Posts #43 and #44 were around using ‘behavioral interviewing’ and the STAR format as prompters for excellent selling content, particularly when you need to support your claims of being the best, brightest, fastest, most creative….you get the idea. Let’s stick with the theme of anecdotes/story-telling as a tool for supporting your sales efforts.
A couple of years ago, I had the pleasure of meeting a fellow speaker at the SMPS Southern Regional Conference. Her name is Sandra Zimmer of the Self Expression Center. I liked Sandra immediately; you know that warm vibe that you can get from people, where you know they are being real.
In that particular session, Sandra shared a fun way to uncover anecdotes you may have in your memory, but haven’t yet put to good use! In short, this is how I recall her process. {Take note, over the years I’ve added my own editorial ideas to her framework.}
Step One: Write a list of all the roles you’ve had in your professional and personal life. Little league coach, father, brother, project manager, business development representative, college baseball player….and so forth. Be exhaustive with this list. No role is too big or too small.
Step Two: Out of the laundry list of roles, choose about 8-10 to focus on. {I suggest choosing the ones that intuitively seem like they will have the richest and most relevant stories for your upcoming purpose}.
Step Three: Think about the question that you are trying to answer, the client you want to pitch, or the project you’re hoping to land. In other words, think about what might be in the minds of your audience. {‘Audience’, in this case, can also be a generic view of prospects and clients in general, rather than a particular upcoming interview or sales meeting}.
Step Four: Being mindful of step three, look back at the roles you’ve decided to focus on. When wearing those various hats, when did you experience Victory, Conflict, Discovery, or Decision? Give this experience a title, much like a title you’d see for an article in a magazine or newspaper. Short, sweet, perhaps even clever.
Step Five: Now, in just a few sentences, write out the story. If you wanted, you could even make certain that it’s succinct by writing the situation, task, action that you or someone else took, and the final result/outcome. Sound familiar? RIGHT. You can use the STAR format as a way to craft your stories that were inspired using Sandra’s technique.
For me, this process has worked well in both professional and academic environments. In addition to suggesting it to my clients when they are stumped about how to make their sales pitch/presentations richer and more interesting, I also use it to help my Oral Communications students at Columbia College. I also suggest this process in some of my business development workshops such as Ace the Q&A Portion of the Interview.
You won’t be surprised that I will suggest—just like with the behavioral interviewing techniques—that you conduct some sort of in-house workshop to guide your staff on creating their own personal stories. I’d be more than happy to hear how it’s made a difference for your team when it comes to presentations and sales pitches.
