Curatti

Social Selling – They Don’t Care What You Know

  • Deborah Tutnauer

    • They don’t care what you know you until…

    Social Selling for smart entrepreneurs means beginning where your customer already is.

    When we have a product to sell, from our perspective we tend to believe that

    They Don’t Care What You Know Until They TRUST That You Care

    everyone is going to be as thrilled and enamored with it as we are. After all, our product (or service) is amazing and will solve so many problems!

    It is this perception that gets marketers into trouble time and time again. Each of us lives within the bubble of our own perceptual filter. We make decisions and explore options for our lives and our businesses all through the lens of our own experiences and beliefs.

    Thus in the context of social selling, we tend to promote our wares with expectations understood through that lens. Yet our customers are not looking at the world with our eyes, they are looking at it with their own. The reality is they won’t be as excited about our offerings as we are, because their challenges and needs are different than ours. They won’t even give us a second glance to explore what we have that will benefit them, until they feel we are speaking directly to them, in their language.

    They won’t care what we know or what we have, until they feel that we genuinely care about their lives and their problems. In these days of social selling, our customers are looking to engage with caring humans offering products and services aligned with their own needs and values. When our customers are searching online in the social media sphere, they are looking first for a compelling reason to engage. They are looking for real humans communicating interest and genuine regard. They are turned off by jargon, advertising-speak and anything even hinting of lack in the integrity sphere.

    In social selling, our customers and clients are searching for a real human offering – a product or service that touches their pain or problems or desires. They are actively seeking honest communication, beyond all the “business-sy” stuff they teach you in business school. Today’s customers want authentic caring from the brands and the services providers with whom they engage.

    The beginning of authentic social selling is an understanding from the customer’s perspective, of what business you are REALLY in.

    For example, I’m an entrepreneur business coach focusing on inner game transformation and authentic marketing. Is that the business I’m really in? Does that descriptive sentence touch your heart or speak to you on an emotional level?

    No. I don’t believe it does. It doesn’t touch you and it doesn’t touch my potential clients and customers. That description is only the short-hand for what I really do.

    I’m in the business of helping small business owners to stop tripping on their own toes, and scraping their knees as they fall. I’m in the business of freeing people from their old stories and fears so they can bring their true gifts to the world. I’m in the business of grounding entrepreneurs into a place where their daily activities and tasks joyfully align with their life’s purpose and core values. I’m in the business of guiding people towards freedom, integrity and happiness in their work.

    I’m sitting in a coffee shop as I write this article. What business is this place really in? Is it the soy chai latte business? Or the double caff – hold the crème business?

    Yes, coffee and chai are the products of their business. So are homemade scones and vegan granola bars. But those are items you can get in many places, including your own home kitchen for a fraction of the price. The reality is they are in the business of providing delicious beverages and simple snacks in a cozy atmosphere to local people looking for a nice place to meet, read, or do some writing. If they were just in the business drinks and quick food, it could be done at a Formica counter-top where you stand to grab a quick pick-me-up.

    The human factor in social selling for entrepreneurs is about knowing your customer or clients and THINKING about them as an individual. Many times business owners, when asked about their audience, will talk about a somewhat vaguely defined group. Yet each individual is not a group. Each of us is a person who has our own unique pains and pleasures. Good marketers are intimate with their avatars. (I’ve had many a client laugh uncomfortably with that concept – to get intimate with your avatar!) Yet the human factor in social selling for entrepreneurs is all about exactly that. It’s about knowing what business you are really in and communicating it in a manner that touches your unique audience emotionally and compels them to move to the next step in your marketing sequence.

    As the old adage says:

    They don’t care what you know until they know that you care!

     

     

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    Deborah Tutnauer

    Question Master - Entrepreneur Business Coach and Mentor at Deborah Tutnauer, LLC
    Inspiring change in people for over 25 years, Deborah Tutnauer, MEd, MSW digs deep to help authentic entrepreneurs move away from the stories that no longer serve them while clarifying and solidifying those that really do! Deborah helps frustrated entrepreneurs get exquisitely clear about meaning, purpose and expertise, then facilitates the creation of a financially sustainable and joyfully structured framework in which business and business people thrive. Coaching both privately and in groups, Deborah is also a speaker, author, event leader and consultant. Creator of the Foundation and Framework Intensive, Deborah has been called an “Architect of Magical Business and Soul Structure”by her clients because she has a powerful ability to perform alchemy, changing passions and dreams into money and time by design. She lives in the mountains of Colorado with her husband and teenage daughter.