Story Telling - One Must Learn!

Those who tell stories, win the clients. Story telling is perhaps the most ancient art and yet it is still the most powerful tool to capture one's imagination. Though the forms and ways of story telling has evolved with time, the art of verbal story-telling is still very handy and powerful today as ever. From Shakespeare to Gandhi to Steve Jobs and to Narendra Modi, if there is one thing common between all of them, it is their ability to tell stories. What makes them so great is not just the ideas and concepts that they hold, but the way in which they translate those thoughts into carefully developed and artistically delivered stories.

Why is storytelling so powerful? It is because, it helps us connect. It helps connect an individual to the story or to the underlying idea or to a particular situation very easily. No amount of figures and research can make an impact what one touching story can. Owing to its' effectiveness, storytelling is very popular and perhaps a must for those into sales. For financial advisors, its' importance cannot be overestimated. An advisor can use storytelling to emotionally connect with his/her clients and if there is any shortcut to winning clients, then this must be it...

Advantages of Storytelling:

• Capture the attention, curiosity and concern of the client
• Helps establish connection with the client
• Opportunity to show your creativity, skills, experience and stature to clients
• Opportunity to highlight cases, products, needs, etc. to the client
• Guide clients to think the way you desire
• Make your presentation / pitch interesting and memorable

Why Storytelling for Clients:

• Clients make decisions emotionally
• Clients want to do business with people they like and trust
• Clients may not really understand numbers & products easily
• Clients may not readily know /appreciate their needs /goals
• Clients may not readily change their beliefs /attitudes
• Clients may likely get into arguments and evidence in absence of stories

Making Difference:
The difference between a truly great and successful financial advisor from the rest is the ability to create a connection between themselves and their clients. Experience shows that attitudes, greed, joy, fears, hopes, and values are the emotions that are strongly influenced by stories. Stories are also more effective at changing the attitudes and belief systems held by clients which otherwise is a big challenge. Your own, personal stories can establish a true connection with the client but to make a real difference to your storytelling ability, here are a few key points to keep in mind.

The stories must be carefully designed to ...

• Cover both your and client's point of view
• Argue, persuade and give evidence for your case
• Be factual, believable and realistic, if not true
• Not disclose the identify /confidentiality of other clients
• Highlight your experience, skills & abilities in a mild way
• Evoke emotions of hope, fear, responsibility and action
• Not make fool of anyone or brag about self
• Not focus too much technicality /numbers

Selecting / Building the stories

• Share your own experience – you have many more good stories than you think
• Select stories to match client needs / ideas / products to be pitched, etc.
• Stories selected must be dramatic to be able to evoke emotions
• Get the background facts rights
• Present your time and nature of intervention /role in the story properly
• Build a mental library of stories for each occasion /sale

Delivering the stories with impact ...

• Speak as the first or second person
• Love your stories and deliver with passion
• Take it deep and make it personal
• Be courageous in revealing your weaknesses /mistakes
• Keep it short and focused on the main theme
• Don't keep it too obvious

New to Storytelling:
If you have not used storytelling in past or find it difficult, remember that storytelling is not something god-gifted but can be learnt at any age. You can dramatically improve your storytelling ability by practicing, reading books, watching and listening to good presentors. Remember that practice will only make you better. Overtime, as a financial advisor, you will have enough stories of your own that you will be able to narrate with great conviction and impact.

Conclusion:
As human beings, we love to connect to others. A client is more likely to do business with you if he/she connects emotionally with you. If a financial advisor can find the right story suitable to the client and the situation, and deliver it with passion and honesty, there is little doubt that the client will turn away. Advisors can be honest enough to even share their mistakes and weaknesses – it will only show that you are human and perhaps may even generate more trust and likeness for you from the clients.

A study has shown that most of the affluent clients are right-mind dominant – meaning that they will first like to judge you as a person and connect emotionally before finding a logical reason to do business. Financial advisors, on the other hand, are more likely to be left-brain dominant meaning that they will be too focused on logic, numbers, product features, etc. to pitch to clients. Thus, storytelling is one easy shortcut to connect and influence clients.