OK…The first step if you want to capture attention is to focus on a problem.
But that’s only the first step. How do we go from “mild curiosity” to having our prospect really care about the story we’re about to tell?
Care so much that they’ll give us a call?
Care so much that they’ll pay us large sums of money to solve it for them?
The answer is by communicating the consequences of not solving the problem. This is the stage at which we make our prospect start to really care about the challenge that faces the character you’ve created.
Consequences address the question of, “Why should I care?” or “Why is that a big deal?” Sometimes a form of Socratic questioning can be highly effective in uncovering the consequences of a particular problem.
Dan and Stan are in conversation. Dan is struggling to hire a salesperson for the St. Louis territory. The search has been going on for over 9 weeks and he still hasn’t found the right person.
Stan: “I don’t understand why you just don’t hire the best person you’ve found thus far. I mean you must have interviewed over 30 candidates.”
Dan: “I tried that once and it really backfired on me. If all you’ve seen is grade C prospects you’re not going to get someone who is really going to solidify our sales position in the mid-west. Compromising just isn’t going to work.”
Stan: “I still think that you’re making too big a deal out of this. I mean you’ve got the majority market share right now-what is it, 65%? That’s huge. Any warm body would have to work real hard to mess that up. I still think you’re being too picky.”
Dan: “And I think you’re missing the point. Sure, I’ve got a majority market share at the moment, but that only because our largest competitors new it wasn’t worth their time to try to muscle in while Susan was working the territory. Now that she’s gone, you know they’ll be dog-birding the new rep to see if they’re as strong. I put an ‘also-ran’ in that job and I’m going to have competitors coming out of my ears in less than 30 days.”
Stan: “Well I really I think you’re giving your competitors a lot more credit for awareness than they deserve.”
Dan: “Suppose you’re right. Suppose they don’t bird-dog my guy. Here’s the next problem. Corporate is rolling out the new products at the end of the month. If this guy isn’t up to speed by then, he’s toast when it comes to being able to talk coherently about the new stuff.”
Stan: “I guess I hadn’t thought of that.”
Dan: “If this guy isn’t super sharp I’m not only not going to make my numbers on the new product, but dollar to donuts he’ll start falling apart with the prime products.”
Stan: “True, I guess the last thing you want is for someone to get overwhelmed.”
Dan: “Yeah, I’ve gone done that road before. Once they feel that they’re in over their heads, they start to get nervous and then embarrassed that they’re not doing better. The next thing I know I’ve got a resignation notice sitting on my desk and I’m starting over from scratch.”
So let’s examine this dialogue and see how it uncovered some real and substantial consequences to the problem of staffing a sales position that Dan faces.
The conversation starts out with the problem being, “not all that big a deal”. This is the attitude that many of your prospects will have as well. Although you may think that the consequences of not addressing the problem are obvious, your prospect is likely not to be as self-aware. As a result of the ensuing dialogue it becomes apparent that there are at least three consequences to compromising and hiring only a average candidate.
1) The competition is likely to find out and as a result put a greater emphasis on gaining market share.
2) There is a new product being introduced. It will be a challenge to get up to speed on both the existing product line and the new one. Unless the new hire is extremely sharp it’s likely that he or she will get overwhelmed and be effective at neither.
3) As a consequence of becoming overwhelmed, the odds of the new rep quitting become increasingly likely. This would put Dan back in the position he currently is with the added pressure of wasted time.
It’s likely that if we allowed the conversation between Dan and Stan to continue, we would uncover additional consequences for not addressing the problem. At this stage in the development of your sales story you may find it helpful to map out the consequences section by using this form of interactive dialogue.
This “devils advocate” approach can be highly effective in uncovering consequences that might otherwise not be readily apparent. Although one could use the discussion model to communicate these consequences, that may not be feasible or practical, especially if your story is to be told verbally. This Socratic dialogue technique is often best used for uncovering the key points rather than as a method for story telling. However, if your story is being told on your blog, website or through a sales letter, dialogue can be a highly effective tool.
The story that we have developed thus far might be told as follows:
Dan Sullivan wondered to himself why with the economy so poor was it so difficult to recruit a top flight sales rep? When he started the search 9 weeks ago, he felt confident that he would have it wrapped up by now. Unfortunately nothing could be further from the truth.
“Over 30 interviews and I’m not really impressed with any of these people” thought Dan to himself.
He pulled the schedule for the rest of the week up on his computer and groaned. Hardly an open hour remained. “Maybe I should just hire one of these people and hope for the best” he considered as he once again shuffled through the pile of resumes.
His hand paused mid-thought as he reflected on what had happened the last time he had gone down that road. It had been over 5 years ago but the painful memory still lingered. “What a bust that was. Not only did he only last in the job 6 weeks, but our largest competitor instinctively knew we had compromised our hiring standards. They’d stayed out of the territory when we had an A player in place, but this industry is so incestuous-everyone knows everyone-that they rushed in once I hired the best of the mediocre. I certainly don’t want to be sitting here 6 weeks from now starting this process all over again from scratch.”
Dan’s eye turned to his Blackberry and it’s most recent message. “Update on Sniffer New Product Introduction at 3 pm Today” read the subject line. “One more reason not to compromise”, thought Dan. “This person is going to need to not only get up to speed on the existing product line, but this new product is going to challenging to explain to our prospects. Great potential, it could be huge for us, but I really need someone who is going to catch on quickly.”
Realizing he had made his decision, Dan picked up the phone and placed a call he had been hoping to avoid. “These search consultants are awfully expensive, I was really hoping to do it myself, but I just don’t see how I’m going to find the person I need on my own.”
What makes your unique sales story compelling and interesting is the layering of facts it contains. At the early stages of the story, when your prospect is still considering in their mind whether to pay attention to you, we need to make them care about what you are communicating. If you think about stories that didn’t engage you, often times the reason was because the problem they focused on just didn’t seem to be “that big a deal”. By infusing your story with the consequences that can occur we make our prospects care. And that’s a very important step since if they don’t care about the problem they certainly won’t care about the solution. And if they don’t care about that, the odds of them becoming a paying client become very long indeed.
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