Leverage power of triangulation to target message -
5/21/2009 2:19:46 PM
This article was originally posted on Providence Business News at http://www.pbn.com/detail.html?sub_id=42323
In these challenging financial times, must-win deals are only won if your message is precisely targeted and powerfully delivered. The fact is, your prospective customers are finding it increasingly challenging to pay attention and when they do, their expectations for efficient communications are high, and getting higher.
Distracted and impatient, these prospects also may know more about you and your competitors than you think. With always-on e-mail, text messages, Web updates, blogs and Twitter they are “virtually updated.” In the world of the shrinking sound bite (Twitter doesn’t even use full sentences) they will smile, but tune you out unless your sales messages zero in on what they care most about and what they really need to know.
Message GPS is based on the power of triangulation; zeroing in on precise locations or targets by utilizing multiple points of reference. Just as multiple GPS satellites pinpoint fixed points on the ground, Message GPS applies the same proven principle shaping and targeting your sales messages.
Message GPS has three main elements of triangulation. Using all three, your message is shaped and customized to zero in on what your prospects really care about, how your proposed solution is different and why selecting you is justified. Using these three points of reference, your sales message will hit the bull’s-eye, not only earning and sustaining your prospect’s attention, but also driving home the key facts and evidence that will separate you from your competitors.
The issues behind the requirement
Often referred to as the “need-within-the-need,” the first triangulation point is communicating that you not only understand what the prospect says they need, but why. The more thorough your understanding of the issues and implications underlying the stated requirement or need, the faster you gain their attention.
One of the most prevalent errors in sales is making assumptions in this area or being superficial as to your grasp of the issues behind the requirement and who they affect. Why did the prospect ask for an increased service response time, or require certain features or support capabilities? What problem or objective generated this requirement? What corporate objective, department goal, or individual need is driving this? Who are you really speaking to when you address this need?
As you carefully and accurately dissect and diagnose their stated requirements into more detailed needs, you demonstrate a deeper understanding of the results they seek, and set the first anchor point of your sales message. You have their attention and maybe even respect for really thinking about their problems and goals.
What will they hear from your competitors?
The second point of reference for targeting your sales message is anticipating and deflecting, or minimizing, the impact of what your prospect will hear from others. Others include not only direct competitors, but also internal constituencies that may view your solution as additional work, risk or worse, a threat to their jobs (many of today’s products and services focus on improving efficiency and lowering costs. This often implies potential issues for those it may appear to disrupt). Often referred to in business development terms as “competitive ghosting,” your message will be most effective when you acknowledge and “position” the alternative choices your prospect will likely consider. This reference point has two elements; offense and defense.
• Offense: By addressing several of the alternative approaches offered by competitors for meeting the prospect’s requirements you project a confident and solution-oriented posture. While never directly naming competitors or criticizing them, your sales message should include the rationale for why your proposed solution is different and offers certain comparative advantages, including the benefits over doing nothing (nonaction is always a competitor). Your careful diagnosis of the client’s need-within-the-need and your understanding of the rationale and personalities behind it also allows you to target specific advantages to specific decision-makers or evaluators. Prospects want the bottom line, “why should I vote for you.” Giving them what they need to know to arrive at their own conclusion anchors their attention and shapes their thinking. Doing it with professionalism, facts and candor builds trust.
• Defense: At the same time you are anticipating and handling competitive alternatives, you must zero in on and minimize your potential limitations, weaknesses and likely openings for competitive challenge. What are the worst three things your competitors will say about your proposed solution? How does the prospect truly perceive you and your organization? It is always better to acknowledge and then position your issues directly and candidly. This will either pre-empt questions and challenges because your competitors have already raised these issues or your prospect was previously informed, or it will “seed” these answers for future reference when your competitors bring them up.
Substantiate your claims and justify your price
The third reference point for precision-targeting your sales message is addressing the prospect’s need for “proof” or evidence that supports your claims and financial rationale for selecting your proposed solution over the alternatives. In today’s accelerated, information-overload world, it seems everyone is claiming just about everything; biggest, best and fastest. You name it, they are saying it. What decision-makers want is objective and reliable support for the importance and priority of the issues you raise and the solutions and advantages you claim. When your sales message includes facts and “expert” opinions from research (formal and informal), studies, published white papers, etc. your claims are strengthened as being more reliable and relevant. Just watch skilled communicators making presentations and you will likely see a carefully organized use of facts and figures to back up key message points. It is surprising how fast we forget this. Increasingly, people tend to believe experts and third parties (even news stories) more than they do you.
In addition to supporting facts, you need figures. As I discussed in “To close the deal, prove your value to client,” March 9, Providence Business News, there are many ways to monetize the value you offer, present quantifiable measurements and illustrate the value of the results you can help them achieve. Prospects are still buying quality; higher-priced alternatives are worth it, but only if the financial advantages are clear. From “total cost of ownership,”, and “best value,” to linking your solution to key financial and operational goals, you turn the consideration of price into one of investment and return. This third reference point is essential in “locking-in” a highly targeted sales message. Without it, your sales message is incomplete and imprecise.
Using these three Message GPS reference points for targeting your sales messages, you will seize your prospect’s attention because you are zeroing in on what they really care about. Your first reference point quickly communicates that you “get it” by focusing on the need-within-the need. You will establish trust and carefully build the rationale for guiding their selection decision because your second reference point addresses the relative strengths and weaknesses of the alternatives. You artfully go on offense setting up issues and questions about alternative solutions while thoughtfully minimizing perceived weaknesses and drawbacks with relevant comparisons and considerations.
Finally, your third reference point builds momentum and maximizes credibility by providing objective rationale and concrete evidence to support your claims and quantifiable metrics that prove your value. As you work on your next business proposal, sales presentation or even a speech to your constituents apply Message GPS to leverage the power of triangulation; zeroing in on what your audience cares most about and needs to know to make a decision. Messages intended to persuade are likely to wander about or get lost without the accuracy and precision of Message GPS.
