Business and Marketing
It's How you Say it, not What you Say
Here is, word for word, a conversation I overheard last week in response to a local business person, asked how things were going in the recession:
“It’s a nightmare, new enquiries are down 20%, sales are down 10% and our profit is shot – we’re still making a profit, but it’s pathetic.”
Needless to say, the receiver of the news will go out and tell all his friends the same story, and soon the whole island will be repeating these words.
I had a long conversation with the person who had given the answer, and suggested he could have said:
“We’re hanging in there. New enquiries are down 20%, but sales are only down 10%, so our conversation rate is much better. And the best news? We’re still making a profit, so we’ll be ready to do lots more business when we all come out of this.”
The facts in both sentences are the same, the truth remains, but the spin is totally different.
What would happen if we all started putting a positive spin on hard facts like these?
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Great Point
It's a lot harder to put a positive spin on things like this. It is much easier to blame things that are out of your control like the economy. Curious as to what the shop owners response was after your discussion.
Brent's last blog post... YummieTummie.com gets a new look for Spring ?09
Hi Brent. To be fair his
Hi Brent. To be fair his response was that he was mortified - he simply didn't think about it, and realized quickly what a negative impact what he says could have on other people, his staff and even his family.
Mike
Another downside to the negative spin ...
There's another tremendous downside to this business person's negative spin on these not-so-bad numbers. Let's call the business person "Adam" and the person he was talking to "Bob". Bob might remember the specific numbers, but he's much more likely to remember the gloom and doom. When he talks to Charlie about Adam's business, Bob is going to relay the story in a way that's even worse. Charlie tells David and now Adam's business isn't just down, it's going out. Would you want to do business with someone who's about to go under? Adam may be losing himself business with the bad spin.
Beth Bridges's last blog post... Expanding Your Comfort Zone
And Bad News Travels
Unfortunately bad news not only "sells" but it seems also to travel better than good news. If the business owner had used a positive spin the story might have remained with the listener, but people like to share bad news, for some strange reason. Still, it wasn't dramatically bad so maybe it won't go too far.
I'm fighting the tide and trying to share good news whenever I can!
Alison Kerr's last blog post... Green Product Reviews/Give Aways?
Agree
Agree Alison and Beth. And the problem is compounded here, as we're a very small island community, so the grapevine is extremely fast.
Mike