uses journey mapping, story mapping, and prototyping to design potential solutions to problems quickly and cost-effectively. Each of these techniques is discussed more thoroughly later in this article. The develop phase also embraces SAFe Principle #3 – Assume variability; preserve options , using design techniques to preserve options in a responsible manner.
• Deliver – The deliver phase produces artifacts that are suitable for creating the solution and vary based on context. They often start as prototypes that are expressed as a validated set of Features in the Program Backlog for ongoing delivery through the Continuous Delivery Pipeline.

Note that each diamond focuses on divergent thinking (understanding, exploring options) followed by convergent thinking (evaluating options and making choices).

Using Personas to Focus Design

Bespoke solutions offer designers the advantage of speaking directly and frequently with a few targeted users, permitting them to participate in design meetings, PI Planning, System Demos, and other SAFe events. In several organizations, these people are considered part of the team, so creating a Persona to represent them isn’t typically needed, but may be helpful when the organization is highly distributed.

In contrast, in an indirect customer market, which is common in B2C solutions, product teams need a way to maintain a connection with their target customer. So, they develop ‘personas’, fictional consumers and/or users derived from customer research. [2] They depict the different people who might use a product or solution in a similar way, providing insights into how real users would engage with a solution. User personas also support market segmentation strategy by offering a concrete design tool to reinforce that products and solutions are created for people. Personas drive product development and several SAFe practices, as shown in Figure 3.

In addition to user personas, buyer personas extend design thinking to include the individuals and organizations that authorize purchasing decisions. They help ensure that the design encompasses the whole product purchase experience, including after-sales service, support, and operations.

Establish Empathy Through Empathy Maps

Customer-centric enterprises use empathy throughout the design process. Broadly speaking, empathetic design dismisses preconceived ideas and uses the customer’s perspective to inform solution development.

Empathy maps[1] are a design thinking tool that promote customer identification by helping teams develop deep, shared understanding for others (Figure 4). They help teams imagine what a specific persona is thinking, feeling, hearing, and seeing as they use the product. The greater the degree of empathy that a team has for their customer, the more likely the team will be able to design a desirable solution.

Designing the Customer Experience through Journey Maps

A customer journey map illustrates the experience as a user engages with a company’s Operational Value Stream , products, and services. As shown in Figure 5, journey maps are powerful design thinking tools for operational value streams. They allow teams to identify ways in which the specific deliverables of one or more Development Value Streams can be improved to create a better end-to-end experience.

Delivering Benefits Through Features

While a journey map captures the high-level experience of the customer through the operational value stream, product Features manage the specific deliverables that fulfill a stakeholder need. Features are commonly described through a features and benefit matrix using short phrases that provide context and a hypothesis of the benefits that the user experiences.

Design thinking practices promote changing the order in which we consider elements of the Feature-Benefit Hypothesis. They help Agile teams explore better and faster ways to deliver the desired benefits (Figure 6).

Designing User Workflows through Story Maps

Features are implemented through one or more Stories. There are two types of stories in SAFe:

• User Stories are the primary means of expressing needed functionality. They can be written in a role format or a persona format:

Role: As a <user role> I want <activity/goal> so that <some reason, such as creating business value or personal value>

Persona: Frank wants to <activity/goal> so that Frank gets <value>

• Enabler Stories capture system, architecture, or infrastructure requirements, such as building improvements to support the continuous delivery pipeline.

The Team Backlog contains user and enabler Stories that originate from the Program Backlog, as well as stories that arise from the team’s local context. Like all backlogs, the Team Backlog is prioritized, and stories are implemented in priority order.

Features that capture a workflow present a unique challenge to Agile teams: A workflow is a sequence of steps that must be completed to accomplish a higher-level user goal. The linear order of a backlog can make it hard for Agile Teams to understand the relationships between the steps. Frequently a given step can be improved, and teams must also balance completeness (all of the steps must be supported) before improving a specific set of steps. Potential conflicts arise when the divergent phase of developing a solution envisions improvement opportunities, while the convergent phase of design thinking focuses on what’s essential for the next release.

Solutions contain both large and small workflows. Consider the small workflow of a businessperson importing a credit card statement into an expense reporting system for processing. The user must:

• Download the credit statement from the bank
• Upload the credit card statement into the expense reporting system
• Match transactions from the credit card statement with expense receipts stored in the expense reporting system
• Remove any non-reimbursable transactions

As described earlier, each of these stories can be captured in a workflow. Moreover, each can be improved over time: We could, for example, imagine a direct connection between the bank and the expense reporting system, or an automated AI agent that managed the task of matching transactions.

Features that represent a workflow are captured through story maps [3], which organize a sequence of stories according to the tasks a user needs to accomplish their goal (Figure 7).

Story maps enable teams to understand how the stories in the team backlog support user objectives (Figure 8).

Story maps also clarify the relationships between quality and value:

• Quality – Each Story in the backlog must be completed with quality
• Value –  All the selected Stories in the Story Map must be completed to create value, because if a Story is missed, the user cannot complete their workflow

Increasing Design Feedback Through Prototypes

A prototype is a functional model of the Feature or Product we wish to build. It helps the design team clarify their understanding of the problem and reduces risk in developing a solution. Prototypes provide a myriad of benefits to product teams:

• Fast feedback. By definition, a prototype is cheaper and faster to produce than a full solution. This enables faster feedback from users and customers, increased understanding of solution requirements, and greater confidence in the final designs.
• Risk reduction. Prototypes can reduce technical risk by enabling Agile teams to focus initial efforts on the aspects of the solution associated with the highest risk.
• Intellectual property / patent filing. Prototypes can be used to satisfy strategic requirements for managing intellectual property as early as possible in the development process.
• Models for requirements. Prototypes can provide more clarity in the requirements of the desired feature or solution than pages of documentation.

There are many kinds of prototypes, each optimized to provide different types of insights:

• Paper prototypes are typically hand-drawn sketches of the intended solution. They can be automated to illustrate workflows as complements to user story maps.
• Mid-Fi prototypes are visually-complete representations of software-centric solutions but are not typically functionally integrated.
• Hi-Fi prototypes are visually-complete and interactive models which users and customers can directly explore.
• Hardware prototypes provide critical feedback to the Agile team on such things as form factors, sizes, and operational requirements. For example, when exploring form factors to see how a new tablet might fit into existing backpacks, briefcases and cars, one Silicon Valley company simply cut a multitude of plastic models from a single sheet plastic. Later in this design process, this same team found they needed to redesign the power supply so that it would not unduly interfere with the WIFI signal.

Last updated: 10 February 2021

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5 Simple Steps to Write a Benefit Statement (+ Tips and Examples)

Douglas Phillips | October 9, 2023 | Marketing Strategy | 13 min read

Quick Links

• 1.   What Is It?
• 2.   Benefits
• 3.   Steps
• 4.   Best Practices
• 5.   Examples

When talking to potential customers, marketers often fall into the trap of listing all of the special features that their product or service offers, hoping to persuade them with cool traits and tricks.

While features are somewhat appealing to your leads (of course they'll want to know how your product or service works), they’re far more interested in what using that product or service will actually do for them.

What’s the value of your product? How is your service going to provide a positive experience for them? What goals can they achieve using that product or service?

A great benefit statement will help you answer those questions and entice your leads. What is a benefit statement? How does it help you inspire your prospects to become customers? How can you create an awesome statement of benefits to help your company improve conversion rates?

What Is a Benefit Statement?

Basically, it’s a statement that clearly communicates the benefits of a particular product or service to a prospect. Your customers will be able to grasp the true value of your business and purchase based on that statement.

It’s important to understand that there is a distinct difference between benefits and features.

A benefit highlights how the customer’s experience or situation improves as a result of your product or service. A feature highlights the product’s uniqueness and attributes.

Don’t be mistaken: There’s nothing wrong with sharing the features of your product or service. But keeping your marketing and sales processes centered around the customer and their needs will definitely do a better job of converting them than simply bragging "My product can do 'X' thing," where "X" is some random neat feature of the product.

Put yourself in the customer's shoes. When you’re considering which new smartphone to buy, it’s cool to hear about all the new camera lenses, speakers, and screen sizes.

But you’re only closer to making a decision once you hear about how the new camera will give you better-quality pictures to capture memories. Or how the larger screen size means better picture quality and visibility.

This goes double for B2B companies. When you're trying to market products and services to these prospects, they have their own goals that they need to meet. They don't care about the features of a product or service nearly as much as whether that product or service will help them fulfill their business goals.

For example, say that Bill is a C-suite decision-maker in XYZ Gaming Corp. His current business strategy requires him to reduce operating costs for his development team by 5% and increase productivity by 10%. How likely is it that Bill will care about a new computer having twice the operations per second of his current computers? Not likely at all.

He might think that feature is neat but without an explanation of how doubling operations per second helps everyone in the organization save time on processor-heavy tasks, he won't care as much. His dev team leads will probably have a firm grasp of how processing speed and power will affect their daily operations, but they aren't the ones with final decision authority. To make this feature matter to Bill, you need to communicate how it will help him achieve his goals .

Benefit statements can even be useful for making effective CTAs that encourage visitors to click on them. The challenge is getting the message across with very limited copy. For example, check out this simple statement:

Boost your sales and marketing results by reaching out to Bluleadz !

Here, the copy indicates what the benefit is (increased sales and marketing results) and what you can do to get those results (reaching out to Bluleadz).

Why Benefit Statements Are Important (In Marketing & Sales)

Long story short, benefit statements are important because they give customers context to their purchases upfront. This, in turn, leads to more sales as it helps link your product to future success in the minds of prospective customers. Benefit statements give marketers and salespeople leverage when customers might be feeling hesitant or skeptical.

Here are just a few advantages to a well-written statement of benefits.

It Shows That You Understand Their Needs.

All the gizmos and gadgets in the world aren't going to matter to a customer if they don't meet some kind of need for them. Oftentimes, making the connection between a feature and a need isn't obvious to them.

By having a benefit statement prepared for them, you'll be able to easily answer their question, "How is this going to help me?"

When you ask the prospect what problems they're facing and then tell them how your product or service can assist them, you're giving them a reason to believe in your business.

They'll also feel heard, which goes a long way in establishing brand trust.

It Helps You Highlight Hidden Values of Your Product/Service.

Certain products, programs, and services actually cover a much wider range of pain points than advertised. This makes sense since you can't really fit every possible use case for every potential user into a single ad of reasonable length.

For a B2C example, when Sony's Playstation 4 was released, sure most customers were interested in the game library and new graphics. But the console also acts as a Blu-ray player, sound system, and streaming host for streaming sites like Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime.

That hidden value broadened the audience to more than just avid gamers once people learned that they'd have an all-in-one entertainment center in addition to a gaming platform. Being able to replace multiple devices with a single one that only takes a single 

It Helps You Increase Sale Quality.

Emotions help marketing and sales. We know this. Building relationships with prospects and customers often leads to a better quality sale both for the buyer and the company.

Customers are always more satisfied when they have a complete understanding of the value they're going to get out of a purchase.

By leading both the marketing and the sales conversation with a benefit statement, you'll be able to establish trust and familiarity with your customers. That sort of relationship can lead to repeat customers and upsells .

How to Write a Benefit Statement in 5 Steps

It's actually incredibly easy to create a benefit statement if you truly understand your business, your product/service, and your audience. More importantly, it's even easier if you believe in what you're selling.

Here are five easy steps to help structure your benefit statement:

1. Identify the Customer's Problem.

If you're having the right conversation with your customers, this should be the easiest step. Figure out what their need is by asking open-ended questions. You'll need to connect the problem to the benefit in order to showcase your product or service's value.

For marketing teams, you might instead want to base marketing materials on different problems that the sales team has identified during sales calls or that you've identified through surveys of your customer base.

2. Highlight a Feature.

Which aspect of the product or service is going to alleviate the customer's problem? Be sure to offer a specific feature of your product that's related to their need. A general "this fixes everything" isn't going to convince them.

3. Spotlight the Benefit.

This is what the customer wants to hear. Let them know exactly how that specific feature is going to improve their life. Whether it be big or small, if your business is providing true value, your product or service is going to help them in some way.

4. Present an Action.

Of course, the customer will only benefit if they work for it. Explain to them what action (or actions) they'll have to take in order to see results. It can be as easy as uncapping toothpaste or as complex as building an Ikea bookcase, but they still need to know.

5. Share the Result.

Paint a picture of their life after their stress is alleviated by your product or service. What does that end result look like for them? How excited should they be for it? If your benefit statement is great, then they should be very excited about it.

Tips for Writing a Benefit Statement

There are a few best practices for writing a great benefit statement. It's a pretty simple process, but it never hurts to look for additional ways to optimize your efforts.

Clarify What the Benefit Means for the Prospect.

If you're having a tough time matching features and benefits, an easier way of brainstorming is to think of them in a cause-and-effect scenario.

For example: "Our mouthwash kills 99.9 percent of germs in the mouth." This is a fairly common claim made by mouthwash brands... which means:  "You'll have better breath throughout the day."

Include Statistics, If They're Relevant.

In the example above, I included an effectiveness percentage. Customers appreciate measurable benefits like percentages, survey numbers, and statistics that support the value of your product or service.

Adding quantifiable facts validates your business and keeps your benefit claim from feeling too general or vague. When making these claims, it's important to verify that they're accurate as well—the FTC can be kind of strict about making companies verify that they can back up their claims !

Be Crystal Clear with Your Benefit Statement.

Along the same lines, you'll want to be as straightforward as possible in your benefit statement. Get to the point and address the customer's needs before you go into great detail about other features. If they ask for more, that's when you can dive deeper.

Share What Makes Your Company Special (e.g., What's Your Unique Value Proposition?).

Chances are you have some competition within your market. Another business, or maybe several, are selling the same products or services as you. Mention benefits that are going to set you apart from the others. This is also known as your unique selling proposition or, in the case of writing a benefits statement, your unique value proposition .

Don't Exaggerate Your Claims.

When talking about the happy ending, make sure you're not setting unrealistic expectations for the customer. You'll be setting them up for disappointment if you're trying to sell your goods as being more than they actually are.

Let their true value speak for themselves. If it's a good product or service, then it'll do well simply by being high quality.

Keep It Short and Sweet.

If you have to go on for a long while trying to sell the benefits of your business, then you probably don't fully understand them yourself, which can be unconvincing to the customer.

Keep your statement concise and to the point, hitting all of the key benefits of each relevant feature efficiently.

Consider Using AI Tools to Help You Start Writing Your Benefit Statement.

Artificial Intelligence tools have come a long way in recent years. While they certainly won't replace a good sales rep in the sales process, they can be useful for helping you get a good start on a statement of benefits.

For example, you could feed a prompt like "sell a [Insert product/service name here]" into an AI generative text tool and see what it gives you. Naturally, you probably can't use the raw text a tool like this generates. These AI "train" on publicly-available text from across the internet—and that includes a lot of bad information.. Also, odds are that the AI won't be able to express your company's unique value proposition.

What an AI text generator  can do is give you a decent starting point—a bit of text for you to polish up and leverage for your benefit statement. Also, since it trains on text from across the web, it can potentially give you a general idea of what's being said by most so you can make your statement more unique.

Roleplay Your Benefit Statement with Other Sales Team Members.

It's one thing to write an initial draft of your benefit statement, but how do you know it's as awesome as it should be? You could experiment with real customers... but it's probably a better idea to roleplay a sales call with another member of the sales team first.

Your peers—especially those who consistently generate great results and have a wealth of sales experience—can provide invaluable feedback for your benefit statement. They can help you revise your terminology, cut out excess language, and even refine how you deliver your statement.

Additionally, if you come up with an awesome statement of benefits that will help improve sales, your team can benefit from using it in their own calls—helping bring up numbers for your whole department. Sharing yours by participating in these roleplay sessions can help your entire team. 

Benefit Statement Examples

There are so many ways you can write a benefit statement. You could write several on one product alone, highlighting all the different ways it can provide value to a customer.

Alternatively, you could create a benefit statement that encompasses a range of features of your product when they're used synergistically — HubSpot does a great job of this, since the more tools you use on their platform, the better your sales and marketing data analytics will be. 

Need some inspiration to help you get started? Here's a list of benefit sample examples for you.

A business owner is having a difficult time marketing their business. You're an agency offering marketing consultations.

Benefit statement : Creating a clear marketing plan with us will help you organize the information you need to take intentional and confident action in marketing your business and attract at least five new clients over the next quarter.

A homeowner is debating whether or not to purchase hurricane insurance for the upcoming storm season. You're an insurance broker looking to help them find coverage.

Benefit statement : Hurricane insurance helps you bounce back in the unfortunate event that your home is damaged during a hurricane. Our homeowner's insurance policies cover hurricane damage equal to [value of the prospect's home or the insurance cap for your insurance company's policies] to safeguard your home.

An influencer is purchasing a new smartphone because she wants a higher camera quality. You just got a shipment of the latest smartphone models.

Benefit statement : This new smartphone's camera mode features will guarantee that you're ready for any spur-of-the-moment photoshoots or video recording opportunities no matter where you are.

A mountain climber is stocking up on gear that will help him on his three-week expedition. Your company sells compact, sustainable camping stoves.

Benefit statement : Carrying our lightweight, collapsible burner stove means you'll have hot meals with the push of a button. Save up to 50% pack space and weight compared to a standard camping stove to spare your back on a long trek through the wilderness.

A small company is looking for help rebranding and rebuilding their website. Your digital marketing agency has a full staff of developers and copywriters with over 25 years of experience.

Benefit statement : Our team of developers, designers, and copywriters have over 25 years of experience developing websites that generate leads, increase brand awareness, and promote business for clients.

Here's one for a more traditional retail setting: A parent is looking for a present for their child's thirteenth birthday, but they don't know what to get, they're too pressed for time to do serious shopping, or the item their child really wanted is out of stock. You're a customer sales rep at a major retail chain trying to up your sales numbers.

Benefit statement : Don't know what to get for your kid right now? Get them a gift card so they can pick and choose what they want! You can either have them use it here or on our online store and have your special birthday gift delivered to your door.

Your benefit statement is essentially your product or service's claim to fame. Bragging about features can only get you so far into a conversation before the other person asks, "So what?"

You'll always be ready to answer that question with confidence if you understand the value of your business and have benefit statements ready to back that value up.

Douglas Phillips

Former military brat, graduated from Leilehua High School in Wahiawa, Hawaii in 2001. After earning my Bachelor's in English/Professional Writing, took on a job as a writer here at Bluleadz.

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The Running Mann

Humorous Anecdotes, Observations & Accounts of Marathon Running & Agile Adventures.

The Power of Feature Hypotheses

One of the improvements SAFe version 4.5 introduced was incorporating practices from “ The Lean Startup ” into the framework – specifically the use of benefit hypothesis statements into features and epics. This is a story of how well this worked for us.

We were worried about the standard of feature writing across our teams and also wanted to bring them up to speed with the SAFe 4.5 feature hypothesis thinking. Therefore, we organised a Friday afternoon “Lunch and Learn” session for interested team members.

The main objective was to go over a practical example from one of our feature teams and convert an existing feature into a ‘ valuable feature hypothesis statement ‘.

[If you are unfamiliar with the Lean Startup concept of hypotheses, please see supporting post:  Using Hypothesis Statements for Features in Software Development ]

Getting A Feature Benefit Hypothesis Statement

We started with the feature captured below that, no disrespect to team, was not very well written. The definition I like to use for a well written feature is that: ‘ someone outside the team can read it once and understand what needs to be done ’. At this stage I don’t even think that most of the team understood the feature.

Luckily we had the product owner (PO) in the room. We asked him a few probing questions that went something like this.

Team: Why are we doing this change? What is the benefit? PO: We need to update the audit report fields for our customers. Team: Why do they need the additional fields. PO: So that customers can check for errors before they submit them to us for processing. Team: Why do they check for errors? How does this work? PO: All customers have a QA person or someone similar checking these reports to prevent errors being processed. When errors get missed and processed, it wastes time and causes a lot of frustration. Team: So what exactly is the current problem? PO: Today, customer auditors can’t see all the relevant information on the audit reports for cross-checking and referencing so many errors are still processed. Team: What is the intended result of this change? PO: We’ll reduce the error rate by 95%. [And BAM! We get our hypothesis]

Interesting takeout: The PO did not come right out with the “95% error reduction” even though it was in his head from the start – it required a conversation to get his knowledge shared with the rest of the team. This is part of the magic of conversation within collocated teams – and the importance of having a PO who works with the team.

The benefit hypothesis makes the “why” clear to without having to write a long document. Everyone in the room quickly came to the same understanding as to what needed to be done and why. A well worded hypothesis statement helps remove ambiguities and focuses the team on what really needs to be done. [To understand why “why?” is important – see Simon Sinek’s TED Talk below.]

The other (perhaps even more) positive outcome is that it gives “purpose” to the teams’ work. I asked the group, “Would you rather (a) update some fields on an audit report or (b) reduce error rates by 95%?” – unsurprisingly there was unanimous agreement that (b) was the more exciting option.

“Reducing error rates by 95%” gives meaning to the team’s work. I am unlikely to go home and proudly tell my kids I updated some fields on an audit report. But telling them that I helped reduce foreign exchange error rates by 95% makes my job as a developer on a transactional banking system sound sexy and important!

Feature Acceptance Criteria & Slicing

We then moved onto the feature acceptance criteria (AC). The simple way I view feature AC is, “ How will we UAT the feature to know that it’s complete and fit for purpose? ” (as opposed to user story AC which are the actual unit test cases).

If you are not able to write clear AC you don’t know enough to proceed with the feature so this was a good test of the strength of our feature hypothesis. Once again it was an interesting and valuable discussion with participants throwing various questions at the PO. A summary is below:

Which countries are in scope?

The PO initially said “all countries”. Further conversation sliced it down to two countries (South Africa and Uganda) where there was definite current need – from there it made sense to split the feature into one for each country. South Africa had the most urgent need so we focused on that and the lower priority Uganda feature went onto the backlog (where it will remain until it becomes priority). The requirement that the initial feature for South Africa be scalable for other countries was included as a non-functional requirement.

Attempted slipping in of a production defect

The PO tried to slip a production defect into the AC (the format of the onscreen and printed reports are different). The team deftly managed to slice the defect off the feature (the defect fix is roughly the same size as the eventual feature). The valid defect was added to the team backlog (where the PO can prioritise it against other work to determine when it will get fixed).

Attempted scope creep

The PO also tried to slip a new requirement into the AC – the ability to be able to save audit reports as a .pdf file. Once again the team deftly convinced the PO that this was not part of the minimum viable product (MVP) by referring to the hypothesis statement (i.e. we don’t need to save to .pdf to test the hypothesis). The valid requirement was also added to the team backlog (and the PO gets to decide when it’s priority enough to be built).

Interesting takeout: In my opinion, the PO was doing his job perfectly – trying to get as much as possible into the feature to maximise the customer benefit. Because he’s part of the overall team having the conversation he gets to understand the trade-offs involved with different decisions. When posed with the question, “Do you want to have the feature done in 2 weeks if we just do MVP or do you want to wait for 2 months if we do ‘ all this other stuff ‘?” a good PO will always go for “ small and fast “.

By reducing the feature to a single (highest priority) country and omitting other requirements that (whilst important) had no impact on the hypothesis statement, the feature ended up being at least 10 times smaller than if we’d tried to include everything. Slicing the feature down to get the most value with the least amount of work drastically increases the speed with which it can be built and dramatically reduces risk.

The team left the room knowing exactly what needed to be done. More importantly everyone had agreed on what didn’t need to be done “right now” (i.e. in the next sprint) because they were not MVP (however these requirements have been added to the team backlog and can be done when the PO prioritises them). The PO was also part of all the decisions taken so he should get no nasty surprises when the feature is presented back as “done”.

Conclusion: Super-Quick Delivery

The best part of this story was that two weeks later when I asked the team “How’s the feature going?”, the reply was “It’s already done.”

The team was able to fully design, build and test a valuable feature in less than two weeks (fitting easily into a 2-week sprint). In the past a feature like this would usually take 12 months to deliver (see the supporting post “ 6 Reasons: From 12 Months to 2 Weeks for Feature Delivery “). By slicing the feature down to its true MVP and the team knowing exactly what was needed and why, the feature flew through the development value stream.

Of course, now the real test is to measure whether our hypothesis proves true and we successfully reduce the error rate by 95% – let’s hope so! We’ll know pretty soon…

The actual reduction in client error rates was 80%. As it stands this has been deemed sufficient. There are no plans to build additional features to further reduce the error rates (as there have been higher priority features to work on). Likewise, the production defect has not been fixed (and may never be) since it has never been a priority compared to other more beneficial work.

I delivered a presentation on “The Power of Feature Hypotheses” at Agile Africa 2018 using this and other examples. Here is the video link from the conference:  https://youtu.be/CUVX1AiqQak?list=PLp6xQ3fl72zIu8FJjDtBUFUS0w1FPQhPZ

I am also more than happy to submit a speaker proposal for your conference. Feel free to contact me via email: [email protected] or Twitter @runningmann100 /  @StuartDMann .

4 Replies to “The Power of Feature Hypotheses”

• Pingback: 6 Reasons: From 12 Months to 2 Weeks for Feature Delivery - The Running Mann
• Pingback: Using Hypothesis Statements for Features in Software Development - The Running Mann

Good account of what we discussed in the session and what was learnt. Going forward it will definitely provide a mechanism for us to access information on the sessions to further unpack.

• Pingback: How George Costanza, Frogger & a Craving For Sushi Help Explain Features & User Stories - The Running Mann

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Minimum Requirements for a Feature

Minimum requirements for a feature: what is a benefit hypothesis, minimum requirements for a feature: who writes acceptance criteria, feature definition.

A feature, within the scaled Agile definition (SAfe), requires a benefits hypothesis and acceptance criteria. These establish what and why you are testing and how you will determine success or failure. Each feature will usually have three key components that form the minimum requirements: Beneficiaries. These are needed upfront to establish the hypothesis and the acceptance criteria. Benefit hypothesis.  Acceptance criteria.

.css-uphcpb{position:absolute;left:0;top:-87px;} How do you write a feature in agile?

The minimum requirements already discussed can be made more detailed by covering a few related areas:

The beneficiaries.

The benefit hypothesis. 

The feature’s business value.

A clear feature description.

Acceptance criteria.

The two fundamental elements of the benefits hypothesis and the acceptance criteria can be unpacked in a little more detail to illustrate their individual and collective roles for features.

The benefit hypothesis is the business value that the feature is expected to deliver. Similar to a scientific hypothesis, this is a statement that will ultimately be tested to see if it is correct. A good formula to use is:

If (proposition), then (benefit)

The proposition is what your team plans to deliver, while the benefit is the value that this will deliver. Benefits can be business-side and include:

Increased efficiency.

Greater transparency.

Cost reductions.

Improved data streams.

Increased revenue.

On the client-side, benefits can include:

Increase customer satisfaction.

Improved functionality.

Greater simplicity for better customer experiences (CX).

How likely is this proposition able to deliver this benefit? 

Is this feature’s success rate quantifiable? 

You must be able to validate your hypothesis to measure the relative success or lack of success of the related feature. Ongoing optimization or even a decision to pivot will not be possible without the ability to quantify how well the proposition succeeded in delivering the benefit.

In Scaled Agile Frameworks (SAFe) a feature’s acceptance criteria are usually written by the stakeholder or the product owner. The acceptance criteria should provide a framework to measure whether the benefit is being delivered by the proposition. In other words, has the feature shown the benefit hypothesis to be correct? If not, is it possible to optimize or would it be better to pivot?

The main functions of acceptance criteria are:

Determine if the feature has been implemented correctly.

Establish whether the business benefits are being delivered.

Mitigate implementation risks.

Facilitate early validation testing to prevent unnecessary costs and effort.

Inform user stories and functional tests.

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