I included another idea in that talk. I don’t know where I heard this one, so I can’t credit the person who said it, but I want to pass this on because it’s a very useful idea.

If we’re telling powerful stories, they’ll be data with soul.

Just getting raw facts gives you an incomplete picture, doesn’t it? As does just getting the emotional part of a story. But if we get both, we get a fulfilling story that engages us.

So, when telling people about your business, using the 3 Ps, try to make sure that you tell stories that are data with soul.

I couldn’t resist using this slide to illustrate the point as I spoke. Please forgive me!

So why, when we encounter today’s version of the camp fire – a round table at a business networking event – do we find it difficult to unleash the story teller inside of us?

How often have you been on the receiving end of an ‘elevator pitch’ that failed to gain your interest and stick in your memory? Of the people that I’ve networked with, the memorable ones have been those that told me stories about what they do. I’ve retold some of those stories when telling somebody new about the people I’ve met. But I’ve never retold an elevator pitch. Think about it – I bet you haven’t either.

Sometimes, I meet people whose business lives seem to be filled with triumphs and victories. If they are so successful, then why do they get up before dawn to go and network over breakfast? There must be something they need – and something I might be able to help them with – if they only opened the door a little to show me what’s inside.

The people I’ve remembered, and come to understand well enough to want to do business with, have allowed their vulnerability to show, as they’ve revealed something about themselves. I’ve been able to understand what makes them tick.

I suspect there are two reasons that we don’t let ourselves be the story tellers that we naturally are. The first is that there’s an awful lot of emphasis put on ‘making elevator pitches’ and ‘pitching your offering in 30 seconds or less’. We’ve devalued the art and pleasure of telling and listening to stories.

The second reason is that we lack some guidance on what to put in our stories. There, I can help you. Use the 3 Ps, of PRODUCT, PROCESS, and PEOPLE.

You’ll see that we use 3 Ps in our work as we describe the fundamentals of any company. If you cover each of those areas, you’ll tell a complete story.

While telling your story:

• Describe how you came to develop your PRODUCT (which of course might be a service), who buys it and why. Tell your audience how you’d like to see it improve, because no product is perfect and someone there might be able to help you make that improvement.
• Let people know how you do what you do, for example by talking about the PROCESS you use to market your product, or how you win business. Be open about the bits of your process that you’d like to change, because you may be talking to someone who’s already made a similar change.
• And make sure you don’t just talk about yourself, but include the PEOPLE around you, whether that’s colleagues, investors or the wider network of contacts that you rely on. Why? Simply because we understand people not just from what they are themselves, but from the friends they have and the company they keep.

But good networking involves being a great listener too, so how can you use the 3 Ps there too? It’s easy:

• Ask the speaker why someone would buy their PRODUCT and not a competitors. Get to understand who their competitors are.
• Check whether the speaker has experience of a PROCESS that you are having difficulty with. What lessons could you learn from their approach to marketing, for example?
• And dig into the PEOPLE aspect. Why does the speaker do what they’re doing? Why not something else? What choices have they had to make that got them to be in the same room as you on that day?

I guarantee that if you remember and use the 3 Ps in your networking conversations you’ll give and get a more complete and revealing view of what’s going on. And you’ll enjoy the stories that you tell, and listen to, so much more than the pitches they’ll replace.

Come back tomorrow for a related thought.

Looking back at what I set out to do, I don’t think I did too bad a job. I certainly enjoyed doing it much more than I expected to. The only thing I won’t miss is the compulsory early morning start on the second Thurday of the month.

Thank You

I need to mention how grateful I am to:

• Pauline Pawlykiwskyj and Nicola Davies, from the Chamber’s events team. You made it so easy for me, by making sure the event was flawlessly organised, every time.
• All the people who acted as table hosts, making sure that the conversation flowed.
• The regular attendees who gave me support along the way.
• Julie Finch, who convinced me to do it in the first place.

My successors will no doubt bring something fresh to Breakfast Club as they take over the chair in January. I’ve left Stockport’s longest running (and best) networking event in capable hands.

If I was going to give in to a relentless stream of almost-identical messages, I’d have done it by now.

Years ago, when I was running an international marketing team, I was able to measure the effectiveness of a wide range of marketing campaigns over several countries and over an extended period of time. Here’s what my team and I learned.

For anyone to become a customer, we had to touch them, on average, in six different ways. And we had to touch them with more than three distinct messages. For anyone who’s not a marketing geek, ‘touch’ means the person received some sort of marketing approach from us – an email, a direct mail offer, a website visit, a recommendation from a peer facilitated by us, and so on.

When we examined the statistics, we couldn’t find anyone who had been persuaded by a single touch.

The question for you is, does your marketing plan allow you to touch each of your potential customers enough times, and in a variety of ways?

Are you able to use a variety of communication methods? Are you able to vary your message enough for it to be interesting, catching people’s attention, without fundamentally shifting your value proposition?

Other favourites are Dab-It-Off (a cleaner my mother used to use) and Goo-Gone (seen in Walmarts – it gets rid of that sticky goo left behind when you peel adhesive labels off). Just from the names, which are obviously memorable, you’ve got an idea of what those products are for and how they’d be used.

I have no idea whether the people at RTM came up with the name in an instant or thought about it for a long time. What I do know is that naming a product or service imaginatively and descriptively will help people engage with what you’re offering more easily and quickly.

What examples of good product names do you have? Let me know, in the comments.