The LBD of copywriting? Features, advantages, and benefits explained

I wanted to share with you a copywriting technique that’s pretty much like the little black dress of copywriting techniques.

It’s super effective, powerful, looks good, and has people turning heads.

All like a little black dress.

What made me think of recording an episode on it today was that I’ve recently been helping a coach with their web copy. Oftentimes with coaches or really anyone who needs web copy, you want the copy to be concise and impactful. And so on the website I use this copywriting technique, which is FAB, my favourite word ever.

It’s basically the features, advantages, and benefits.

It’s really helpful because it helps you go beyond just listing what the product or service is. Instead, it shows why it matters to your audience, and that’s where you get really compelling copy, rather than just listing all the features. You say exactly how it helps.

If you’ve ever been stuck on how to make your offer stand out, or if you’re tired of complicated copywriting tips or sifting through different types of techniques, I really recommend you to start with this one. Because it’s really simple, it’s clear, and it’s actually super effective as well.

I read an interesting statistic recently that the average attention span now on the internet is about eight seconds. So we really don’t have that much time to capture people’s attention.

In a recent episode, I was talking with Eleni who’s a business psychologist, who said people need to see about 20 pieces of your content before they make a purchasing decision.

So that means you’ve got to show people a lot of stuff in a really small dose way. And so you really want your messages to be super powerful and crisp and clear. That’s why I think this FAB technique is really important.

In a recent episode, I spoke with Eleni, a business psychologist, who shared that people often need to see around 20 pieces of your content before making a purchasing decision. This means you need to present your messages in small, impactful doses. You want your copy to be powerful, crisp, and clear. That’s exactly why the FAB technique is so valuable.

Here’s how FAB works:

• Feature: The fact or basic information about your product or service. For example, if you’re a therapist who offers online sessions, the feature here is “online therapy sessions.”

• Advantage: Why that feature is useful and how it makes things easier or more effective. With online therapy, an advantage might be that it’s accessible from anywhere with an internet connection, making it more convenient.

• Benefit: The payoff for the client or customer—how it makes their life better. This part is often personal and can vary widely from person to person. For example, with online therapy, the benefit could be receiving support from the comfort of your own home, attending sessions in your pyjamas, or even accessing therapy while travelling the world. For a busy person, it might mean fitting a session into their lunch break.

The feature answers “what” the product or service is. The advantage explains why it’s important and how it improves the experience. The benefit answers why it’s valuable to the client, often on a personal or emotional level.

This FAB copywriting technique is so widely used. 

Once you start looking for it, you’ll find it everywhere. And particularly Apple. Apple loves the FAB technique. I literally went on their website and the first product that was advertised was the new MacBook Pro that’s coming out in December in 2024. And I scrolled down and yeah, pretty much the technique was in action.

So they’re talking about a special type of chip. I don’t know what it means, but anyway, it’s a chip. 

The M4 family of chips features a GPU with a second generation hardware accelerated ray tracing engine that renders images faster. So gaming feels more immersive and realistic than ever before.

And dynamic caching optimises fast on-chip memory to drastically increase average GPU utilisation, driving a huge performance boost for the most demanding pro apps and games. 

Now there’s a lot of gobbledygook in there. I don’t know what on earth a GPU is. I don’t understand dynamic caching. I’m not really sure what an M4 family of chips is, but the other stuff sounds really good, right?

So the feature is: the M4 family of chips with GPU

That’s the technical detail. So I lead with that, but then the advantage is like, how is that important and how can that make things better? And that’s renders image faster and optimises fast on chip memory to dramatically increase GPU utilisation.

Cool. That sounds great. That’s like how the features work to improve the speed of the efficiency, making it more powerful. But then the benefit, which is the only thing that really stood out to me and made me go, Oh my gosh, yes, I need this. Even though I don’t know what the hell it is, the benefit was run graphics, intensive workflows with the responsiveness that keeps up with your imagination.

So the benefit was gaming feels more immersive and realistic than ever before.

Which, you know, if I was a gamer, I’d be like, hell yeah, I need this in my life. So that’s just one example of how Apple uses it. But if you go on their website, you can have a little look at that, or you can look at anything really. 

Maybe even the iPhone would have an example, but how do you even find the benefits or advantages, right? There are a few questions that you can ask yourself.

If you’ve got the feature, think about: How does the feature improve the experience or make things easier? This really uncovers the advantage by showing why the feature is useful.

Another question is: What makes this feature unique compared to others? This can point out the advantage or highlight what sets that feature apart.

For benefits, consider: What’s the emotional or personal payoff for the user?

Or, what frustration or pain does this remove for the user? This goes straight to the benefit, particularly if your product or service solves a specific pain point.

Another question to ask: What feeling or experience does the user gain by using this? This really taps into those positive emotions or experiences. 

One method I use when writing copy is to ask, “So what?” Keep asking yourself “So what?” until you get to something that’s really juicy. It’s almost like peeling back layers.

If you ask, How does this feature make things easier? or What makes this feature unique?, you’re in the advantage territory. 

But if you go a little deeper and ask questions like, What frustration does this remove? or What feelings does the user gain?, you’re moving into the benefit territory. That’s where real connection and the “Oh yes, I need this product or service” moment happens.

They aren’t really looking for features, they’re looking for the results. They don’t care about your product or service; they care about what it can do for them.

So if you lead with the benefits or acknowledge the benefits, it really taps into why people should care about what you’re selling.

So, if you lead with or acknowledge the benefits, it really taps into why people should care about what you’re selling. There’s even research indicating that benefit focused copy can increase conversions by up to 45%. I feel like it might be even higher, but I’m not sure. I just believe it could be a lot higher.

But I thought I’d give some more examples about how you can use FAB based on a few different services.