A Minute to Win It!

A minute to win it …. One of the most commonly used tools cited on the networking circuit is the one minute elevator pitch.  Hands up if you’ve heard that?  The premise is that … should you be lucky enough to jump in a lift with Richard Branson and he asks you what you do.  You are able explain explicitly, all the benefits you deliver with your offer  …  by the time he gets out on the next floor.

It is my opinion that one of the biggest misconceptions floating around the business networking circuit is the importance of the one minute elevator pitch. 

Let’s just say that you DID get into a lift with Richard Branson, I’m hazarding a guess here but the chances are going to be 64,000,000 to one … at least.  Let’s say that he did ask a stranger what he did for a living?  And let’s say you weren’t so tongue tied that you could get out a response.  Why on earth would he need what you have to offer from someone he’d just met in a lift?

We network from the moment we first step over the school ground threshold.  Think about the people Richard may still know from way back then.  Now I can’t say what Richard’s connections look like but this is simple version of mine.

I have school friends that I have known for 37 years and we still meet up every year.  I have colleagues that I’m still in contact with from the seven companies I have worked for.  On average I got to know these people over a period of three to five years.  I have family – immediate and extended and whilst I’ve only known my parents for the 48 years I’ve been alive I’ve know the others for better or worse from anywhere between two to 48 years.  Then I have my social networks; I dance, I play golf and I attend Casterbridge Speakers.   These people I’ve known from between two months and perhaps 20 years.

Of all those contacts none has been won in a minute!  So what about you? What about your family, your work or social clubs?  I suggest that like mine; none has been won in a minute.

Let me share three strategies and six top tips that will remind you how you do connect for success.

The first is to share tokens.  That’s little bits of information about yourself that help people connect with you.  Only tell people things you are happy for them to know about yourself; but make it interesting.  So if you are asked where you’ve come from.  Reply with something extra like I’m moved nearWeymouth13 years ago.  You can see the white horse on the hill from my bedroom window.  I’ve often walked myLabradorsover the Ridgeway.  During this reply I have offered three hooks that invite further questions …

The second tip from this strategy is be curious.  Ask questions to get others to give you as many tokens back.  The more you find out the more you will find you have something in common.  Common ground is the foundation of the long term relationship.

Strategy number two is to remember their names!  Dale Carnegie in his book How to Win Friends and Influence People illustrated the importance of people’s names to them.

The first tip is to look them in the eye, keep your attention on them and how they look and you’ll remember … their face.  The second tip is to use their name at least three times during your conversation and you’ll remember both.

So tell me Brian Bull … Where have you come from tonight? 

Brian! That’s so interesting.  I have aLabradortoo!  Where else do you take your dogs?

Great to have met you Brian – I’ll give you a call to take the dogs over the downs next week sometime.

Strategy no three is to build bonds.  To keep your network connected with you, you need to keep touching them and introducing them to others within your network.  The following tips are the least likely to get done but are the most powerful. 

Seven years ago I met a girl called Alison Curtis who had a problem with her wodge of lists of things to do – I sent her an article on ‘The Flaws of Listitus’.  From there we connected immediately.  Then as I got to know Alison better, I thought about where she fitted into my network of contacts.  Who could I connect with Alison, who would she like, who could she help, who might help her? 

In just a few words we’ve considered three key powerful strategies:  Share tokens, Remember names, Build the bonds.  Powerful they are but not outwith your current knowledge or capabilities.  At the beginning we’ve looked at how we already have a network of contacts.  You already know how to build them.  I’ve shared a number of hints and tips to act as a gentle reminder. 

The one minute introduction does have a place in business to business networking but only if it is integrated as part of the power of these three strategies. 

 A minute to win it – don’t think so – do you?

Reading ease 5.8

Breathe!

I was asked a month or so ago for a top tip on overcoming nerves when speaking in public.  I immediately responded with a one word quip … “breathe”. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bb7S8-Iewi0

Then I thought about it!

Apart from it being essential to life, a good belly breath in and a good belly breath out centres your body and helps to anchor your mind.  It adds quality to your voice projection.  For maximum control of your breathing stand straight, knees slightly flexed, head straight and shoulders back.  The deep breath allows you to project your voice to the back of the room.

When you breathe steadily you maintain control of what you are delivering. This has a calming effect on the listener. It allows the audience to take in what you have just said.  What’s more, a pause for breath will save you from uttering an irritating um or err or stammer.

It is easier to breathe when you use short sentences.  Grammatically when you write you add in commas, semi colons, colons and points to indicate an intake of breath.  When you converse you tend to do it in short sentences combined with linked words such as and or but.  In public speaking short sentences that are not linked deliver a much more powerful message.  The audience imagines the linking words.

We only need to watch The King’s Speech to recognise the power of the short sentence and the pause for breath.  This is the effect!  This is King George’s Real Speech. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=opkMyKGx7TQ&feature=related

What’s in a Word?

Improving our word repertoire gives flavour to speeches and presentations.  Whilst we don’t want to use jargon or words that are incomprehensible, elaborating our vocabulary can improve the listener’s enjoyment and therefore their attention.

The way we learn new words is to recognise and interpret those we have not come across before.  We then need to include them in our active vocabulary.  I recently offered the following word for usage at a Toastmasters meeting. 

Cantankerous – It means bad tempered, irritable, crabby, argumentative, difficult, tetchy, complaining, unreasonable, or indeed belligerent.

In Charles Dicken’s A Christmas Carol, Mr Scrooge was without doubt the most cantankerous of characters until, that is, he was visited by three equally cantankerous ghosts.

Substituting a word can also be extremely useful when writing or speaking – as to repeat the same word throughout your prose is not only dull but obviously lazy, unless of course you use it to make a point. 

This is not about increasing your word power to pad out your conversation with long convoluted words.  No one likes a show off after all.  This can be as simple as swapping common verbs like to go or to be with a more descriptive one.  The difference between she went to the park and she skipped to the park offers the listener a lot of detail both visually and emotionally.

Have a listen to The Christians “What’s in a word?”

How much clearer might your communiqué be, if you chose alternative words to convey your meaning?  Have some fun with Thesaurus!

In the air tonight

It is possible you can learn a lot about communicating by checking out some of the big brand success stories.  We receive somewhere in the region of 3000 commercial messages every day.  Which ones resonate with you?  Which ones resonate with your client base?  What can you learn from this?

Warren Buffet once said that if someone offered him 100 billion dollars to knock Coke Cola off the top soft drink spot – he’d refuse the challenge.  Only 25% of the value of this company is tangible, the remainder is the power of the brand. 

The brand is all about delivering a promise.  To build a brand you not only need to set out what it stands for, but set out how that message is delivered through every single interaction you have with your target client base.

There are some key words that illustrate brand values, they are: integrity, trust, difference, loyalty, fame, belief, cohesion, principle, profit, and passion.  These are significantly important in word of mouth marketing sphere but it is important to recognise that advertising still has its place.  Even, Cadbury, an established brand, had a 20% uplift with this brilliantly conceived gorilla advertising campaign

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wy52yueBX_s&NR=1

To emulate the high street brands you need to build your own brand on four pillars.  They are:

• The ideology of your business,
• The capability to deliver what you promise,
• The environment in which you are trading,
• The consumer connecting completely with the above.

If any of your pillars fall short of the others then the imbalance throws your brand off kilter.  The following brands are good examples of balance of strength in their four pillars just right, when they launched.  First Direct, Sanctuary, Innocence. 

How balanced do you think, are your four pillars?

With thanks to Andy Parker of Sandbourne Marketing for inspiring this Blog post.

What’s the point?

There are fourteen punctuation marks in English grammar. They are the full stop, comma, colon, semicolon, dash, hyphen, apostrophe, question mark, exclamation point, quotation marks, brackets, parenthesis, braces, and ellipses.  Check this … Punctuation by Wretch 32 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_shm7bKtKUw

How many of them do you use in your sales copy and how many might you add the emphasise the point you are trying to make?

Let me know what you have discovered?

8.7

The Low Down on Slogans

The art of assonance adds poetic rhythm and medial rhyme to the words that you use.  Unlike alliteration when the reader is aware at the start that there is a match, assonance is subtle.  You barely know it is there.  The rhyme or rhythm comes from the structure of the words you use. 

I love this example from the song With Love by Thin Lizzy:  “I must confess that in my quest I felt depressed and restless.” Click through and listen out for it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzOQB2-bcZ8

Vowels are particularly useful in developing assonance.  Is and es are high sounds and increase energy whereas longer sounds like aahs, uuhs and oohs will slow down the rhythm and pace. 

Consider Hoover’s slogan “It beats as it sweeps as it cleans” or the Bounty bar as a “quicker picker upper” Listen to the difference in pace with “You know when you’ve been Tango’d” or Volkswagen’s “Ever wonder how the man who drives the snowplough gets to work”

Your challenge; should you choose to accept it … is to work out how many examples of assonance there are in this, possibly the longest single word slogan ever?

Lipsmackin-thirstquenchin-acetastin-motivatin-goodbuzzin-cooltalkin-highwalkin-fastlivin- evergivin- coolfizzin…Pepsi 

7.7

The Point of NO Return

If only I could learn to say the word no  ….  I mean; how hard can it be?  No, no, no, nO, no, no, no, no, no, no, No, no, no, nO, no, no, no, no, no, no, No, no, no, nO, no, no, no, no, no, no, No, no, no, nO, no, no, no, no, no, no, No, no, no, nO, no, no, no, no, no, no, No, no, no, nO, no, no, no, no, no, no, No, no, no, nO, no, no, no, no, no, no, No, no, no, nO, no, no, no, no, no, no, No, no, no, nO, no, no, no, no, no, no, No, no, no, nO, no, no, no, no, no, no!

…. Such a small and innocent word that always seems to come out “oh go on then!”  And this – is the point of no return;  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42GT410SVUA

And your examples are?

7.4

Brilliant is the New Black

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k816dPQyPAM

Those of you who don’t know what I do for a living, I run the ‘brilliant’ BusinessXchange programme.  I have been referring this Business Link service with this superlative message for the last four or five years.  It has stuck.  Not everyone remembers to repeat the alliteration.  But people remember the premise of the adjective and reiterate rather than repeat it. Hey I am not tetchy. This is OK! 

There is an element of psychology in the premise that the brilliant BusinessXchange programme is indeed brilliant.  Whilst it is of course – the repetition reinforces that.  If I referred to it as the boring BusinessXchange then the programme is likely to be considered boring.  Not brilliant, not inspired not exceptional or indeed accomplished; just boring.

Now the brilliant BusinessXchange did not become brilliant overnight.  Nor will it remain brilliant if I don’t reinforce the message consistently.  This copy message is important in its existent.  The reiteration of the message builds a rhythm and becomes hypnotic. 

You need to repeat an advert many times to ensure the media message sticks.  Likewise you need to reiterate the key AIDA messages http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIDA_(marketing) on each and every piece of marketing copy you chose to use.  This includes the key words as well as the message.  It is important to repeat on each and every page of your website, your Blogs, your online profiles, as well as whatever print you use – do you get the message? 

7.6

Every step you take – 2

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSaHoYN-FsU

 

So how do you emulate the shoe retailer, Clarke’s superb strapline – “enjoy every step”?

 

It is not easy – your strapline needs to convey a combination of customer awareness; competitive differentiation, and your internal aims in order to reinforce your brand in less than eight words.

 

Welcome Home – there’s no place quite like it.

 

Welcome Home is retail shop in Worthing established in 1994 – last time I spoke to my ex on Facebook it was still trading.  This simple business name and strap line took about four months to come up with and hone.  

 

 

It was designed to reflect that the products were unusual home based gifts and accessories.  These ranged from elaborate statement pieces to a variety of nik knacks that reflect the buyers’ personalities turning their house into their home.  The fixtures and fittings were all saleable and unusual pieces of furniture.  Everything in the shop except the till and the cash desk was for sale and even then…

 

Finally we wanted to get across a ‘make yourself at home’ atmosphere. The strapline wasn’t just a marketing message it was le raison d’être; and a statement which was easily recognisable for its clichéd simplicity. 

 

I mentioned the four month search for the business name and strapline – this may be a slight exaggeration, nonetheless the hyperbole is just.  This is not a simple exercise; I expect it is why excellent copywriters are paid so well.

 

If you are struggling with a micro message, this is a method I have used with some success in the past.

 

Get a pad of post it notes.  Use one note for each of the following:

 

1. Write down five words that you think describe what your business does.
2. Write another five words that describe the benefits.
3. Write another five words that depict the business values you hold dear.
4. Recognise any words that have come up more than once. 
5. Discard the following five words: Quality, Value, Service, Caring and Integrity http://http://thehiddenedge.wordpress.com/2007/04/21/the-five-words-to-never-to-use-in-an-ad-2/
6. Now play around with the remaining words you have selected ….
7. Can you pose a short question?
8. Can you answer a rhetorical question?
9. Can you mirror key words, repeat or reflect?
10. Can you create a rhyming couplet?
11. Can you use alliteration?
12. Use a Thesaurus for alternative words to the ones you have chosen.

 

Most successful straplines sit between three and six words.  The longer the line the less memorable it becomes.  Here are some famous ones:

 

Just do it!

Never knowingly undersold

Reassuringly expensive

We’re no 2 so we try harder.

Every little helps.

Vorsprung durch technik.

 

Question – to which brand do they belong? 

Name other straplines can you recall – what about highlighting some local ones that are not famous brands … yet?

 

6.4

Irony

Irony, used gently conveys amused mockery or banter.  It is the back bone of spoofs and has a notorious role in the British sense of humour.  Having done some research I found it really difficult to find a simple description that easily conveys its meaning.  This, I think, is because what might seem ironic to me may not necessarily seem to be ironic to others. 

For the purpose of this Blog irony is the use of language to convey an outward meaning and different inward meaning.  Irony tends to fall into three categories

The first is where there are two audiences, one that understands what is going on and is privy to the underlying plot and acts as an observer whilst the other is uninitiated can only react to the outward meaning, a good example is ‘Candid Camera’ which links dramatic irony with humour. 

The second is rhetorical irony which is based on the use of language that is saying one thing whilst deliberately meaning the opposite which is obvious to the listener; for example when someone says “Warm enough for you” but actually means what a cold and wet day it really is.  Hyperbole is used to great ironic effect.  http://thehiddenedge.blogwessex.com/2007/07/29/end-of-an-era/

The third is situational or circumstantial irony where the expected outcome is opposite to the actual outcome better perhaps described as a flaw of fate.  This tends to be subjective. 

Irony is sometimes confused with sarcasm.  Certainly irony is a major means in the Sarcastic’s tool box.  But when it is used it is cruel, taunts and ridicules.

But there can be a fine line between what one finds humorous and what others may consider to be bullying.  Now I am not going all politically correct here – what I am saying is that, it is worth considering whether the words you are using and implying will come across without the support of your tone of voice and body language.

Even when you speak ironically the listener may not necessarily be on the same wave length and your humour may hit way of the mark.  When you don’t have the bonus of sight and tonal communication – irony needs to be used carefully. 

Many written works are considered masterpieces of irony and the authors have set the tone based on the words that they used so that you are in doubt as to the genre you are reading.  In short marketing pieces whether it is internal or external communications the use of words must be considered carefully to ensure the correct message is received. 

Let’s face it – if your literal meaning, which has an alternative intention, is acted upon literally; you may not be laughing.  Imagine if your April fools joke is actually believed by your clients and staff?  Likewise if you make a flippant comment that someone takes seriously!  Ratner’s crap gold jewellery springs to mind!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ng9iooXUxQ