Make Small Talk Less Painful

Many people dread small talk.  You know, the cocktail party chatter, networking, and anytime you find yourself in a room full of strangers that you are expected to interact with socially.  Ugh!  If you are one of these people, here are a few easy tips on how to have more fun at your next networking event.

Much has been written about how to become a better conversationalist, and usually the tips go like this:

• Smile
• Ask questions 
• Be a good listener

All of these instructions are valid, for sure, but there is a lot more to being a good conversationalist.  For example, to become a good listener, the instruction is usually to be genuinely interested in what the other person is saying.  But what if they are boring the pants off of you?  What if they are talking about a subject that is so foreign to you (i.e. over your head) that you can't follow what they are saying?  How can you possibly generate "genuine" interest in something you are so genuinely NOT interested in?  Here are some ideas....

Remember, They Are Here to Network
Though your conversational partner may not be acting like they want to talk to anyone other than you, they came to the event for the very same reason as you; to meet people.  Be a good friend, and help them do it.  When you find yourself drowning in a boring conversation, look for people walking by who might be more interesting to talk to, and invite them to join you.  Don't think of this as dropping a boredom bomb on them.  Simply invite them to join you, introduce them to your conversational partner, and give them a brief synopsis of the most interesting (i.e. least boring) parts of the conversation so far.  Then ask them a question that is loosely related to the subject, and hope that they take it in a different direction.  No need to make the earliest escape possible, as you don't want to appear rude.  You end up looking great because you are the conduit connecting people to each other.

Listen For Detour Opportunities
The advice to be a good listener is great, but you need to do more than just process the words that are coming out of the other person's mouth.  Especially if the conversation is heading to Boresville, you need to be listening for something very specific; for an opening.  You want to listen for little hooks in the conversation that you can grab onto and ask a question that will direct the conversation to a topic you find more interesting.  For example, if your partner is blabbing on and on about a golf trip they took to Scottsdale, and you have no interest in golf, you could grab onto "Scottsdale" and ask them how far that is from the Grand Canyon.  "Oh, you've never been there?  It's one of the most beautiful places to see a sunset.  What national parks have you been to?"  Viola!  The trick here is that you are not hijacking the conversation so that you can tell your own story.  You are just redirecting your partner to speak on a topic more interesting to you.  In the end, your conversational partner will only remember how easy it was to speak to you, not necessarily what you talked about.

Escape With Grace
The classic phrase to escape a boring conversation is, "Excuse me, I need to get another drink/go to the bathroom/check my voicemail."  And while these do often work, there is always the chance that the person follows you.  To truly make a graceful exit, you need to be respectful of what your partner might want to achieve at this networking event.  First of all, be polite.  Thank them for the great conversation (even if it's a lie).  Second, ask for their business card and tell them why you might give them a call in the future ("if I am headed to Scottsdale anytime soon, I am going to give you a ring.").  Third, ask them if they are trying to meet anyone specific at the event.  Tell them that if you bump into that person, you will try to introduce them.  Lastly, wish them well ("enjoy the rest of the event").  Now head to the bar for a refill.

Help Others Be Successful
Overall, one of the best ways to be a good conversationalist is to make others feel comfortable.  Most people find it difficult and nerve racking to make small talk.  The more you can do to make them feel comfortable and help them make connections, the better you are going to look.  At their core, all of the tips above focus on how you can help others be more successful at networking, not simply to escape from a boring conversation.  By keeping your focus on how you can help others, people are going to remember you as one of the most interesting people that they meet at any event.

Everything Starts With A Conversation

A job interview.  A sales call.  A business relationship.  Even romance.  The way we communicate with each other orally is one of the most overlooked skills by today's professionals.  No matter how many new social networks are invented, the core concept of communicating face-to-face will always trump the influence of chatting online.

Thank you to my friend, Nick Staron at Jackson Hole Adventure Video, for helping me with this video commercial.  True to my statement above, this video only scratches the surface of how Dialogue Business Strategy can help you and your co-workers communicate more effectively with your customers and each other.

Call me anytime to discuss how improving your communication skills will help improve your business.  My cell number is 307-699-1159.  I look forward to chatting with you.

Sincerely,

John Morgan
Owner / President
Dialogue Business Strategy, Inc.
Jackson Hole, Wyoming, USA

The Winner Often Loses

Have you ever met an aggressive sales person who pushes and pushes as hard as they can to make the sale, hopefully wearing down their customer enough that they finally give in? Chances are, your reaction to that sales person was not very favorable.  Even if you did give in to that initial purchase, you probably never wanted to deal with that salesperson ever again. You stopped taking their calls. You blocked their email address. And you may even have told others to "watch out" for this salesperson in the future. In the end, the salesperson may have won a sale, but they lost your future business.

What Is "Internal Marketing?"

After a recent seminar that I presented, I passed my business cards around to the audience and asked if anyone had questions.  I was surprised when one of the first questions was not about the presentation, but about my card.

"Your cards lists, 'Sales Consulting, Customer Retention, and Employee Engagement" the gentleman asked.  "How does employee engagement fit in with all the sales & marketing stuff?"

"Great question," I responded.  I then challenged the audience to consider the "Identify Your Target Customer?" exercise we had worked on earlier in the presentation, and to substitute the word "customer" with the word "employee."  In many instances, employees are your core customers! 

The Most Inspiring Marketing Medium

"A speech is a solemn responsibility.  The man who makes a bad thirty-minute speech to two hundred people wastes only a half-hour of his own time.  But he wastes one hundred hours of the audience's time - more than four days - which should be a hanging offense."

                                                                                                       - Jenkin Lloyd Jones

Steve Jobs - A man who understood the power of
public speaking for business better than most.

We all have to speak in public at sometime in our lives.  Most of us have to do it almost every day in the form of sales calls, staff meetings, and presentations.  As someone who has studied and taught public speaking for many years, I cringe whenever I listen to a speaker who has not prepared for and practiced the skill of public speaking before they stand in front of an audience.  Not only does it show a lack of respect for the audience, it exhibits a complete loss of opportunity.

More than every other form of marketing or sales, the opportunity to prepare and deliver a speech for a specific audience gives you the chance to share your idea and your perspective in a way that is specifically tailored for the people receiving it (e.g. customers, potential donors, board of directors, etc.).  It is not just a captive audience, it is an engaged audience that is in the room specifically to hear what you have to say.  Magazines, newspapers, radio, internet, and social media all rely on chance that a viewer is interested in your message at the exact time that they see or hear it.  Public speaking audiences typically know the topic of a presentation and have committed to listening prior to hearing even the first word.  Furthermore, with traditional marketing your audience must become immediately engaged with your message, or they will turn the page, change the station, or click another link.  Nearly 100% of a public speaking audience stays listening attentively to the speaker for the entire speech.

How You Talk Is How You Should Market Your Business

How we talk is the core to how we communicate.  How we communicate is core to how we connect with customers. Too many businesses create a marketing strategy based on what they think they their customers want to hear, rather than trusting their own voice to communicate why they serve their customers in the first place.

My approach to marketing for Teton Healing Arts has been to encourage every practitioner to speak in their own voice.  To communicate from their own heart.  Once everyone became comfortable speaking candidly about why their work is important to the health of their patients, it became simple to make those messages engaging from a marketing perspective.

Thanks again to my friend Nick Staron from Jackson Hole Adventure Video, for helping me create this video testimonial.  

-John

Staying Ahead of the Curve

Woah, it’s been quite a while since my last blog entry! Thankfully, my absence is the result of being extremely busy this summer. Aside from the obvious benefit of being busy ($$$), working with new clients and new projects has been a great learning opportunity! I am convinced, there is no better way to keep ahead of the curve, keep energized, and pursue innovation than to be proactive about working with new projects.

“To stay ahead, you must have your next idea waiting in the wings”   -Rosabeth Moss Kanter

The 90% Rule

90% of marketing happens AFTER your customer contacts you, however most businesses spend the vast majority of their marketing budget on awareness initiatives.  How could this be?  It comes down to the fact that the most easily measurable statistics for marketers are awareness indicators (e.g. click-throughs, page views, phone calls, Facebook “Likes”, etc.).  Businesses would do themselves a big favor if they devoted more of their marketing efforts to customer engagement and measured revenue and repeat business.

Engage Employees With Facebook????

During a recent strategic planning session with one of my clients the subject of Social Media came up.  Almost immediately the owner of the company rolled her eyes back, and made one of those "hrumph" sort of noises, indicating her displeasure.  She went on to explain that her employees "waste time" on Facebook, and that productivity suffers as a result. I saw this as an opportunity to explain to her that people may waste time socializing when they should be working, but it is hardly the fault of Facebook.  

Copy This Practice

Earlier this month, my wife went out of town for a couple of weeks to help her company with a project in Denver.  Before she left, she asked if I would bring her car in to have some service done, to which I agreed, of course. 

As I called Teton Motors, our local GM dealer, to schedule an appointment, it occurred to me that the car would be listed under my wife's name.  When I arrived at the dealer a few days later, I let the gentleman behind the service desk know that I was dropping the car off for my wife, offering her name to help him easily locate the file in the computer.  Sure enough, he found it right away.

"My name is Bruce," he said extending his hand over the counter to shake.  "Please let me know your name, and I will add it to the records for this vehicle."

Immediately, I was impressed.  This gesture seems simple enough, but believe me, it is more complex than you may imagine.  Bruce identified an opportunity to use a conversation to connect with one of his customers, and he executed it very well.  Let me explain.

Know Thy Customer

I made the mistake today of Googling "Ten Commandments of Marketing." I wanted to know where "Know Thy Customer" ranked on the de facto online authority (as deemed by the highest search engine rank). Looking back, I know it was a dumb idea. I had expected that a dozen or so people would have posted their version of this fictional list of marketing dos & don'ts, but I had no idea that there would be more than 83 pages of results! That is more than 800 individual websites referencing some version of the Ten Commandments of Marketing. 

Ten Commandments of Modern Marketing

...Social Media Marketing

...Guerrilla Marketing

...Green Marketing

...Networking

...Better Networking

...Great Networking

Then things started to get weird...

...Ethnic Marketing

...Marketing for Chiropractors

...Marketing & Promoting a Horse Business

And my personal favorite: 

The Ten Commandments of Mafia Marketing

I also really enjoyed the Hip Hop Ten Commandments which really had very little to do with marketing, but almost made me fall out of my chair from laughing.

Listening to Guy Kawasaki

A couple of months ago I had the opportunity to hear Guy Kawasaki speak at a conference in Banff, Alberta. I was very excited to hear Guy live and in person, because I have seen his books in just about every airport bookstore I have visited, though I have never actually bought one. Of his, that is.

Interested vs. Interesting

Here is a fundamental difference between sales & marketing. Traditional marketing has always been about grabbing your customer's attention and getting them excited about your product or service; being interesting.

Sales, on the other hand, is all about conversation; two-way dialogue. And one of the hallmarks of conversation is that both parties have to be interested in what the other has to say.