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?
Leave a Reply