“Stop showing off!”
By Adam Radzik
Consultant to Professional Firms

Do those words sound familiar to you? I bet they do. We heard them repeatedly as we were growing up. We were being trained to be modest, to not be braggarts and to carry ourselves with a touch of humility. How right they were to teach us those qualities. We all know how unpleasant it is to be trapped in a social situation with someone who is forever expounding on the wonderfulness of him or herself.

But marketing activities should not be confused with social occasions. Marketing is the process of targeting and presenting a sale. During the presenting phase, we are required to make an extremely favorable impression on the prospect. Indeed, we need to create such a favorable impression that he or she will ignore the lapel-grabbing presentations of our competitors and abandon his or her current practitioner, all in favor of coming to our shop. Sounds like a tall order, doesn’t it? Can this be accomplished without saying nice things about your firm, your department, yourself? Absolutely not!

Accomplishing a sale will be heavily influenced by your ability to cause the prospect to respect your ability. In fact, the prospect must develop respect for your talents that is greater than the respect he or she has for the talents of either the current practitioner or your competitors. Otherwise, why would the prospect choose you? The prospect wants to get the best possible value for the dollars expended. What this means is that you must share what your achievements have been, what your special aptitudes are and what the prospect will get if he or she retains you.

“But I am so uncomfortable talking about myself, Adam.” (How many times I have heard that in the last twenty-four years of coaching professionals.) The powerful programming of a lifetime makes us hesitate to talk about ourselves in a positive way. But we have no choice; if we want to be successful at bringing in those clients, we have to take a deep breath and talk about that which makes us special.

But maybe we are reacting incorrectly. Imagine the following scenario: You, yes you, the reader, are in a posh restaurant making a presentation to a prospect; and I, yes I, Adam Radzik, walk over to your table and say to your prospect, “You have a choice. This professional [pointing at you] can tell you every reason why she can do a great job for you, or she can tell you very little about herself and act modestly. Which do you prefer?” The prospect (who is looking to get as much information about you as possible so he or she can make an informed choice) will say, “For heaven’s sake, don’t act modestly. Tell me everything. That’s why I’m here!” My point is, we are not only not helping the prospect by acting modestly, we are actually working against his or her best business interest!

Finally, imagine that your son informs you that he’s getting engaged and he wants you to go with him to pick out a ring. You enter the jewelry store and discover that all the display cases are completely empty. You say to the jeweler, “Where is your jewelry?” He answers with an embarrassed red face that he doesn’t like to show off all the precious inventory he has, so he always keeps it locked up in his vault. Would you think this fellow needs help?

Let us all be careful that, because of our childhood programming, we don’t act like this misguided jeweler.

This excerpt is from Adam Radzik’s seminar “Overcoming Obstacles to Marketing.”

If you would like to learn more about sales coaching, contact SIC today!