Do Your Customers Have Needs Or Wants?

You may have noticed I use the word want instead of the word need. Customers don’t need what you have, but they might want what you have.

I first learned this way of thinking from Jacques Werth and Richard Himmer, and I’ve continued to think on it more and more over the years.

I have two main reasons for switching from need to want.

The first is stop kidding yourself. If someone needs food or shelter, don’t sell it to them, give it to them:

If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? (James 2:15-16 NKJV).

People can live without your product or service. They don’t need it. If they needed it, be like the good Samaritan and love them (Luke 10:25-37 NKJV).

The second is it makes you better. You sell feelings; you don’t sell stuff. People want a better future. They want to fulfill a dream or a desire. They want to fulfill a want.

Your product or service is not the thing you are selling. Your product or service is a vehicle that delivers the feelings you're selling.

What do you think?
Joseph