Get wise with your whys – for stories that sell

If you consider that you need to do a sales pitch or have a conversation that will end in the sell, then you might be setting yourself up to not sell much at all.

The thing with a sales pitch is you’ll go into pitch mode–you’ll start to talk differently, change your energy, perhaps feel uncomfortable (as will most likely the person you’re pitching to) and you’ll feel less like you and more like a salesperson.

Now, hands up, I’ve got a very good selection of online courses in my collection of which a fair few (OK, pretty much all of them) haven’t been totally completed. Sometimes I buy them when they’re on special as I’ll ‘need them later’ (which is sometimes true), or I buy them as it’s something I think I ‘should be doing’ (and often actually I don’t do…). That is not to say I never log in to online courses and follow the content–as I do. And sometimes I’m even a really good student–watching every class, asking questions and getting the most from the content. But the point is always that the courses themselves don’t fix anything on their own–you have to do the work.

I don’t know about you, but sometimes I have already decided I want to work with someone—or buy something, or visit somewhere—and so I’m already sold. But then I get sold to even more, even when I’m already ‘in’. And sometimes it puts me off and I don’t buy.

Now I love cheese. Nothing gets me more excited than a cheeseboard of stinky, oozy, mouldy cheese and some delicious crackers BUT I am so over the cheese when it comes to marketing.

WARNING: This may turn into a bit of a rant.

What time is the right time to start being a business celebrity? What time is the best time to launch a new product or service? What time is it?

I was having a conversation with someone recently about starting up in business and as ever the usual reservations and fears came up – what if it doesn’t work, what if we don’t make enough money, where will we find customers etc, but there was one fear that was bigger than all of them – what if we don’t get paid?

Now getting paid is important in business, but what you have to remember is that YOU are in charge.