Follow the leader

I think that there’s a science to storytelling. Good storytellers transport their audiences, making them feel what the characters feel. For audiences to bond with characters in this way, there has to be some sort of arousal response in the brain. I mean that in order to engage the listener, storytelling requires the ability to tell a story with just the right emotion, description, and details… not too much and not too little. 

 

What distinguishes business storytelling from classical storytelling?
Business storytelling has a clearly stated point. Classical stories are enriched by multi-layered interpretations, but in business storytelling, there should be no doubt in the listeners’ minds about what they should do in response to your story. When it comes to business stories, don’t just wing it and ramble. Know the structure that will be easiest for your audience to follow and then they will not only follow the story, but they’ll also follow you as a leader.

The keys to a good story

When it comes to storytelling one of the best ways to draw people to you is not by telling them - you should do this or that, you should listen to me, etc. A much more powerful and persuasive way to do it is to share the same lesson in a story. I think that sharing a good story is a win-win as both the storyteller and the audience are elevated to a higher level. The more you tell, the more you sell, set the stage, start dialogues, and present the point.

 

I think all good stories starts with you taking the audience to a time and place when this happens, and you need to be very specific. Perhaps, I’m mistaken but I remember that fairy tales always start with, “once upon a time.” When I tell stories I always try to set the stage, for example, “many years ago I did…” to create a mental image in your imagination. I like to use dialogues because dialogues are so powerful in storytelling as places the listeners and readers right in the middle of the scenario. For example, how many of you can visualise a 2m tall guy on stage from the back of the room? See, dialogue immediately puts your listeners right into the middle of the action, and this is a very powerful thing to do. What’s the moral of the story? What’s the transformation? What’s the one takeaway that you want the listener to have? 

What is your story?

I think for brand storytelling to work, we have to understand where we’re starting, where it is we aspire to be, how much time we’re willing to invest and how committed we are to executing this consistently. And that’s when we’ll see the relative force behind a brand story jump dramatically. The force is your brand story and what you are able to accomplish by committing to it over a specific period of time.

 

How consistently will you tell your brand story? This usually follows closely on the heels of an organisation’s willingness to change how they approach marketing and how they connect with audiences. Are you trying to accomplish great things but refuse to step away from your brand-centred tactics? Alternatively, are you willing to become customer-centric and shift your efforts in their direction? Where you are right now with your level of sophistication in brand storytelling? Contact me via e-mail fro arrange a storytelling workshop for your brand.

Storytelling on Sunday

Business storytelling elements help you engage your audience and leave a lasting impression. A story with business impact can be as short as one sentence, a three-minute speech, or a thirty-minute product demonstration. No matter what, it should have the following:
-       An intriguing beginning
-       A riveting middle
-       And a satisfying end


For brand storytelling to work, we have to understand where we’re starting, where it is we aspire to be, how much time we’re willing to invest and how committed we are to executing this consistently. That’s when we’ll see the relative force behind a brand story jump dramatically. I have helped leaders build relationships, credibility, and impact via stories. Contact me via e-mail for a meeting about how to create a short story that other people can relate to.

Think big, start small and start now!

I’m self-made as I wasn’t born with a silver spoon in my mouth. I was fortunate to be born in London to Jamaican parents with an expectation that I would be successful. My early sales and marketing lessons were learned in the inner city. I think that you are more likely to succeed in sales and marketing if you have certain personality traits, for example, being extrovert, assertive and it also helps to be emotionally stable to tolerate rejection.

This week I have been leading a Focus Group for a new womenswear brand, XIII.dk. I’ve always enjoyed selling straight to the consumer as there are more customers and you are directly in front of the decision maker. There’s a fast feedback loop when you sell direct-to-consumer (DtC), and you receive true comments without filter which enables you to learn very quickly and intuitively. This week was a wonderful reminder that selling DtC is way less stressful and more rewarding because you are changing the individual lives with the high quality clothing. 

Sales is a performance art

I love to have conversations, do you? In order to have a great conversation we need to know more about that person or persons. Asking open-ended questions is the key to keep the other person talking and from a psychological standpoint, when the other person is talking, they are sharing a lot of information about themselves. When I am speaking to people, I want them to feel comfortable with me and I want to hear their story and gather information, so when I begin to talk, it will have more relevance and impact.

 

One of the best things you can do as a salesperson is to listen, look at things from the customer’s point of view and learn how to ask good questions. In my experience, I have found that the average salesperson practices what to say, the best salespersons practice what to ask. This is because when you ask, you keep the conversation going and you focus on them and not yourself. We often think that selling is about talking, it’s not. Selling is about understanding and if you can understand your customers, you can have better conversations. Remember, when you are talking to the customer that it’s not a presentation, it’s a conversation. 

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Everyone thinks they are the best

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Mammals are naturally territorial animals and view strangers as a threat. In nature, unfamiliar creatures pose a threat when they encroach on an animal's territory. How do you build trust with new people? How good is your judgement about what to work on? The process, your skill set, and your ability is the secret to success.

 

Everyone knows that sales professionals need to ask lots of questions, but what questions should you ask?
-  Are they written down?
-  Have planned them out?
-  Are they sequenced?
-  Are you taking the client from where they are to where they need to be?

 

Selling is a performance, knowing the elements of your products or services is just a tiny part. I think it’s all about how well you ask questions and uncover the client’s needs and then design your questions to build interest in your products or services. Focus on what you can control, and you have control over your strategy, tactics, and planning. Contact me via e-mail for developing yourself and a review of how well you are executing your sales strategy.

What did you say?

Verbal communication is a skill, one must be careful about how you say things to avoid misunderstandings because everyone has different meaning for same words. In this world what you say doesn’t matter as much as how you say it. When putting forward an opinion, you need to think about your choice of words, your gestures, body language and about your tone intensity pitch. 

 

My father always used to say, “It’s not what you say, it’s the way that you say it!” I think that this is correct and incorrect at the same time, as it's both what you say AND how you say it. The non-verbal components of an assertive message are really the key to its effectiveness. When a customer sees you - your look and your body language - you are already communicating to them, non-verbally, and they are deciding whether or not they want to listen.

I trust science

In general, scientists are motivated in their work by curiosity about the world and how it works. Behavioural science is the branch of science that deals primarily with human interaction and has a fundamental connection to sales, as salespersons ask a lot of questions, experiment and interact with buyers. 


Contact me via e-mail for a peer review of your sales process. I think that sales professionals who understand the core concepts of behavioural science are better able to engage their customers because they have:

  • Increased self-awareness

  • Improved emotional intelligence

  • Improved agility

  • Reduced social anxiety

  • Reduced fear in managing difficult conversations

  • Improved ability to assess challenges and opportunities objectively

Tell the truth

c/o Apple TV

Many of you have heard about the Apple TV series, “Ted Lasso”, perhaps you have seen it. It’s about an American football coach Ted Lasso who is hired by a wealthy divorcée to coach the English football (soccer)team AFC Richmond. Here’s 10 leadership lessons from Ted Lasso:
1. Believe in believe
2. Live in the moment 
3. Doing the right thing is never the wrong thing
4. All people are different people
5. Optimism is a superpower
6. Be kind
7. Tell the truth 
8. Happiness is a choice
9. Forgive first
10. See the good in others

Many of you may also have heard the English phrase, “Many a true word is spoken in jest.” Watching “Ted Lasso” may not make you a better sales leader. What’s wrong with sales leadership today and how I can fix it? Contact me via e-mail if you are interested in hearing more.

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Don’t mistake courtesy for consent

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Some salespersons are busy going around and around but never seeing clients, so their progress is small. Many sales trainers forget to separate “knowledge” and how much time salespersons should spend in front of their clients in their sales training. It’s essential to teach salespersons that they should never mistake activity for achievement.

Do you have a systematic way of getting better every day?
It often takes more than a good idea to make things a success. All around us there are hidden forces which make it difficult for us to reach our goals, close a sale or convince others to adopt new ideas, often, an outsider’s expertise is most helpful in identifying these areas of improvement. I would like to offer you a free 30 minute consultation to help you maximise performance and leadership - for yourself and your organisation. 
Click here and book a free 30-minute consultation with me. This offer ends on 30th January 2022.

More feedback required

How do you start a feedback loop?
- Plan (choose an action)
- Execute (perform the action)
- Monitor (observe the reaction)
- Analyse (measure the reaction)


Touch points are interactions between businesses and customers that occur during the customer’s journey. These moments significantly influence customer experience as well as brand perception. A good customer journey is when we include everyone who’s involved in a touch point - customers, the people who influence them and those they influence. In order to start a feedback loop, you will need to add another layer to the journey - who, on our brand’s side, holds responsibility for each step and what constitutes a handoff to the next group. These teams need to provide feedback at each step so everyone along the customer journey understands the bigger impact of their work.

Asking better questions

I think that when you slow down and ask better questions, you will sell more effectively. The quality of your questions will determine the quality of the relationship you develop with your clients. If you ask them dumb, simple questions then that’s the relationship you are going to have. On the other hand, if you are asking deep, insightful questions - questions that make them say: “Nobody has ever asked me that” or “I’ve never thought about it from that perspective, let me think about it.”

When the quality of the questions is high, the client knows you are really trying to understand where they are coming from. It’s not about getting them to say yes, it’s about getting them to say, “That’s right, you understand.” Selling isn’t hard when you know how!

““If we want to direct our lives, we must take control of our consistent actions. It’s not what we do once in a while that shapes our lives, but what we do consistently.””
— Tony Robbins

Brain contribution

When we express gratitude, our brain releases dopamine and serotonin - two hormones that make us feel lighter and happier inside. It’s been really important to take care of our minds during this pandemic and understanding how to trigger this feeling is an important tool to have at our disposal. Before you can trigger it, let’s understand why gratitude is so important. We experience gratitude when we shift our focus from what we don’t have to what we do, and when we take time to appreciate and be thankful for those who have contributed to the abundance in our lives.

Which part of the brain controls our important cognitive skills, for example, emotional expression, problem solving, memory, language, judgement, and sexual behaviours?
The amygdala is responsible for the ‘fight/flight/freeze’ mechanism of our bodies and when stress makes you feel anger, aggression, or fear, the fight-flight response mechanism is activated. The frontal lobe controls our short-sighted behaviours to be able to act with a goal in mind and this may include things  like self-control, planning, decision-making and problem-solving. I think that it’s the subconscious mind that controls all our behaviours and since it is open to continued suggestions, we are being changed by the constant messaging. 

Active imagination

Imagination is more important than knowledge because imagination is the only thing that can open up our minds and our hearts to the possible - to the successful and fulfilling future we all envision for ourselves but that may seem out of reach because we currently don't have the knowledge to see the exact path to that.

“I am enough of the artist to draw freely upon my imagination. Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world.”
— Albert Einstein

Sunday exercise

When we close our eyes, or even if our eyes are open and start to use our imagination - the Einstein brain - we have just activated one of the bigger centres of our brain, the occipital lobe that’s connected to the motor cortex. It’s also connected to the motivational circuit; the nucleus comes and releases that dopamine that makes you feel good and makes you want to act. So, if you visualise yourself achieving the goal, if you visualise yourself behaving in ways that match the new belief, even if you visualise the words or you take the words on a sheet of paper and you read them. 

 

Try it: Close your eyes, see it, and feel it, your brain will begin to create a mental movie with the words and as it creates a mental movie with the words that’s happening in your subconscious mind. And when you give the subconscious mind these instructions a couple of things happen because of the way the brain hierarchy works. Number one is survival; number two is safety and number three is energy conservation. When you do something consistently, it takes between 60 and 365 days of repetition to override an old habitual circuit. Therefore, if you visualise yourself achieving the goal, feeling the success you want to feel, seeing the belief on the screen of your mind, you are actually creating an artificial numeral network through the science of neuroplasticity. And since your brain wants to conserve energy, if you do this on a consistent basis, your brain will automatically set aside the old beliefs and replace them with new beliefs, and then you will have deliberately and consciously evolved yourself.

New mindset, new results

When somebody says no to you, don’t take it personally, in my mind when they say, no - I say next, which means when you say no to me, I’m just going to move onto the next client or opportunity. There’s so much business out there, so are so many potential customers to go after, you just have to have the abundance mindset. 

 

Always reflect on why you lost the sale when you are rejected. And ask: What could I have done better? I will always encourage you to reflect on why you lost that deal but don’t just sit there and beat yourself up about being rejected. The real sales mindset is that the rejection is not about you and rejection is part of the game, that’s why you are in sales - if you don’t like rejection, you really shouldn’t be in sales.

Remote working

In the current remote working world, managers and leaders must promote ownership and accountability to help their employees to connect to the organisations mission. Do you have a clear picture about your team members?

-       Who are they as a person?
-       What skills can be improved?
-       How can you help them to thrive?

 

Leaders who want to maximise self-motivation for each member of their team would have given them a clear definition of their purpose and role in the organisation as they began working from home. And this should be connected to the organisations overall purpose (or why). Purpose may include a desire to make an impact by contributing to something larger than themselves or challenging themselves to grow and learn new skills. Overcoming challenges and acquiring mastery is one of the most satisfying parts of the human experience, regardless of whether it is work related or not. How well do you understand your employees’ current skills, aptitude, and potential?