The Imaging Channel

Stop Selling and Start Storytelling: The Secret to Success in Winning MPS Deals

This guest blog was contributed by Robert Newry.

At a recent MPS event, the keynote speaker told an entertaining story about why only a genuine Gucci handbag, at five times the price of a good copy, would satisfy his wife. For him the physical difference was only in the stitching; for her it was the emotional value of the brand. At the time, I didn’t see much relevance in the story to our less glamorous world of office printing. Only when running a training course shortly afterward to a group of “wannabe” MPS sales professionals did I happen to refer to the “story” that a good assessment allows you to tell, and the penny dropped. To be successful in selling an MPS program, you need to be a storyteller, someone who can inspire the customer to make an emotion-based choice of competency to deliver over the cost to acquire. Telling a good story is why successful MPS salespeople, whether from small or large players, win big deals – often at higher prices too.

Given we are in the business world, the story has to be credible rather than fictional, and the skill is in constructing and communicating a compelling proposition. Yet few of the training courses out there teach us how to do this, mostly because storytelling is something we were meant to have learned in childhood. The problem has arisen out of the legacy of product selling that still permeates our industry. Although the days when selling was about functions, specifications and ending every sales call by giving the customer a brochure are fast diminishing, they have been replaced with simplified data-gathering and the customer being left with an impersonal and “templated” report. Sales managers around the world crave the standard report and automated proposal-maker – the only differentiation fast becoming the cover. For me, giving a customer an automated and statistic-driven report is like turning “Snow White and the Seven Dwarves” into a description of the daily gemstone output of their mining activities! Clever observers pick up so much more from their assessment and deliver that back to the customer in a meaningful and personalized way, comforting the customer with their understanding and professionalism.

So for those who want to become the “Pied Pipers” of their territory, here are three fundamentals to get you going.

Every tale should have a twist

Any good storyteller has to grab and keep the audience’s attention. This can only be done by telling them something they didn’t already know, and the skillful storyteller will do this by releasing information slowly, hinting always of greater things to come and creating a desire in the audience to know more. The material for your storyline should come from a thorough assessment, but the data itself is not the story. I have seen some assessments where the provider believed that the customer would rate the value of the story in direct proportion to the weight of the report! The opposite is usually true. The customer is looking for insights, ministories of their own organization’s inefficiencies, not reams of charts and tables. One law firm we approached proudly told us they had a state-of-the-art document management system, yet when we walked around, we could see paper all over the place – the natural by-product of legal activity, we were told. Yet when we did the assessment, a few questions revealed that the scanning facilities on each floor were woefully inadequate, and the electronic filing structure did not cover all the requirements, so some staff members were still storing every paper record as a backup. After we told stories of blocked fire escapes and overflowing offices, the client was quick to award the next stage of the project. The trick is not simply the extent of the data gathered – rather, the way you use that data to demonstrate your competency and expertise. Toner storage cabinets become “mini Staples stores,” and discarded piles of paper by devices are “security risks.”

Visualize the value

We all know that a picture speaks a thousand words, and the best storybooks are illustrated. Yet, many of the presentations I have seen from providers trying to make their mark in MPS are static MS PowerPoint slides filled with charts and floor plans in the hope that the customer is impressed by the mono/color split or the volume by department. In a world of TouchPads and interactivity, the customer is far more impressed by a presentation that projects all the data on a floor plan, where walking distances to coffee machines can be demonstrated and user interviews as well as data can be combined with device volumes to show who are the print paupers and who are the print princes. By doing this, the customer becomes engaged in your story, and suddenly the situation is no longer a one-way delivery of statistics; instead, it’s transformed into an active discussion about the challenges and how they might be solved. In such circumstances, the good storyteller is no longer a salesperson but an advisor – someone the customer wants to listen to more and trusts now to get the job done.

Personalize the pitch

When my kids were younger, I used to regularly read them bedtime stories. The ones they liked the most were the ones where I added in different voices and tones for each of the characters. All I was doing was personalizing what was already a good story, but they loved the way this gave the story an extra edge and made it special to them. A good MPS presentation should be no different (well, you can skip the voices). Customers are comforted when you use their terms, speak about the business in their way and above all show true understanding of their environment. Taking the time to think about the data you have gathered and how that can be presented back in the most meaningful and insightful way will endear you to them. At the end of the day, what do you want your pitch to be: the cheap and cheerful paperback read in a monotone voice or the beautiful hardback (at twice the price) read with vitality?

In summary, telling a good story is what will impress the customer. But don’t go over the top. We are short-story tellers. Keep all reports to less than 10 pages and any presentation to less than 30 minutes. Go through your upcoming reports and presentations and check that they are personal, compelling and inspiring. Ask yourself each and every time: “Can I make this story any better?” If you have followed the advice above successfully, you should be on course for a happy ending and, with any luck, the customer should be asking for a signed hardback!

Contact Robert Newry at robert.newry@newfieldit.com.

Posted on 12/05/2011