Grab a milk and your mat – It’s story time

by adamhallas in Business Development, Marketing on March 30, 2010

This is my first post. So take it easy. Like a new born baby deer, I have some shaky legs and my movement is awkward but dang it, I have a purpose. I see that everyone at SES is talking about creating and conveying a story. You are excited about your services. Great!! Now, how to convey that to somebody who is looking at the bottom line…

This topic hits really close to home. As “Lead Business Development” AKA: Captain Awesome, I deal with a slew of reasons why or why not people go with a certain service or develop hesitations. I do get really excited about what we have to offer here at tLF. I may be overstepping my gender boundaries here but I sometimes do feel like a perky cheerleader when talking about our services. But in reality, that’s kind of what we do. If we, as representatives of our companies, are not excited about our services then it doesn’t matter how good your company is, you have lost the sale before you even walked in the door.

As you tell the story of your company create an emotional need. People are more likely to react. Case in point: After watching “Die Hard” people are more apt to think “Wow, that was great story.” But their call to action is nothing unless it’s to remember to wear shoes just in case glass windows get broken out in an attempt to thwart the activities of international criminals. On the flipside of the coin, I recently watched a movie called “Food Inc.”. If you want to talk about an emotional need that called me into action. That movie/documentary literally made my “Honey Bunny” (Pulp Fiction reference in post -check) and I pause the movie and have a discussion about our current eating habits. We both changed our habits. And for the most part…we have stuck by our guns (I still heart bacon).

Telling a story can be rough though. If you get too detailed and too vivid you can lose the audience (your prospective client). I make sure that I give enough detail about our services and their specific benefit for the company (remember our emotional need) but I know not to give too much. The great thing about a good story is that it can be retold, and that the retelling still has the same message. Most of the time I try and get the decision maker on the first shot. It’s usually not too hard unless the decision maker is a Mizzou fan and finds out I went to Kansas. When I don’t get the decision maker I make sure that tLF’s story can be retold without much problem, and the same message I conveyed the first time around can still get through the second.

The pitfall of conveying your services is that some people start traveling through the “Epic Zone”. The “Epic Zone” is your Gone with the Wind stories. Stories that could be summed up in shorter time but instead go on like my financial class in college (it was void of time and any personality). Once this happens you lose your client. They have zoned off. They’re thinking about what they need to pick up from the store or dropping little Timmy off at soccer practice. What you could have had at “Hello” is now lost in a whirlwind of words that is blowing through from one ear to the next. Remember we want our message to be able to be retold and retold without an intermission. Hopefully my first post has evoked an emotion. A call to action.

SAN DIMAS FOOTBALL RULES!! (Bill and Ted reference -check)

Hallas out.

About the Author
Adam Hallas is the Business Development Lead at The Loud Few and specializes in interactive marketing strategy. You can learn more about him here or follow him on twitter at twitter.com/MrHallas.