23 Jul Who Loves Pizza?
Pizza is my favorite food, although I have had to reduce the number of occasions that I dine on it due to my recent diagnosis of type 2 diabetes. I enjoy all styles of pizza, including thin crust, stuffed crust, Detroit-style, New York-style, and Neapolitan. My favorite is pepperoni pizza. Since I grew up and live in Chicago, I especially like Chicago deep-dish style pizza, a style unique to the Windy City.
Did I catch your attention with my opening? I must have because you are still reading.
So, what does this have to do with sales? It’s all about quickly relating to the audience.
When you meet with your prospect, wouldn’t it be nice to open your meeting with a sentence or phrase (a “hook”) that everyone in the room (or on Zoom) can relate to? Something vital to them at that moment. You want to capture your attention immediately. This has become increasingly essential in the digital age, when attention spans are growing shorter.
Research shows that you have 81 to 102 seconds before your audience loses interest and becomes distracted by other activities, such as checking emails or sending texts on their smartphones. How long do you look at a website when you are browsing before moving on? Seconds. It is the same when you address an audience.
There are also generational differences in attention spans. Millennials have shorter attention spans than Gen X and Baby Boomers. Those of us who are older have noticed this. And Gen Z has the shortest –about 8 seconds.3 So you need to be aware of the composition of your audience.
The primary goal at the outset of the meeting should be to engage the audience’s interest by immediately addressing topics relevant to them.
To gain their immediate attention, it is recommended to start with a clear value proposition that directly addresses issues important to the audience– what your product or service can do for their company. How will it improve their lives? You need to immediately catch their attention so that they put their smartphones away.
For example:
If you know that the company is having significant issues with shipping, logistics, and on-time delivery, then open your meeting with-
“I understand that you are having issues with on-time delivery and have lost some important customers lately. I am here today to help you solve that problem.”
Another, you have found that the company has encountered problems with its collections and accounts receivable-
“I understand that you are having problems with your collections and many of your customers have not paid you on time, which has caused you cash flow issues. I am here today to help you solve that problem.”
Opening a meeting with details about one’s own company or products is generally less effective at capturing attention and can be shared later in the discussion. Frankly, it puts me to sleep.
Grab their attention at the beginning of your presentation – just like I did with my “who likes pizza” headline. But not by doing or saying something stupid.
Rather than drone on about product features, including those cool ones that excite you, it is better to tell stories that the audience can relate to. For example, how a similar company in their industry implemented your solution and saved $10 million per year, or increased on-time delivery and customer satisfaction by 300 percent. That will get the audience’s attention. When they ask how that happened, you can provide an overview (not a detailed explanation) of how the company used your solution to achieve outstanding results.
In summary, it is essential to immediately capture the audience’s attention and interest when presenting to them. I suggest that you relate your clear value proposition that directly addresses issues important to the audience (not to your marketing department). For instance, if a company is experiencing challenges with logistics and timely deliveries, one could begin a meeting by referencing those specific issues, stating their intention to help address them. Similarly, if accounts receivable pose challenges, a direct acknowledgment of the problem followed by a proposed solution can be impactful. How will your product or service dramatically improve their result?. Relating to an audience quickly is crucial in sales. Beginning a meeting or presentation with a statement or question relevant to the audience’s current concerns can be effective. This approach is increasingly important in the digital age, where attention spans are often brief. That should result in gaining interest and having a successful meeting.
1 https://www.verdanabold.com/post/grab-your-audience-s-attention-in-eight-seconds-or-less
2 https://www.pragmaticinstitute.com/resources/articles/product/the-10-second-customer-attention-test/
3 https://www.keg.com/news/the-first-8-seconds-capturing-the-attention-of-gen-z-students#:~:text=Research%20conducted%20by%20Microsoft%20in,digital%20content%20and%20multiple%20screens.