Creativity | A Sales Guy

Creative Engagement

This is absolutely the kind of creativity we need more of.

The Learn That Name game on the Gist IPhone App is plain creative for a couple of reasons

It’s fun
It emphasizes the value of the application
It shows you how to use the application
It reinforces WHY you NEED it in the first place

Getting our attention is getting harder and harder everyday. Gist is being creative. They aren’t just yelling at us; “Hey check me out.” They are engaging us. Engaging goes against everything we’ve been taught about traditional selling and advertising.

Engagement that works, takes creativity.

How creative can you be in engaging us? We will respond!

Gist Acquires Startup Weekend App ‘Learn That Name’ (techcrunch.com)

March 24, 2010 | Filed under: Business Performance,Enterprise 2.0 | View Comments |

Work the Canvas

Sales is pretty simple. It’s about creating revenue. How the revenue is created isn’t so simple. Like an artist you have to work the canvas.

Good sales people see things others don’t. They work the canvas, adding the right elements to the right places. Like an artist each line and stroke works on top of the last. Colors blend, shadows embellish and depth field are manipulated to create the work.

Like an artist, sales is about seeing how the different elements come together. It’s about seeing the subtleties. It’s the simple connection, between customer and product. It’s seeing the emotional components, the motivational influences and the subtle reactions to new information.

In sales like art, you create a picture, it’s how you draw the picture that determines how well you work the canvas.

How do your work the canvas? It’s all about the subtleties you see.

What do you draw; stick figures or Monet’s?

February 14, 2010 | Filed under: Personal Development,Sales Process,The Chase | View Comments |

Your Momma Drives a Pickle Wagon.

You ever watch kids busting on each other; calling each other names, making fun of their families?

They start out pretty innocuous and then get pretty nasty. Each volley, leverages more and more creativity to top the last brutal insult. As they get more intricate, and complex, someone inevitably can’t top the last one . . . and he is the cat who throws the first blow.

Smack, he knocks his opponent right in the mug.

The problem is, by smacking his opponent, victory has been conceded and it can never be regained.

The business world is like this. We go back and forth, adding new features, constantly improving our products trying to one up our competition until one of us can’t keep up, runs out of creativity and lobs off and pops the competition in the mouth (this is usually in the form of badmouthing, running cheezy commercials, attacking the better product etc.). It happens with our peers as well. We’re competing for a promotion, or trying to grow our internal brand, our competition out flanks us with creativity and what do we do, we pop-em in the mouth, (spread rumors, back stab, go over their head)

The problem is, once we’ve done this we’ve lost, game over.

There is no time limit on creativity. You don’t have to win today. You just have to win.

The next time you’re losing the creativity battle, don’t concede defeat by popping your competition in the mouth. Step back, look to change the rules, attack the problem differently and buy time.

Concede the battle, but quietly be planning to win the war.

photo: Flickr-Tony the Misfit

December 18, 2009 | Filed under: Personal Brand,Personal Development,Random | View Comments |

Ideas Aren’t Democratic

Idea’s come from everywhere. The good usually come from those who are not the experts or who push the limits. RIM and Apple are good examples. Why is it the mobile carriers didn’t design and create the two best mobile devices available?

Really good ideas are different. They usually don’t conform to what we know. It’s their lack of continuity with traditional thought that makes them good. It’s also what makes them difficult to stick.

When most of us get a great idea, we look for concurrence, we look for agreement and if we don’t get it, we move on. We measure an idea on the vote of others. If no one thinks it’s a good ideas we pack it in.

The problem is, great ideas aren’t democratic. Great ideas aren’t dependent on what others think. Great ideas depend on their premise and execution.

Great ideas in big companies almost always die, because not only do they require support from a bunch of people, it has to be the right people. They make ideas democratic.

Just because your idea isn’t getting the votes, doesn’t mean its not a good idea. Idea’s aren’t democratic. Don’t let the naysayers kick your idea to the curb.

Ideas only need one vote, yours. The rest is gravy. Spend less time on what other people think and more time worrying about execution.

November 28, 2009 | Filed under: Business Performance,Entrepreneur,Random | View Comments |

Why We Can’t Innovate

In today’s competitive and difficult economy innovation is critical. Doing the same old things, the same old way just isn’t acceptable any more. People and companies are looking for new, innovative ways to get things done. The status quo isn’t going to work. The idea of make something reliable, steady and dependable and your business will survive is being usurped by the need to be new, efficient, innovative, and creative. People want constant improvement.

If this is true, why is innovation so difficult? Why do companies struggle with innovation?

To be innovative, you have to be creative. When we are creative, we do things differently. When things are different it makes us feel uncomfortable. When we are uncomfortable things feel risky. When things feel risky we become afraid of failure. When we feel failure we avoid it. To avoid failure we attach to what we know, and what we know is what we have always done.

This is the innovation circle. To be innovative you have to break the circle and to many the fear of failure is just too high. Most large established companies aren’t built to be creative or innovative. They are designed to stay the same. Employees aren’t rewarded for thinking outside the box. They are rewarded for following the rules. Employees aren’t rewarded for failing but making progress. They are rewarded for not making a mistakes. Employees aren’t rewarded for being different. They are celebrated for being part of the team. Most companies, even those that embrace innovation, aren’t built for creativity. They are built for just the opposite. They are built not to fail!

And as the innovation cirlce states: when there is fear of failure, there is NO innovation.

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August 11, 2009 | Filed under: Business Performance | View Comments |

Don’t Let Anyone Kid You; It’s Emotional

Buying is emotional! People AND companies buy for different reasons. Don’t confuse motives, for buying, with emotions. The motives can be financial, political, and personal. Underneath these motives is an emotional connection to each. The emotional thrill of beating out the competition and getting a promotion (political), the emotional warmth of buying a second home on the beach, where the family builds great memories (personal), the emotional sense of accomplishment of an additional $25 million dollars for your division by implementing a new solution.(financial), all these emotions drive the motives.

Don Drapper, from Mad Men captures it best here. In the video Draper talks about a “deeper bond with the product” in this case nostalgia. Nostalgia is the motive, but emotion is the driver. Bonds are emotional. They are created through emotion. A product or service makes us feel a certain way. That feeling drives us to buy.

Get to the emotion. Understand what the emotional impact is and play it. Don’t confuse feeling good with emotion. Emotion is pain and pleasure. Decisions will be made to avoid emotion as much as to be emotional.

To sell with emotion you have to use vision. You need to build a vision your buyer can see as if it were real. Know what motivates your buyers. Then move them emotionally. Create excitement around decisions that will drive financial rewards, or beat the competition. Leverage fear around decisions that could lose to the competition, increase loss, or fail.

Leverage your knowledge to drive the sale. Identify the opportunities, target the motives, and then tap into the emotion.

Business is emotional, if anyone tells you different they’re full of shit.

May 28, 2009 | Filed under: Sales Process,The Chase | View Comments |

What Was Once Risk

When things are going well and flying high, we tend to take more risk. We think we are invincible. In the moment it doesn’t feel like risk. Labeled optimism, and capitalism we jump. We jump into areas we know little about. We get creative in working the system in our favor. We push the envelope; fearful we are going to miss the boat.

When things are bad, we take less risk. We cut back. We delay investment. We hoard cash. We loose optimism. We become conservative. We become naysayers. We loose creativity. When things are bad, we freeze.

The problem is when things are bad; it is exactly the time to take risk. Taking risk, being creative, stepping out of your comfort zone is exactly how you turn things around. When things are bad, status quo will not get you out. When things are bad, look at the problem differently, challenge conventional wisdom, and ask the question why. Listen to the intern, who knows nothing about your business. Look to other industries. Watch your competitors. Engage your customers and offer them something different. Re-evaluate that crazy project you put on hold. What was once considered risk, just maybe your ticket out.

February 24, 2009 | Filed under: Uncategorized | View Comments |