When selling ideas, quiet your chattering mind

The best communicators I know are great listeners. They shape a message to my needs (though without twisting the truth). And because I know they listen, I listen more in turn to them.

They listen even as they speak, somehow. That’s so valuable when “selling ideas” or just plain selling. Most of us can easily get distracted by our inner voices, and miss important cues from the people we’re talking with. Here’s a real case I experienced.

Critical cues drowned out

A government department wanted to better manage and distribute information. A consultant and a salesperson were dispatched, to see where their agency could advise.

The government team behind the information talked through pains and aspirations. The pair from the agency nodded, describing methods, successes, and a package to kick things off. The agency had some tech too, that could be useful later, and this was mentioned briefly, though the team explained politely that they were not interested, they had other ideas. But to most in the room, the consulting was interesting and, towards the end, next steps were taking shape.

And then, the salesperson spoke about the tech again. He felt it would help. He knew the team would like it. Ignoring their growingly strained faces, he listed features and pushed for a demo. Perhaps the customer’s voice was drowned by the call of recurring revenue.

As laptops were folded, not much was said, but the head of department summed it up with: “thank you so much for laying out your wares”. Like street traders with a tray of plastic, blinking toys.

The next day, when the agency got in touch, a team member civilly said that they’d decided to look elsewhere. It must have seemed as though the consulting, the main reason for the meeting, was bait being switched. Could the agency’s tech product have helped them? Maybe, alongside careful planning and changed processes. But there was never a chance to find out, because the salesperson had been too hasty to push what he thought was right, without listening. The opportunity, though just a seed, was burned.

In meetings like this, our fear of not not getting our point across or of what others will think, drowns out the important message we should be listening to. Even if that message consists of silence and pursed lips.

How to improve? First, by reminding ourselves that the audience should be our key focus. We literally need to pay them attention. As neuroscientist Daniel Levitin writes in “The Organized Mind“:

Attention has a cost. It is a this-or-that, zero-sum game. We pay attention to one thing, either through conscious decision or because our attentional filter deemed it important enough to push it to the forefront of attentional focus. When we pay attention to one thing, we are necessarily taking attention away from something else.

By paying more attention to signals from our audience, we can understand them better, and glimpse their unsaid meanings too.

The second thing we need to do is simply slow down. That’s tough, especially in a sales scenario! We’ll probably feel as if chances are passing us by. (“What if I haven’t spent enough time telling them about our other products?”)

It’s often a question of timing and pace. And good timing takes a measure of calm. Even if you don’t feel calm, you need to act the part of someone who does. And sometimes, that does the trick.

With good timing and a better ear, by listening carefully to “text and subtext”, we can open more opportunity. Here’s another case I saw.

Perceptive listening helps all involved

A manufacturer wanted to save time preparing their technical content. As they described to a salesperson the problems they were trying to solve, she heard something beyond what they stated.

The team writing the content said that because it was so hard to check and maintain, it reached its consumers of engineers and local area representatives too slowly. Someone said “not that they’re happy when it gets to them”. The team resented their audience’s grumbling, as they saw it, given that they were working so hard. Almost like a counsellor, the salesperson elicited from the team that the content itself wasn’t perfect – the audience struggled to find a path through the various documents affecting their roles. But there had been no time to think about this in the daily battles for accurate information.

The salesperson started to bounce ideas off the content team. Were they open to a better way to serve it up? What if it could be recombined via new mapping and linking techniques? Would the organization see the value? Apparently it could, because the sponsor signed up for a more comprehensive solution than they had thought they needed. Within a year, they had happier, more productive content consumers, as well as the more efficient content creation they sought initially.

In short

Often, we’re passing through situations while always thinking about the next thing, or someone else’s thing, rather than the thing that’s right in front of us. We miss out then. We don’t pick up the signs of the emotions and thoughts of the people we’re with. So breathe out, and be here. Let yourself rest from all the other things you could be thinking or doing, and then pay attention. Look for signals that surprise you, things that don’t quite fit your internal story.