Category Archives: Conversation

Don’t Over Engineer Your Elevator Pitch

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You walk into a crowded conference hall. The air in the exhibit hall seems to stand still. If you wanted a breath of fresh air, you came to the wrong place.

People are bustling energetically amongst booths, tables, demo stations, attempting to learn the latest technology, find a new job, or pass the time until the next presentation begins.

You are on a mission to meet new folks, to network, to forge connections.

You show a smile as a young woman approaches. You give yourself an internal pep talk. Good posture. Check. Eye contact. Check.

When it's time to shake hands, what do you say?

When it’s time to shake hands, what do you say?

You outstretch your hand as the woman approaches.

She smiles and says hello as her hand meet yours in a firm, strong handshake.

You exchange names, comment on the conference, and she asks you:

“So what do you do?”

“I work to grow the Agile community through positive online and offline interactions.”

She responds with a half-interested, “Oh, that’s cool.”

“What do you do?” I ask, with hope to keep the conversation going.

“I work as a Business Analyst over the DSM and CSL divisions with dotted line responsibility to the Core Group,” she responds as she glances towards the conference floor.

“OK,” I say, and quickly realize that I have no idea what she just said. She lost me after Business Analyst. Everything else was a jumbled mess of acronyms and confusion.

The two of us strained to keep the conversation going for a few additional minutes, but this was a brutal task. She kept looking towards the door; I must have looked drunk on acronyms.

With the past as my guide, I now realize that this conversation could have gone smoother for the young woman and for me.

So what 3 things could each of us have done differently?

Elevator Pitch Tips:

  1. She set the conversation off in the wrong direction by asked the predictable, banal question: “So what do you do?” We all lean forward into a conversation when livelier questions are asked.

    Examples:

        • What brings you to the conference?
        • What has surprised you about the conference thus far?
        • What’s your biggest learning so far?

2. I bumbled and stumbled by replying to her question with the exact same question. How dull and unoriginal can I get? We were both guaranteed to remember nothing from a conversation when it stayed superficial and impersonal.

3. Despite your best intentions, some conversations will inevitably steer towards the basic question: “What do you do?” Give the follow up conversation some sparkle by replying with color, excitement, passion. Make it impossible for this conversation to stop with these elevator pitches:

  • “I build bridges between the development team and management. “
  • “I create atmospheres of innovation and collaboration for my team.”
  • “I turn first-time Web site visitors into life-time subscribers.”

Use these tips to your advantage and make your next conference experience full of exciting, memorable conversations. You’ll be well on your way to turning attendees into lifelong business connections.

Until next time, 

Dan Naden

Get personal and watch a person light up

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The scene: Two workers decompress over a beer at a local conference’s happy hour.

When this conversation ends, what will anyone remember?

“So, what do you do?” says the bespectacled middle manager #1. The grey in his hair is slight, yet his face’s wrinkles signify many years of hard work.

“Oh, I am an engineer,” responds middle manager #2. His hip backpack with electronic gadgets and artsy glasses hint that he’s new to the working world.

“Where do you work?” says manager #1, sipping slowly from his ice cold green bottle of Heineken.

“ICE Wonder Corporation,” responds the engineer. “I just started there after I finished school last fall.”

The conversation drags slowly along, finally crashing to a halt with the inevitable exchange of business cards; two people with so much potential and opportunity never to cross paths again. There’s a ‘chance’ that new business was generated, a referral was brokered, career advice was shared. More than likely, however, there’s very little that managers #1 and #2 will remember about one another when the happy hour ends.

Ask these types of questions and watch a person grow:

  • What do you like to do on the weekends?
  • What’s been your favorite vacation spot?
  • When have you felt most alive?

It’s fine to talk ‘work’. After all, it’s what’s pays the bills. Sometimes, if you’re lucky, you’ll meet a person and you ’just click’. You laugh, swap stories, enjoying the company the entire time.

If not, crack into authenticity by using the above questions to find out if that engineer is:

–the world’s greatest Nascar fan
–a season ticket holder for your favorite football team, Chicago Bears
–a die hard 30 Rock viewer (he’s never missed an episode!)

Not everyone will feel comfortable getting personal. That’s ok; it’s their choice. Keep at it. Find connection points even if they are far away from the 9-to-5. If it works, you’ll forge a strong professional connection while uncovering the uniqueness that lives inside each of us.

Until next time,

Dan Naden

When’s the last time you talked with your customers?

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Have you heard someone say?: “To have a friend, you need to be a friend.”

Can this quote be repurposed for a business setting?

How about: “To have customers, you need to act like a customer.”

Drop everything (even that briefcase) and call your customers asap.

Think about it.

  • Customers want to know that you care about them. Am I too small to matter to your company?
  • Customers want to know that their needs are being met. Am I being heard?
  • Customers want to know that you aren’t just pushing something at them that they don’t really need or won’t solve their problem.  Am I just padding their bottom line?

When you are in business, you aren’t ‘necessarily’ in the business of making friends, but it certainly couldn’t hurt to be friendly.

When’s the last time you actually picked up the phone and talked with your customers?

Go ahead right now and act like a customer with your existing customers; make a courtesy call with the following questions in mind: (Remember you aren’t selling anything; your goal is to listen intently and show genuine appreciation for their business.)

  • How’s business going?
  • How are things going with ‘Insert your product name’?
  • Do you have any questions about using our product?
  • Is there anything else we can do to help your company?

Close the call by sincerely thanking them for their business, setting the stage for future interactions.

Dale Carnegie said:
“You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you.”

There’s no reason we can’t replace ‘friend’ with customer:
“You can make more customers in two months by becoming interested in customers than you can in two years by trying to get other customers interested in you.”

Now, get out there and speak to your customers. (not just e-mail or text)

Until next time,

Dan Naden

Hungry to persuade and motivate? Try this recipe.

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The words we use are very situation-dependent.

What you tell your friends on the green of the 18th hole on a recent golf outing will most likely be different than how you respond to someone’s question during a job interview.

The same holds true for your voice tone.

Yelling at a teammate to hustle on a basketball court is expected just as whispering is between the stacks of books at a library.

But how about what you say? Can certain words persuade or motivate us to act?

Go ahead, tell me about your most popular dish.

I don’t do it often, but I recently visited a few ‘very’ fine-dining restaurants. Outside of the delectable, mouth-watering food, my favorite part was listening to the waiters announce the ‘specials of the day’.

“Our chef has specially-prepared this dish for you: It’s always one of our favorites. We’ve trolled the deepest part of the ocean to find the thickest, most meaty red snapper. We top the snapper with lime juice, capers and the sweetest organic tomatoes straight for our own garden. The perfect pairing for the red snapper is the wild rice combination with finely-cut almonds. Delicious!”

“We offer you the freshest ocean salmon, drizzled with light cream sauce, nestled under a bed of organic orzo. Accompanying the salmon is gently fire-roasted asparagus.”

Hungry? I didn’t need much more convincing. Typically, I ordered the specials that were so brilliantly communicated by the skilled waitstaff.

So what’s their trick? It’s a trick that you can use in your marketing.

Notice these words:

  • Specially-prepared
  • We offer you
  • It’s always one of our favorites

Now, you may not be selling high-quality seafood, yet you are trying to make your prospect feel as if your product or solution is directly geared to his/her need. I always like to know that a company is doing everything they can to make me happy (see: ‘specially-prepared or ‘we offer you’). I want to know that others have made a similar choice (see: it’s always one of our favorites), whether it’s trying the red snapper or spending big money on the latest storage technology.

It’s easy to over-complicate, pushing every single feature through a face-to-face demo, meeting or Web site copy. Stick to the basics: you’ll convince them every time.

Bon appetit!

Until next time,

Dan Naden

Tell a good story and you’ve got a customer for life

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I have plenty of fun doing nighttime baths with the kids. In kids’ bathtubs, animals, boats, floating books take up nearly every inch of the tub.

Our children’s imaginations run wild in the tub (amongst other places!). Recently, they’ve wanted to ‘create a story’ based on whatever toys they could grab in the tub.

rubber duck in the bathtub

This duck is sometimes privy to some very good stories.

While our daughter grabbed a floating duck and a cow and wove an intriguing tale about friendship, forgiveness, sharing; I sorted through the floating alphabet letters and selected ‘M’ and I was off….

‘M’ always felt stuck in the middle.

‘M’ listened as children recited the alphabet, but felt anxious. To ‘M’, children were also quickly rushing through the middle of the alphabet; it seemed as if it were a race to the letter Z. No one stopped to appreciate what ‘M’ had to offer.

‘M’ wasn’t a vowel.

‘M’ wasn’t glamorous like ‘S’ or ‘T’.

‘M’ wanted out of the alphabet. This ‘A to Z’ game just wasn’t cutting it anymore.

The other letters noticed his dejection.

“Hey M, cheer up. You’ve got nothing to worry about. Kids love you,” exclaimed the letter O.

“Yeah M; you start some pretty cool words you know. Think about how kids love the words: Monster, Marshmallow, Mustard, Monkey,” added K.

M began to smile. “You know what? You are right. I do bring happiness to children’s lives.”

As a business owner or marketing manager, I am not recommending bathtub brainstorming sessions. Your business, however, can benefit from some creative storytelling when it comes to matching customer need with the exceptional successes that you potentially already have at your disposal.

  • Do you have a small business success story that nearly saved a company from ruin and now they are thriving?
  • Do you have some customer stories that you could share from a few verticals where you’re continually losing deals? Show the prospects in this industry that have a proven track record of dealing value.
  • Is the founding of your company or product a unique story? People love to hear how Groupon, Google, Amazon got started. Why not dazzle your prospects and customers by taking them back in time?

Don’t be afraid to ‘break the mold’ and get those creative juices flowing to unlock some hidden stories that can help your business communicate its special offer in the marketplace.

It’s getting late. In fact, it’s close to kid bath time. I think there’s a letter Z that needs a little boost. I am hearing through the grapevine that he loathes being at the end.

Until next time,

Dan Naden