You always have the answer (you just need to say it clearly)

The Thing about your Thing (if you don't already know) is that you already have it. You already know how you see the world because it's the way that you see the world!

There's detail that you notice that other people don't. There's elements that are invisible to others that are in plain sight to you. There are steps, ideas, processes, projects that to everyone else don't make sense or don't even occur in their thoughts. All this is your Thing. But even though you may 'see' all this, if you can't talk about it clearly then it's going to be hard to sell.

Just like any product or service, if you can't clearly say what it is–what it does for people, the results you'll get from having it or doing it–it's going to be an uphill struggle to sell it to anyone. And by sell (just an aside) I'm talking about making it easy for them to buy.

Your answer that you have (your Thing) needs to be explained in a way that people 'get'. And by people I mean prospects and the 'public' at large who are either going to buy OR tell their friends about it.

We've all been there (well, I know I have many times!)... you've met someone for the first time and 5 minutes after you asked them the question "What do you do?" is still waffling on, in half real words, half jargon speak and you're no closer to actually knowing what it is they do. This is not to say this person you've just met doesn't have a brilliant Thing they 'do' in terms of a product or service, it just means they don't know how to tell you about it clearly.

You can do your Thing a big disservice by not taking the time to find a way to describe it easily, succinctly, and with a clear nod to 'what it can do for you'. Because that's key too, in one breath or sentence (and this is where tag lines come in super handy) you want to be able to say 'my Thing is x, and it helps you do y'. It's not enough to just tell us the Thing (unless it's so fantastical we gasp immediately and go "I SO need that in my life") so ideally you want to add in the WHY we need that. Be super clear on what your Thing is going to do for us (that we can't do right now) and we're going to be a LOT more interested in finding out more.

Of course you can have your 5 minutes of information for later on in the conversation–I am not suggesting you have one sentence about your Thing and just repeat it–but don't dive in there. Have that 'headline' that clearly (and quickly) answers the question "What do you do?" so that when you're next asked about your Thing you can say it.

You will find you sell a lot more if you do.

Want to talk more about this?

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Posts you may have missed:

Be willing

I was talking the other day with a client about ideal clients (as I always do!) and was asked in return what my ideal client is. And my answer surprised me as it was so simple – I said my ideal client has to be willing.

Knowing that you want to do more, or grow, or change direction is enough – the only other thing you need is willingness. Fear is bound to come up as new and different things can be scary (I am scared all the time) BUT the way to overcome fear is tackle it head on – so you need to be willing to do this!

The confidence to do your Thing

This is a key element of doing your Thing–it’s one thing to know what it is you do brilliantly and differently to everyone else BUT it’s entirely another to go out and do it… it’s very much about feeling the fear and doing it anyway.

Can you have more than 1 Thing?

Yes I am talking about Things again. I can’t help myself. It’s what I love to do! :)

And a question I get asked often is can you have more than 1 thing? So I thought I’d share my answer here.

What’s your measure?

There’s plenty of measures you can measure in your business. And only one of them is money. And, in fact, if you’re smart you actually know that it’s never about ‘the money’, it’s about profit which is the money left over after you’ve paid for everything else. So for sure, measure your profit (and make sure you have some!) if you want to see how your business is doing.

But there are other measures too…

Even the best hairdresser can’t cut the back of their own head

Sometimes we think that because we can do a good job on others we can do it for ourselves. But that’s when we forget 2 things:

1. It’s on the end of our nose which, of course, we look straight past so don’t actually SEE it
2. Cobbler’s children: we’re SO busy doing our Thing for other people that we completely forget or neglect to do it for ourselves…