Precision Storytelling in Sales

Why getting stories right super-charges influence.

Why Stories?

Imagine you’re a prehistoric caveman. Your buddy Grug has just sprinted back to the village, heart pounding and breath labored. He had just escaped a terrifying encounter with a saber-toothed tiger lurking over the next hill. Frantically, he relates his story; where he found the beast, what it looked like, and how he escaped. Remembering the details of this warning could mean the difference between life and death for you.

For 97% of our evolutionary history, this was the only way to transmit information. Our brains have uniquely evolved to connect with stories as a way of learning, recalling information, and communicating effectively.

This process works uniquely. Neurologically, our brains automatically map us into the role of the hero. We experience what they experience, we feel what they feel. And that mapping process helps us retain the information. Our brains are evolved for this over just about any other information processing method.

Anyone who’s a parent has experienced the impact of storytelling, firsthand. When I try to explain something to my daughter, it can be difficult to hold her attention. But, when I tell her a story with a hero who learns the same lesson I wanted to impart, she’s not just engaged; she’s fixated. She experiences the story as if she were the hero; and learns the lesson durably.

How Storytelling in Sales goes Wrong

Most selling professionals would likely agree that stories are an important part of selling. However, we often don’t see a lot of thought put into when to use them, and often reps stumble as they try to use them effectively. Sales leaders need to consider how to systematically deploy stories through their organization. To illustrate, here are two examples when story effectiveness is severely limited.

• The Case Study
• The Perpetual Story-teller Rep

First, case studies are the most common places where storytelling is employed. But cases often contain a fatal flaw. Most case studies are told about the product or service. (e.g. “here’s a situation where our product saved the customer $2M in costs.”) It’s natural to do this; we’re proud of our solutions. But in making “our product” the hero can come off as self-serving. According to neuroscience, it’s more effective to position the customer as the hero and the product as the enabler of their success. The listener will map themselves to the customer, and experience the impact of the product.

Second, some reps are great with stories. In fact they are so great, that they have a story for everything. Often they use stories to poor effect, spending customer time and patience in places where they do no good. Even worse, other reps begin to see story-telling as a personality trait (e.g. "Oh that's the way Bob does it.”) rather than a critical precision tool for everyone.

For Sales leaders both of these examples highlight critical distinction for deploying stories across an organization. First, stories should be precisely designed for those parts of the sales process where they have maximum impact. And second, stories should be written to engage the listener to maximum effect.

Storytelling is a crucial component in effective consultative selling methods. These methods focus on the deep persuasion and advisory that most solution/value selling methods miss, and which are proven to reliably close more deals. Click here for a great story and additional information.

Actioning the Insight

Here are 5 scenarios where Sales leaders should systematically deploy stories throughout their organization.

1. Use story libraries - Rather than trying to teach your sales staff to be good story writers, teach them instead to be good story tellers and then collect all their stories, have them rewritten for maximum impact, and deploy them through a library that all your reps can access. This way, you collect the wisdom and anecdotes from your sellers’ personal histories.
2. Replace your boring “About Us” slides with a company founding story - You know the ones; they appear in every company's introductory decks. Customers tolerate them, but they’re boring. Instead, skip the slides and tell your founding story, where the key thing your company is known for is the thing the founder set out to conquer. The customer will experience taking on that challenge, and more importantly, they’ll leave the conversation remembering the one key thing your company can help him with.
3. Teach customers with “insight stories” - customers hate it when you point out something they are doing wrong, and most reps walk right into this trap. One of the most powerful ways to highlight customers blind spots is to tell a story about “another customer” who had similar problems which were resolved only when they learned a critical lesson. Your customers empathize with that customer rather than feeling criticized by the rep.
4. Help champions sell your solution internally with “champions stories” - champions put their reputations on the line to help sell our solutions internally. They often have anxiety about scrutiny they’ll face, but aren’t as willing to divulge internal politics or accept coaching. A powerful way to give advice is to re-tell the story of “another champion” who faced a tough internal sell, and what he did that made him successful. The champion will empathize with the story's champion, and be more receptive to the coaching.
5. Flip cases to make the customer, not the product, the hero - I mentioned this one already, but it’s so common that every Sales Leader should evaluate all their case studies. If the “hero" is you, your company or your solution, you did it wrong. Rewrite every case so the customer's journey is the hero's journey.

Happy storytelling!

Until next week,

Kendall -

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