Actually, I get here every day at about 10am.
And I usually go home around six.
It took me a long time to realize that I get to set my own work hours. (Took me even longer to realize that my company has no dress code.)
What “rules” are you still following??
I wasn’t reading closely, just kind of flipping through the pages, looking at the pictures and the captions.
The stories and athletes were all current, but something didn’t feel quite right.
When I got to a “coloring page” I realized that I had picked up Sports Illustrated for Kids.
Same subject, different audience … totally different presentation.
If you’re not thinking about your audience when you create content, don’t be surprised if you strike out (sorry).
Along the way, and after she told me a bit about what she was looking for, I asked her my favorite prospective client question:
“Why don’t you do this yourself?”
(In other words, why does this person believe that he/she needs outside help?)
She responded the way nearly everybody does: “Good question.” Then she went on to explain.
Your best question may be different.
Either way, it took me a long time to realize that asking good questions is the key to effective selling.
It’s called, Houston, We Have A Narrative: Why Science Needs Story, by Randy Olson.
It’ the best book on storytelling I’ve ever read.
I like it for a lot of reasons.
What I like most is that it answers the objections I hear most often from clients and others when I encourage them to include stories and personal information in everything they write and say:
“Nobody cares about me; they just want the information.”
“My readers/prospects/clients are too busy. They’ll stop reading/listening if I don’t get right to the point.”
“I don’t know how to tell stories.”
If you’re wondering why people don’t pay more attention to the things you say and write, this book is worth a read.
(Thanks to Andy Goodman for telling me about this book!)
I asked the conference organizer for a list of session attendees, so that I could send a preliminary email to them, asking what they hoped to learn in our session.
This has two benefits:
First, it helps me know, going in, the topics that people are most interested in.
Second, it allows me to extend the length of our “conversation,” beyond just the day of the workshop. That’s why I’ll also send a follow-up email to the group after the session.
The more opportunities you can create to interact, the more likely you are to make a lasting connection.