Maybe everything you need to know you can learn from
movies. A friend of mine is a screenwriter in Los Angeles. Over a glass of wine, we were discussing his business and nature of beast in Hollywood. He’s a boy from Canada who gave up his much-loved Honda, his life savings, and his broadcasting career to move to Los Angeles to attend American Film Institute. Not an easy feat in your mid-30s. After 8 years of hard work he is now becoming new discovery of LA. He said most difficult thing to adjust to was all talking.Collin slouches into his chair. "Everyone lies in this business. It's all big Cheshire cat smiles – but essentially people have 'Enough about you – more about me' mentality." After our conversation I thought about his last statement.
Are You On A Blind Date With Your Customer?
We tend to love what we do. So we get all excited about it and then proceed to tell everything about ourselves to potential customer. It just reminds me of a really bad date! A one-sided conversation becomes tired pretty quickly. Customers feel like they are on a bad blind date with you if there isn’t a connection to what they need.
Minus cynicism, our clients are also thinking like Hollywood set, "ENOUGH ABOUT YOU blabbing about all wonderful things about your company, your product, your requirements. MORE ABOUT ME – and what I need to survive and thrive!"
The Helium Test
Are you talking your face off when you are speaking with your client? When they ask you on phone what you have to offer – do they hear a massive intake of air and then you giving your best "I just sucked in helium and can talk really fast" act?
If so – you aren’t making a connection with your customer. You sound like everyone else, you act like everyone else and you aren’t positioning yourself as someone who can help. Because at end of day –what you really do is HELP PEOPLE. The only way this is accomplished is by discovering what your customer needs and researching other areas of need – areas your customer may not even have thought of yet!
