Messaging: Are they really listening, or looking to escape?

Karl;

I completely agree with you.

I also agree with Seth Godin who says “If you can’t state your position in eight words or less then you don’t have a position.”

I teach what I call a ‘Seven Second Sale’. The template for this is “We help (market segment) (do something everyone in that market wants)”. Notice I said wants not needs. The want is the emotional component that helps hook the listener.

The intent is to have the other person say, at the end of your seven second sale, something like “How do you do that?”.

I know a lady who runs a womens fitness/wellness facility whose seven second sale is “We help women feel beautiful in anything”.

I know a lady who runs a center for high risk kids and her seven second sale is “We help kids reach their full potential.”

I sit on the advisory team for a company called VendorRate.com and their seven second sale to CIOs is “We reduce the risk of buying IT”.

My own seven second sale is “We help smaller companies outsell bigger companies”

The only intent is to pique someone’s interest enough to have them asking you to tell them more or how do I get myself some of that.

Craig Elias
Creator of Trigger Event Selling

Karl,

Good article – I would like to add the following – never have I made a sale by talking about the product or service – why would I want to build a relationship based on a product, service, company – the more I talk about the customer – the more they want to talk about what I have to offer –

Also, I think sales training has always been about the stupid product or service which if it bores me – then it will bore my customer – and who decides who is the best to provide sales training. When I was at MCI, we had outside sales trainers – and one time – I went up to the sales trainer and gave him some advice on how to really get the class motivated to participate yada yada yada – he was such an ass – he made fun of me and my advice during the next day’s training class – big mistake –

So, unless you are skilled in the ROI, the research, the product – allow your technical people who know the details to sell – and get a financial guy to do the ROI – that is the biggest bunch of bs I have ever heard or seen over my years of selling –

Don’t waste your time – take them to play golf – you will get better ROI from that -

Karl,
yet another great post. If a sales person tells me they are having a hard time the first question I ask is how do you feel about your products or company. Nine time out of ten it is not a positive response. From there we focus a little time on the product and figure out if it is REALLY that bad, or that they did not understand something properly, or were going after the wrong clients.
More often than not once the salesperson can find true passion for the product there is no longer an issue.

Craig, your advice was awesome… I am going to start teaching that model. It is so simple and effective. Much better than the 60 second elevator speech most people teach.

Thanks to both of you!

Brad Trnavsky
Sales Management 2.0

Great article Karl, I particularly liked your point on brevity and clarity. It finaly clicked in place when I thought about all the politicians I have heard answering questions. Why can’t a politian answer a simple question in a yes or no? Because, if they take three or four minutes using ultra long sentences and using confusing terminology, then the audience won’t understand properly – which I think is the aim of being a politician.

The trouble is, that this form of communication does actually sound quite impressive. “I don’t understand what you are saying, but you are using some really long words, therefore you must know what you are talking about”. The problem is that this doesn’t work (at least not in the long run) in the sales world, because when you are asking for a client to commit to buying, the last thing they want is to be confused.

This is one of the reasons that sales presentations and even in ad copy the entire message must be repeated several times. Of course, you want to also qualify the prospect with a series of questions that will ultimately get him or her to say “yes”.

This should keep them alert and awake. If not just go back over the message again.

All,

Your additions to this blog are fantastic! With so many great people giving feedback, we are really building something.

Karl