by Nick Miller of Clarity Advantage

In which we are reminded about the subtle cues we use to control conversation and how they affect what we learn from clients. 

“It’s in how you ask the question, the eye contact, your body language. Are you really wanting to hear the answer or do you want to move on?”

My wife and I had just returned from a neighborhood pre-Christmas party. 25 people, folks that we see every year at this party plus new neighbors who had moved in during the year. Each of the families contributes food to the table and hors d’oeuvres. It’s a magnificent spread. People are happy, glad to see each other, catching up on up to a year’s worth of news.

I consider myself fairly sociable and conversational in these settings. However, when we came home, my wife returned with all kinds of information about the neighbors’ mothers, sisters, jobs, husbands, former husbands, kids, and on and on. “I got nothing” would be too harsh an assessment of my own learning during the evening and there was a dramatic difference between what I had learned and what my wife had learned.

by Nick Miller of Clarity Advantage

In which we are reminded that there ain’t no such thing as a commodity if we consider buyers’ preferences and their buying experience.

The golden New Hampshire morning sun was three hours old. Under a perfect sky, the campus and her students lay still on a Sunday morning. And, then, we were awake.

Dee-dah-dee.   Digga-digga-deeeee-deeeeeeeee.

The powerful opening strains of Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D minor played at Led Zeppelin volume. I’d never heard it before.

by Nick Miller of Clarity Advantage

In which we are reminded of the value of over-preparing for high stakes sales calls.

Long ago in auditoriums far away, thousands of my closest friends and I competed in the Toastmasters International annual public speaking contests.  Best training ever. 

These were five round single elimination contests, speeches five to seven minutes long, played out over a few months every spring.  Only seven of the many thousand contestants appeared in the final round. 

While some speakers were very cool about the contests, most of us were not.  Our bellies churned, our shirts moistened, our skins felt cold and clammy, our throats … got… very…. tight… and our hands shook.

In which we discuss strategies to draw attention and attract  prospects and referrals.

During a training session for branch managers and small business bankers, I shifted the focus from typical networking and prospecting to “attraction marketing” – attracting prospects to us rather than stalking and chasing them.

Feeling a little frisky, I asked, “Remember when you were dating? What strategies did you use to attract people to you?” Virtually all eyes in the room went straight to the floor. Silence.

In which we consider the advantages of introducing ourselves as our benefit rather than as our job description.

Each time I sat in his office,  his small bronzed desk plaque hissed at me, “Do not confuse effort with results.”  30 inches distant,  securely bolted, passive, dead center, front.   Whatever the topic, the plaque stripped the varnish away. “Let’s look… at what you’ve  d o n e.”
 
Segue to… a business gathering. You’re mingling with others. Someone turns to you and says, “Hello, I’m Fred Smith from Amoximated Company.  What do you do?”  You don’t know Fred, you don’t know what’s important to him or what he’s listening for. How do you respond?
 
With a result.  The desk plaque’s legacy.  You could say:
 
 
 (1) “Hello. Fred, I’m a senior relationship manageer at ABC Company based here in the city. I manage our major account relationships in the consumer packaging industry. I work with a team of people who bring expertise from several important financial and technical disciplines to help our clients manufacture more efficiently.”
 
or..
 
 (2) “Hello, Fred.  I work at ABC Company. I help consumer packaging companies reduce manufacturing costs five to ten percent.
 
 
The first one is an “EFFORT” description — a job title and job description, bland, passive, pablum. The second one is a RESULT – crisp, unapologetic, provocative. If Fred wants more discussion, the starting line is bold and clear.     He’s likely to ask, “How do you do that?”
 
Listen, next time you’re mixing with others. What do you hear? Effort or results?  “I sell office equipment. I’m a corporate banker. I’m an asset manager. I sell ball bearings.  I’m a senior accountant at Knight and Day.”  It’s all “effort” and job description. 
 
To stand out, focus on your results. The benefit statements of you. And, if you can’t prove quantitative results, focus on how you help others achieve them.  For example:  The qualitative result,  “I help business owners operate their companies more efficiently,” is stronger than the job description, “I’m a branch manager” or “I’m a Business Banker.”
 
Do not confuse them with your effort or your job title.  Focus on your results.

by Nick Miller of Clarity Advantage

… in which we discuss the benefits of asking broader questions before we qualify someone for our products..It’s a small cafeteria. Solid food to the right. Salad to the left. Cashier at the end.
 
Running to an early morning project team meeting down the hall, two of us swept through, grabbing orange juices, bananas, and blueberry yogurts to sustain us. “Spoons,” my partner said. “Right,” I replied, looking left, right, and down. “Spoons.”
 
None in sight. “This is silly,” I thought, looking at counter tops. “They should be here.” Couldn’t see a one.
 
We found cafeteria staff. She pointed down to the counter that had been directly in front of us. I could see them, now that I’d backed up a few paces. Spoons. Full-sized spoons. BLACK spoons.
 
Well, I hadn’t been looking for full-sized BLACK spoons. I’d been looking for small, flimsy, white plastic spoons. I was right on top of the black spoons and I couldn’t see them while I was looking right at them.
 
We have this experience in sales calls, too. We’re moving so quickly and looking so intently for the specific needs we planned to address (white spoons) that we miss other possible opportunities or needs that we could sell or cross sell (black spoons).
 
One strategy to address this tendency is to start with ‘business’ questions rather than ‘product-qualification questions.’
 
Business questions are broad, survey questions. Product qualification questions tend to be very specific.
 
Suppose we’re selling printers and software. The just-looking-for-white-spoons “product qualification” questions would sound something like, “What kind of computers and software are you using” or “What kind of network are you operating” or “How do you currently print proposals?”
 
If we’re bankers, the product qualification just-looking-for-white-spoons questions could include “what checking accounts do you use” or “how do you use lines of credit to finance seasonal working capital?” or “how do you currently collect and process your accounts receivable?”
 
Broader business questions might include, “How has your business been evolving over the last couple of years” or “What sorts of challenges are you facing in supporting your customers” or “How have the changes in the economy affected your business?”
 
Questions like these broaden our vision a bit. We can, at least, see the black spoons or other spoons, whether or not we choose to pick them up.

by Nick Miller of Clarity Advantage