Too Much Conversation?

Thoroughly enjoying the current World Athletics Championships from London this week.

The drama of the field events wound up a notch by the omnipresence of the Coach.

After each throw and jump, the director pans to the athlete’s key trainer.

Then you try and figure out the mystifying hand signals they produce and how they are trying to improve the next go of their charge.

In one repeated exchange, a pole vaulter seemed a little too dependent on the thoughts of their coach.

Commenting on the visuals, a tv pundit who’s day-job is training heptahletes and responsible for multiple Golds themselves, sighed and said, “that’s too much conversation”.

It was singular yet damning analysis.

As the scene took on the appearance of one-sided Mediterranean road rage, the assessor grew increasingly disapproving. His general gist being that there’s a tiny limit to the amount of info people can take on board in the moment to make an affective change. Give them one solid, main point, he suggested. Two at the outside. And keep it short.

The famed KISS even made an appearance, courtesy of the contribution of his co-commentator, himself a former World Field Champ. Although he did call it the more trad ‘keep it simple, stupid’, rather than the present-day emerging, ‘kiss it super simple’.

For a fleeting moment, I recalled the methods of live telly reporters. Where as back-up, they like to have one point to deliver up their sleeve should the studio sound to them drop or if they were abruptly returned to. With a smaller, quick-fire secondary one at hand as well.

Then you think on Sales situations. How many points are you hoping to ingrain within your prospect on a call?

There’s the old school way to ensure you leave with an unambiguous agreed “action” on which your prospect will follow through. The more concrete the better.

There’s the takeaway teaching that you must know and plan before you enter the call what the one recall you want your prospect to feel once out the room much later.

Selling does have the ‘one thing’ ethos in parts already.

How close does your current selling match to this rule for succinct, concise brevity at the moment?