This charcoal drawing by Susan Krough from San Jose is a prize-winner, entitled "The Letter."

I stopped in front of this artwork at the Triton Museum of Art, riveted by the image, and wondered what was in the letter the young man is running to deliver, who is the woman, where is she going, and what had happened to arrive at this moment.

No words are needed, you can create your story in your own mind, but the image is powerful and it conveys tension, desperation by the young man, and the yearning of the woman to receive it.  I guarantee it is not a bank statement.

This is visual storytelling at its best, meaningful, emotive, and engaging.

Visual storytelling has an enthusiastic mainstream audience with marketers and creative practitioners in B2C businesses for selling a plethora of products and services. Less so in selling B2B technology and services, although early adopters are embracing new tools and techniques to help convey value and engage emotions.

"Why Change" Storytelling 

In most B2B SaaS selling situations today, the salesperson's job is to help the buyer to envisage a new way of operating that will produce a better outcome by using your products or services. This involves helping the buyer to understand the limitations of their current way of doing things and the impact the status quo is having on their business. 

How do tell someone their baby is ugly, when it's theirs? 

I suggest the use of pictures that help the buyer to understand where they are relative to their competition in the marketplace and to tell stories about how people in other companies just like theirs have been negatively impacted by not changing. Ultimately the buyer must convince themselves of the need to change and the value of the future state and then they must convince others to buy into the idea of change.  This is not about the product, it's about the value of a new way of doing things.

A Call to Action

The presentations you are asking salespeople to give to customers are unlikely to convey the same emotional punch as "The Letter" 

If your sales team has not learned the art of storytelling and adapting their listening to the emotional needs of their buyer, then they are underperforming.

If you need help in creating visual aids that help buyers understand the need to change and "why change" stories that connect with emotional impact to what buyers really care about, send me an email and we can discuss it.

If you would like to see what's new in my World, visit Why Change Selling, or you could book a free consultation.