PAY IT FORWARD...JUST NOT SO FAST.

 

Last week, a colleague whom I think of (or thought of) as being bright, reliable and trustworthy forwarded a significant private email on to a third party. 

 

The colleague (we'll call him Joe) and I had been exchanging emails, discussing a client and how best Joe might position things. Our emails went back and forth until we figured out the most effective strategy for his introduction. Once we'd settled on the approach, Joe then forwarded the ENTIRE email exchange on to the client with his opening introduction.

 

OK....Deep breath.

 

So...why did this happen?

 

A combination of carelessness, rushing, and perhaps looking at too many emails on a tiny screen (iPhone, Blackberry, Droid) on which one sees only the top email, forgetting that there's a revealing string trailing after. It's either that or complete ineptitude.

 

Moral: Look at the email thread trailing below your screen before you hit the forward button.

Not only did Joe lose the deal. He also lost my respect for his business acumen...and my trust.

      
       STEPPING OUT OF KANSAS & INTO THE LAND OF OZ

      At the Cirque du Soleil performance of KA in Las Vegas, the show begins before you even arrive at your seat.

 

       Taking your ticket are ushers dressed like characters in the show or as my friend thought, "Like the Ohh-lee-ohh characters in The Wizard of Oz." Sort of. But the point is this. The music was mysterious. The lighting was dark and magical. The ushers were "characters" in full warrior attire. Wow.

 

      The EXPERIENCE had begun. These individuals did not greet us as the typical usher tends to with that reprimanding tone of "Let me see your tickets" or "Are you together?"  wagging a flashlight and with a puckered, annoyed expression blurting out, "Follow me."

 

      Unfortunately, the experience of arriving at most people's offices isn't far from this. In fact, there's a pretty standard FIRST moment. A woman (sorry, but it often is) sitting behind a desk blocking you. When you arrive, she puts down the phone from chatting with her friend, looks up, and says with a tone that's just a bit inconvenienced, "May I help you?"

 

      Hmmm. Sound familiar? You bet. Easy to point the finger, though. So...what's the experience of someone arriving in your office? What's the first moment? Do you have cheeseball fluorescent lighting? Plastic plants with dust covered leaves? A bowl of hard candy? Boring magazines on an old boring coffee table? Marshmallow chairs and a sofa with a stain? AND...a receptionist who doesn't really "receive" but who in fact acts like a mosquito?

 

    What's the first thing your receptionist says when someone comes through the door? Is it a welcoming phrase or an inquisition? What does she offer your "guest"? How are people made to feel welcome? What's the "set" like? The scenic design? The staging? The sound design? The lighting? What cool props are on the table?

     How can you create such a wonderful first moment, such a great experience that when someone arrives they nod, smile and look around in wonder thinking, "Toto, I have a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore."

 

(c) MMX Victoria Labalme Communications, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

   

When it comes to mastering the art of connecting a product with imagery, underlying emotion and a mini story, television commercials win hands down.

 Have you ever gotten choked up over a simple  telephone commercial because you see the grandmother wiping her eyes with joy as her grandson calls to wish her a Happy Mother's Day? OK. Maybe you don't but a lot of people do. In literally 30 seconds, the advertisers have reached their audience on a profound level.

How about you? Are you accomplishing that in a 30-minute meeting with an important client?

When a car is advertised, it's done so with sensuality, adventure, fun, status, or joy.  We see the car careening around mountain roads, across rocky terrain, or swerving to avoid a dangerous obstacle.  Music adds to the mood. The emotion and imagery sell the car and depending on the brand, variables will range from the luxurious (Lexus) to the rugged (Jeep) to those that illustrate family safety (Volvo).

Unless a particular deal is being heavily promoted, all the details regarding price, financing, lease, and dollars appear as an adjunct, often quickly, at the end of the spot and often at the bottom of the screen.  

What we are left with is a strong impression of the "future experience" -- the story and emotional promise behind the sale -- one that is based not on intellect, but on emotion and imagery.

Too often in sales, however, people do exactly the opposite. They focus on details, data, facts, figures and functions, pointing to complicated graphs and tossing out terms the prospect barely understands.

Years ago, I did a television commercial for Metro-North, the local rail system in the New York Tri-State area. My role was that of a working mother coming home to her son and husband.  

The commercial began with a series of shots of the train moving through urban landscapes, and a soundtrack that was rhythmic, pumping, and hopeful.  The finale: A series of shots that added the critical human element and dream. (1) The first of the closing shots shows me coming off the train in business attire, with trench coat and briefcase. (2) The second: my husband and little son standing on the platform eagerly awaiting my arrival and then my son running towards me smiling gleefully. (3) The third reveals me kneeling, wrapping the little boy in my arms.  On this final image, the music comes to a crescendo and the Metro-North logo appears.

We weren't simply selling train tickets.  We were selling family unity and love.

What are you selling?  How can you help your customers and prospects see the mini movie, the commercial or story of what their life will be like if they buy your product or service, and how what you offer can truly help them achieve their dreams?  Start with the challenge; offer the solution. This doesn't have to be done with fancy camera work, film/video and actors. It can be done verbally -- by telling a great story, by painting a verbal picture of the future.

 And if what you create is extraordinary enough, you might just end up in the Super Bowl.

(c) MMX Victoria Labalme Communications, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

 THE SEPARATION MYTH

     When I first moved into the business community after twenty years in the performing arts, I wondered in what world I had landed.

     Acronyms like ROI, RFP, S&P, P&L and concepts such as prospecting, quotas, business models, and Q1-4 were all foreign to me.

     I had lived in a world of imagery and emotion, intention and dilemma, set up and punch, character and conflict, suspense and surprise, lighting and sets, rhythm and tone, first moments and finales.

     As well, of course, the performing arts world included my focus on auditions, contracts, box office sales, insurance, pension plans, SAG & AEA rates, agent commissions, etc. -- but this is the only realm in which I thought the business and the arts overlapped: the fiscal domain.

     At cocktail parties and gatherings, I avoided brokers and business types. Most of the time, people from these worlds treated me as if I belonged to a slightly different species, as if I were some kind of curious tropical bird.

     Wagging a cocktail in one hand, a sales associate would call across the room. "Joe, come over here. This is Virginia...I mean Veronica. Uh, Victoria.  She's an actress." Questions such as, "Have you been in anything I'd recognize?" or "How do you memorize all those lines?" were the norm. I'd often hear about their niece, daughter or cousin who wanted to move to New York City to act.

     The conversation would jolt and sputter along and eventually, I'd excuse myself for a drink.  From the level of their questions, I could see that they really had no idea what went into acting, film, and the performing arts. Learning lines? That's the least of it. But then again, in my eyes, their world was limited to quotas and graphs, profits and losses, excel spread sheets and stock market indexes.

     With time working more deeply within the corporate world, however, I began to see that my perspective of their world had in fact been as limited as theirs of mine. No doubt, people outside the performing arts had only a cursory knowledge of the intricacies of the craft and the depths of the psychology and emotion involved.  But I, as well, had barely been aware of the complex subtle human psychological chess game of a high stakes sales call.

     As I started to spend more time in the business realm, I started to recognize similarities between the performing arts and business, not simply in the domain of finance, but more significantly, and more interestingly, in the domain of the creative, subtle, performance elements. And I began to see that performing arts principles, which I'd studied and practiced for 20 years, held great potential for addressing challenges and uncovering solutions in this seemingly separate world.

     In truth, the performing arts are a perfect resource for teaching and transferring communication skills, because theater and comedy at their most basic are about the human condition, human interaction and human connection--what motivates people, what makes people act, react, retreat, move forward, harness their courage, lie down in submission, or stumble forth with fear--vulnerable, uncertain, and with heart in hand.

     The performing arts are about human beings and their struggles, predicaments, dilemmas and triumphs. In essence, the performing arts are about humanity. And the tools and techniques that help artists advance in their craft are those that help business people and entrepreneurs when they are practicing their business at its highest.

(c) MMIX-MMX Victoria Labalme Communications, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

"What you're after is to change the look behind the other person's eyes." 

- Jerry Zaks, Broadway director

If you're not familiar with Jerry Zaks, let's just say he is to Broadway what Steven Spielberg is to films.  Over the course of his career, he's won numerous awards including four Tony Awards -- the equivalent of four Oscars -- for his directing.

I was lucky enough to meet him of all places while on jury duty. But that's another story...

A few months later over lunch, I asked him how he directed his actors so that their behavior on stage became so real and their dialogue so connected. 

His response:  "I tell them that what they're after is to change the look behind the other person's eyes."

Take a moment to read that line again.

In less effective productions (and sales, consulting and even interpersonal  environments), people talk at each other; their words feel hollow, fake, and staged.

An example I often give in seminars is this: If in real life you loan your car to an 18-year old, you might say, "I need you home by midnight.  Do you understand?"  Before you hand over the keys, you make sure the teen gets the message and you do so by waiting to see that the look has changed behind her eyes - in other words, that your message has registered.  But so often in sales, you see people literally throwing the (metaphorical) car keys and then moving on to the next point.

If your intention is to truly connect with that other person, the result will be a shift in understanding or emotional state, and that shift will register in their eyes. The look will change to one of intrigue, relief, comprehension, agreement, joy, excitement, etc.  

A huge benefit of this process is that it requires you to "get the attention off yourself" (a common acting phrase), which allows for less self-conscious behavior as well as a genuine interest in the other person.

So, where's your focus? On you and your words, or on really connecting.  Change the look in their eyes. And it will change your business...and your life.

(c) MMX Victoria Labalme Communications, LLC.  All Rights Reserved.

     Obscene? Me!? You want my company to be obscene?
 
     Well...yes.
 
     Let's look at the etymology of the word.

     Obscene comes from two Greek works: "ob" meaning "from"; and "skene" meaning "tent or covered place" -- in this case, stage.  Greek theater--the Hollywood of 2,500 years ago--was intense, powerful and bloody, involving battles, murders and infidelity. Sound familiar?
 
     Unlike Hollywood however, the Greeks kept their most horrific moments away from the eyes of the audience, placing them off stage, therefore making those sections ob-scene.
 
     Why? Because they knew that the imagination of the audience was far more powerful than anything they could create live.
 
     In the famous Greek play "Medea", the title character murders her own children to take revenge on her husband. The Greeks staged this murder to be obscene: Medea exits the stage to murder her kids. You heard blood-curdling screams. You saw blood spray onto the stage.  But the rest was left to your imagination.  And there it lived as a gruesome, unsettling nightmare.

     One of the most brilliant examples an obscene marketing approach is the trailer for Andy Nyman's and Jeremy Dyson's unbelievably cool play, "Ghost Stories" which opened this month to rave reviews at the Duke of York's theater in London. Here's a photo of Andy in front of the theater.

      If you watch the Ghost Stories 1:33 trailer (see link below), you'll experience the technique of obscenity in full force. In spite of pressure from some news organizations to release footage of the show, Andy and Jeremy held firm. And what a smart move. The audience going into "Ghost Stories" is vibrating with excitement, anticipation and terror. Before the show even begins people are twittering--literally (with tweets) and physically (with terror).
 
     What's more, "Ghost Stories" delivers big time on its promise. It is a truly terrifying experience--no doubt, the most scared I have ever been in a live theater show. Ever. Period. Bar none.

     So, how does this apply to you?

     While "Ghost Stories" keeps the entire "product" hidden, you can practice being obscene with just one component of what you offer. Here's what you do:

1) Think of one cool feature, benefit, service component, experience or bonus item you can offer your customers/clients

2) Then, get past customers to offer testimonials, talking about that element in such a way that doesn't reveal what it is but entices your prospects, making people so curious they have to come check it out.

 

 

     Great business experiences (and reputations) are the result of many factors, one of which is doing more than expected.

 

     This month I visited La Fenice -- the famous theater in Venice which burned to the ground twice over the past two centuries (once in 1836 and again in 1996). Both times, it was rebuilt.

 

     The extraordinary thing about La Fenice is that on the outside, it is simple: a basic white stone facade with nothing particularly special except for a few columns and flags.

    

     So here's my question for you.

 

     How can you create your own "Fenice Experience" so that clients and customers say to others, "Boy, you really have to check this out."

 

     It's imperative not to let your advertising supersede the experience. How can you not only deliver on your brand promise, but go beyond?

 

     One simple technique for doing this is to not "tell all" in your promotion, and instead, leave some surprises.

 

     In the same way that high end restaurants bring a plate of tiny cookies with your coffee even if you don't order dessert, how can you create (even in the smallest of ways) a "surprise" experience for your customers and clients, one that is positive, one that delights, one that delivers more than expected?

 

     Maybe it's an extra few moments of your time beyond those that are billed, maybe it's a small gift, perhaps it's a baker's dozen or a special event to which they're invited once they join in your community.

 

     Whatever it is, make it unexpected.  

 

     Keep it hidden from all the features and benefits of your advertising.

 

     In other words, keep a bit of La Fenice's facade to mask the delight that lies beyond.

(c) Victoria Labalme Communications, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

Many of you have heard me speak about Velcro Communication(TM), the concept being that the more hooks and loops you have in common with another person, the stronger the bond.

What's a hook or loop?  Anything outside the business domain that might be of mutual interest to a colleague, prospect, client, or customer such as a hobby, passion, family element or life experience. 

Even when the actual items don't align identically, the fact that you are open to sharing a particular hook or loop leads to greater trust -- provided you aren't waxing poetic about something that is of ZERO interest to the other party.

Recently, my colleague Ford Saeks as telling me about a Facebook post he made in which he included a photo from his bike computer.