Photo Credit: The A Group

I attended Discipleship 201 this weekend — the second session in an ongoing series conducted by our Pastor designed to help us grow in our faith, navigate our spiritual journey, and help others navigate theirs.

So Why Mention It Here — In A Business Setting?

Because . . . What strikes me now some 48 hours later is this: Just how universally Applicable the Information, Tools and Principles shared in that session can be — even in (particularly in) business .

The 201 class was very different from the 101 class. The 101 class was an informative orientation. It was interesting — chock full of facts about Christianity and our denomination, peppered with provocative videos, and supported with easy access to plenty of additional resources.

101 was great. But 201 had something different — so different that it changed the entire dynamic. This session required (or at least very enthusiastically requested) each of us to take a stand, to put real skin in the game.

In a word, 201 asks for a COVENANT — In this case, a solemn promise to adopt a specific set of behaviors conducive to strengthening our Spiritual Maturity . . . bringing us closer to God, and further equipping us to help others in that same pursuit.

Have you signed up for 201 in your arena yet?

What Covenants (solemn promises) are you prepared to make with your market?

Try This: Write out 2 Covenants: Two solemn promises you’re prepared to make with one or more of your key constituencies — your customers, your team members, your suppliers, your alliance partners, maybe even your competitors.

If this comes easy, you’re probably “full of it” — but I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt and simply say Congrats !

If this doesn’t come so easy, Welcome To The Club . . . And don’t beat yourself up. You’re probably struggling a bit because you’re a dedicated professional who sincerely wants to make and keep promises to those you serve — but at the same time, you take the matter very seriously — seriously enough to thoroughly consider taking on any vows before boldly declaring “I Do.”

You’re to be commended for exercising this wisdom, not ridiculed. So Congratulations.

Of course, you know it’s not enough though. At some point, you’re going to need to make some promises to your market, keep those promises, and make sure they know you did it. So I Ask Again . . .

Have you signed up for 201 in your arena yet?

What Covenants (solemn promises) are you prepared to make with your market?

In The Meantime, Here Are 2 Covenants From Me:

I, Stone Payton Solemnly Promise:

(And I’ll try my very best to be clear about which items are genuine specialized knowledge, which are nothing more than my best guess, and which lie somewhere between.)

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Robyn Cobb: Project Authenticity

Brief Excerpt

Full Interview

About Project Authenticity

Our mission is really simple, we are working to end violence against women and poverty in developing countries. We know that one billion women will be a victim of violence in her lifetime. As many as one in every three women has been beaten, coerced into sex or abused in some other way – most often by someone she knows, including by her husband or another male family member.

We want to promote peace and prosperity, believe wholeheartedly that it begins with women. We have seen that in societies where women’s rights are respected, economies are stronger, civil societies thrive and political institutions are more open and free.

Our approach is to work alongside vetted country and community leaders to make sure that the girls and women are getting the education and training necessary to participate in programs for micro-finance and build an income. When a woman is educated and bringing income her role in the community changes. It just takes one woman to start to change an entire community.

Our goal isn’t to herd women and girls through a program only to leave them asking what’s next. We are committed to building a movement of empowered women who can be a catalyst in their community for economic viability, human rights, and goodness.

Guest Post by Best Selling Author and High Velocity Friend, Sharon Drew Morgen

Sharon Drew Morgen

Buying Facilitation® is a great model for helping buyers navigate their behind-the-scenes political and relationship issues that must achieve buy-in before they get consensus to purchase a solution – you know, that mysterious stuff buyers go through privately while we sit and wait for them to buy.

By using both two models consecutively, selling and buying becomes a very different experience than the one we are accustomed to: the timing is different, the skills are different, the outcomes are different, the relationship is different and the competitive and money factors fade away.
Indeed, sellers can enter the buying environment much, much earlier, be a coach as buyers gather the appropriate players and handle their buy-in issues, and lead them through all of the behind-the-scenes decisions they must make by being a part of the Buying Decision team – not as a seller, but as a management consultant and change agent dedicated to buyers achieving excellence. They have to do this stuff anyway: might as well be with you. You sit and wait while they do it anyway.

THE BUYER’S DECISION JOURNEY FIRST, THEN PROBLEM RESOLUTION SECOND
By beginning the buyer/seller relationship with a different agenda and skill set as a neutral navigator and using unbiased, systems-based Facilitative Questions to help buyers think through their range of relationship/political issues (like the department heads that need to get along, or the pesky tech team who try to take over the initiative, or the boss that wants to use her favored vendor) you can lead buyers through the non-problem-based, confusing stuff they need address to help them chart a course through their pre-purchase decision issues.

And then, once they determine how and why and if and when they can resolve their problem with minimum disruption, know who will be involved, and the criteria they all need to meet to move forward with any change, then you can start the process of understanding the specifics of their problem and know the right way to introduce your solution. First, neutral, unbiased change agent/coach. Second, gather data about full spectrum of need, and then place solution.

Let me break that down for you:

BUYING FACILITATION®

Step one: Make contact as a change agent. Lead a prospect through the discovery of where they are, what excellence would look like to them in the area your solution can resolve, and if there is a difference.

Step two: help the prospect discover all of the internal factors (many unknown, many historic, and all that they have to manage before considering doing anything different) that keep them where they are.

Step three: by using the right Facilitative Questions (based on helping prospect discover and manage their unconscious criteria), be placed on the Buying Decision Team to continue leading the buyer through all of the off-line, private decision issues they’ll need to address so they can garner buy-in.

Step four: continue to help prospects

» collect the right people,
» recognize their internal systems issues that are maintaining the status quo,
» help them re-organize,
» plot out the steps for adopting a solution that the whole Buying Decision Team would buy-in to,
» recognize any fall-out before they can even consider the right solution.
SALES

Step five: gather the appropriate data to see how your solution would fit and serve.

Step six: discuss your solution in detail, using the buyer’s buying criteria as they have discovered it, and introduced in a way that will teach the buyer how to manage the internal politics that you and the Buying Decision Team have just worked through.

SALES TODAY
In general the steps of sales today start with my Step Five (except when using the Internet as a lead generator, and then many companies start with Step Six, mistakenly assuming once the buyer makes contact they already know your solution fits and they are ready to buy). But make no mistake: buyers need to do the first steps anyway – with you or without you. It is here that you lose your sale.

How many times have you had the exact right solution and the buyer doesn’t buy? It’s not because your solution doesn’t fit or because they don’t like you or your price: it’s because they couldn’t get buy-in to do something different, or the internal politics demanded a different solution, or the status quo prevailed because they didn’t know how to keep their system in tact and determined that the risk and cost would be lower to do nothing.

You lose sales because buyers have a tough time navigating their internal decision issues, and sales doesn’t offer a model to help them do that.

Remember: the time it takes buyers to come up with their own answers is the length of the sales cycle – answers that most likely have absolutely nothing to do with your solution or their need, and everything to do with internal politics, relationships, and the unknown.

Buying Facilitation® is not sales. It’s a decision facilitation model that leads buyers through all of the internal navigation issues they must resolve privately and off-line before they get agreement to do anything different. Using sales, there are no skills to start where BF begins (As my book Dirty Little Secrets says over and over, don’t compare this to sales.) but you lose sales, lose time, lose money because you don’t.

Buyers are going to do this with you, or without you. And they do it very haltingly and inefficiently. Learn this model, add it to the front end of what you are doing now, and close more sales quicker – a lot more sales, a lot quicker.

Do you want to sell? or have someone buy? They are two different activities, and you need skills to support both.

sd

by Sharon Drew Morgen

How To Build Community – Part 3

Don't hide behind this...

I find that most people hide behind their computer monitor for two main reasons:

1. They think they need to continue learning, reading, researching and getting everything perfect, before they go out into the world and go to market with their business.

2. They hide behind Facebook and Twitter all day long, pretending it is hard work that is keeping them busy. When the wife calls into the office, you say, “but honey, I am busy marketing the business.”

Here is the PROBLEM with these two scenarios: One, things will never be perfect. Get out in the real world, mix it up, makes a few mistakes, get a little dirty. You will learn far more valuable lessons from REAL EXPERIENCE than you will from reading all my brilliant thought leadership online.

And two, you probably don’t have a true social media strategy anyway. And you are just fussing around treading water, when in fact, social media – and the relationships you develop online – are just conduits to real world interaction where the magic happens. You do have to venture out and talk to real, honest-to-goodness, humans. It really helps.

Look, there is no doubt that time spent researching and learning online is important, and clearly, implementing an online social media strategy and devoting time to execute and engage, is very important…

But it is just a part of your overall business marketing and outreach. So, go ahead, get out there, meet real people. I promise, EVERY time you go out in the world and engage with the RIGHT live audience, magic will happen. Such as:

1. You find a new client.
2. You build a relationship with a potential referral partner.
3. You find a vendor who can help you.
4. You find people that you can help.
5. You make a new friend, someone who will listen to and share your thought leadership.

These are just a few things that might result. But I promise, building community doesn’t just happen online. But those relationships you start online become much deeper with live interaction.

So, if you spent most of 2009 looking at your monitor, commit to getting out of the office a bit in 2010. Good luck!

[photo credit: kevindean on flickr]

How To Build Community – Part 2

Always be there to serve!

In part 2 of the How to Build Community series, my goal is simply to get one idea, one concept, into your conscience.

And that is the idea of serving first, selling last.

The goal of marketing is to bring awareness of your product or service to a market that needs/wants what you do. The problem is, there is a lot of competition out there, and it is difficult to stand out. The other problem? There are a lot of people shouting from the rafters about what they have to sell.

Consumers are tired of all the shouting. And are tuning out most marketing communication. Big time.

That’s why it is so refreshing to be served, and not sold to. Although MANY “experts” preach this method, I find most people still are not practicing it. Thus, serving first and selling last, will remain a very powerful differentiator.

Serving can come in many forms. It is sending along an article that might help someone. It is connecting them to an individual who can be helpful. It is answering a question that some “consultants” only give away for a fee. It is referring them to a “competitor” who can better help than you can. It is simply listening and being a sounding board to someone. It is helping spread someone’s thought leadership. It is a willingness to connect people without ANY expectation of getting something in return.

I know this will require a change in thinking for most, a new paradigm, an entirely new style. But here are a few reasons why you should adopt a serve first, sell last approach:

1. By serving first, people have already learned how you can help. [Pssst - it is easier to sell them now...]
2. People will naturally want to give something back. This could come in many forms: buying from you, referring someone to you, helping you in some other way..
3. We are always talking about being remarkable. Serving first is a way to stand out and be different. Trust me, most people in the marketplace aren’t doing it. Yet.
4. One of the goals of your marketing is to get people talking about you. Serving first is certainly a way to achieve that…
5. It is contagious. If you start, you will likely get others to follow. What a cool trend to start…
6. Most importantly, this will allow you to start building a community of loyal and trusted friends. And that is all powerful – and necessary in this new marketing age.

How To Build Community – Part 1

nikoskrikelis on flickr

This past fall, I wrote a series of posts, which can be found HERE, that discuss WHY one should seek to build community. As we kick off the new year, I plan to publish a series of short posts discussing some of the easily actionable tactics on HOW to build community. This is the first post in the series.

If you want to be a thought leader in a certain field, industry, or niche – you will want to stand out and be noticed. You will want to rise above the clutter. So exactly how can you stand out in the crowd?

BUILD THE CROWD! Yourself. Lead it. Be the impetus behind it.

In other words, be a connector. Connect people in your space.

But don’t just invite prospects. Invite friends, those will will learn from the interactions, people who should be networking with the people you are bringing together (who can market their own products or services), and yes, your competition.

I find that many are afraid of inviting their competition into this gathering. Well then, you don’t get what building community is all about. You need to let that fear go. It will hold you back.

I promise that the very act of bringing people together will serve you well. It will go a long ways to building your personal brand. People will thank you. They will be grateful to you. They will identify you as a leader. They will seek other ways to return the favor. And yeah, even your “competition” will seek out ways to joint venture…

Here are some simple ways to connect people around an idea or concept:

1. Lead an online chat, on Twitter perhaps
2. Form a LinkedIn group
3. Host a TweetUp
4. Form a Mastermind group
5. Lead a networking group at a local coffee shop
6. Create a blog around the niched theme – and encourage conversation
7. Start a radio show/podcast around the niche topic – and encourage conversation

First of all, Happy Thanksgiving from all of us in the High Velocity family. Hope you and yours have a happy and safe holiday.

What are we most thankful for? Our community. The simple fact that even a few of you spend your time on this blog, listen to our radio show, or observe us on the road with the Video Dust Jacket Tour – means the world to us. And we are grateful.

I recorded this video several days ago, but I think it is appropriate for Thanksgiving Day. It talks about the power of connecting people. And it speaks about making the effort to bring people together. A key point that I forgot to share in the video is this: it doesn’t matter if you bring 150 people together, or five. The thing is, bringing people together around a shared idea, and to help serve each other, is always powerful. Enjoy…

[youtube=5Xy6ko_6zMQ,CENTER,480,4:3]

[home page image by batega on flickr]

cartoon by @gapingvoid

PART 5 of the BUILDING COMMUNITY SERIES!

OK, so we often talk about building community here at High Velocity – it is big piece of how we go to market. That said, we have always been about building community. But modern tactical marketing made this process much easier to execute.

Of course, you could always stick with the more traditional methods. You know, things like paying through the nose for television, radio, or print advertising. Or you could spam the heck out of people who didn’t really give you permission to receive that email.

The good news is your paid television campaign would work great – if your target demographic happens to be watching television at 9:33pm on that given night. The bad news? What if they weren’t?

Wouldn’t it great if you could have a marketing program that worked while you slept? While you played? While you traveled? While you coached the kids baseball team?

It’s 2AM – Do you know where your community is?

How does this work?

Well, first of all, you have to read this whole Building Community series (as seen below) to learn the how and the why to build community.

But here are just a few ways your community markets you and your brand whilst you sleep:

1. People can read your blog at all hours of the day – which is, as luck would have it, selling for you at all hours of the day.
2. People can engage in conversation on your blog, learning about what you do, and what you stand for, all whilst you sleep.
3. Social media conversations on things like Twitter and Facebook also occur 24/7. They are going on when you aren’t actually listening and paying attention. And if you have something worth talking about, people will do so when you aren’t there.
4. The other great thing about social media? It is getting easier and easier to share your content with others. And IF – a BIG IF – you spend a large majority of your time helping and serving others – your community will talk about you too – without you having to bribe them to do so!

Keys to success? Well, you have to:

1. Serve first, sell second.
2. Stand out. You cannot afford to be mediocre.
3. Did I say serve first, sell second?
4. Discipline yourself to put forth a sustained effort. This takes time.

If you do the four simple things listed above, you will have begun to put into place a marketing program that sells for you whilst you rest and play! Now, remember this key point: once you get this rolling, it doesn’t just keep rolling downhill.

It requires constant work and effort, caring about your community, and serving your community. But if you sustain this, it will be working for you all. day. long!

Even at 2:00AM!

Other posts in this series:
Intro - What is Building Community?
Part 1 - Deep Friendships
Part 2 - Raving Fans
Part 3 - Build Your Own Think Tank
Part 4 – Don’t Play To An Empty House

from tochis on flickr

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, people used antique tactics such as distributing white papers, sending mass unsolicited emails, and scheduling speaking engagements to build awareness of their expertise.

OK, so maybe some folks still do. But things are a wee bit different now. Way back then, you know, circa 2008, these options were the way you were expected to go about your business.

Not any more. But as you might expect, a lot of people still believe in these tactics as the only way to go to market. And they wonder why they struggle, or have to push large rocks uphill to get where they want to go.

Now when a client asks why they should invest energies into building community, I tell them so that they can increase their awareness in the marketplace, position themselves as an expert, and become a person of influence.

[insert head scratching and chirping crickets here...]

“But isn’t that why I should distribute white papers and send mass interruption emails?” they will ask…

Well, if you have an audience of people who WANT this material from you, then yes I will answer. Problem is, most people (read: most small businessfolk, consultants, authors, trainers, etc.) don’t have an audience. Most of them are speaking to an empty, silent hall.

The act of building community allows you to grow a community of people interested in what you have to say. Interested in reading what you write. Watching videos you film.

IMPORTANT CAVEAT! If the ONLY reason you want to build community is to build an audience – YOU. WILL. FAIL.

INCREASE PUBLIC AWARENESS
The old way: promote, promote, and promote until somebody…anybody…listens. Maybe.
The new way: by giving, giving, giving…people will become aware of you because you become known as someone who cares about their community.

POSITION YOURSELF AS AN EXPERT
The old way: telling the world that you are an expert.
The new way: having your community tell the world that you are an expert – by sharing your insights to their own communities.

BECOME SOMEONE OF INFLUENCE
The old way: forcing, pushing, driving your “influence” mercilessly.
The new way: helping, serving, and giving to your community naturally makes you a person of influence.

So, the lesson here is simple:

By doing the opposite of what most people think they should do to build an audience – you will likely build an audience. The simple, profound act of caring for your community, serving your community, helping your community – you will grow an audience. See, what most folks do is try to force it – and they actually work against themselves.

If you become known as someone who serves first and sells second – you will be playing to a FULL HOUSE – and a crowd that wants to be there!

Good luck, and break a leg!

Other posts in this series:
Intro – What is Building Community?
Part 1 – Deep Friendships
Part 2 – Raving Fans
Part 3 – Build Your Own Think Tank

Ever since Todd & I shot that little video yammering a bit about our take on CircleNomics ™, I’ve been getting several notes and a few phone calls taking issue with my strong admonishment toward the end of that piece:

“STOP WRITING PROPOSALS”

I’m not offended of course — When you routinely go public with counsel like this . . . or “Forget The Funnel,” or “Serve Your Competition — And You Won’t Have Any,” you have to expect a little backlash.

Of course in a live speaking venue, I usually have an opportunity go on and explain myself a bit (which we really didn’t do in this piece).

I don’t mind the push back. In fact, I rather enjoy it — and the thoughtful exchange of ideas that usually follows.

So call / write anytime if you’d like to explore this or any other topic. I’d be delighted to set aside some time and talk it through with you.

In the meantime, if you’d like a little more context on my thinking regarding proposals . . .

I wrote a piece on this very topic sometime last year. Several e-zine services and aggregate blogs picked it up and distributed it under a couple different titles.

You can find the “Eyes On Sales” version here.

Enjoy, and we’ll see you in the Fast Lane . . .

- Stone