My writing project for that day was a proposal for an online textbook. This message motivated me to add a feature and benefit analysis to the proposal. It consisted of a one page, horizontal, ten-row, three-column table. The columns were labeled as follows:

Feature.

Benefit for Instructor.

Benefit for Students.

Both features and benefits were described in language that the publisher would be likely to consider appropriate for both telemarketers' scripts and direct-mail marketing.

The acquisition editor mentioned this table in the e-mail message he sent me a few days ago acknowledging receipt of the proposal package. He said that it indicated I was "a real pro." Hopefully, this judgment will translate into my being offered a better contract than I would have otherwise. Regardless, I plan to include a similar table in all future proposal packages. With the "bottom line" fixation that most (if not all) textbook publishers currently have, doing so couldn't hurt.