The Stories of Sales

Stories allow us to relate to one another, to better understand one another, to build trust. The power of stories is important for parenting, working, relationships, and even selling. Paul Smith, “one of the world’s leading experts on business storytelling,” wrote multiple books emphasizing the importance of stories, one in particular called Sell with a Story. Smith walks through the power of stories in the entirety of the selling process, encouraging each seller to walk through the process only by way of story-telling. Throughout his book, Smith follows the process below:

One of the interesting points that caught my attention was under the idea of “Building Rapport,” which included being transparent with buyers about admitting mistakes. Smith says that, when appropriate, admitting when you’ve made a mistake to a buyer will earn you instant credibility. It’s often a credible quality to tell a story about when you’ve made and admitted a mistake with previous buyers, because buyers then have the confidence that although there is a possibility that you may make a separate mistake in the future, you’re going to tell that buyer when you made a mistake and handle the situation appropriately. The fear in this approach might be that buyers develop a fear that you are incapable of performing to their expectations, due to your previous mistakes, but Smith argues that there is more value in admitting mistakes than being loosely transparent about past transactions that didn’t go well.

For more information visit: https://leadwithastory.com/25salesstories/