Your stories are your secret weapon

👉 with them you can slay corporate dragons

Kathy and I were up in the North East recently visiting my Mum.

We took her out to Whitley Bay and parked in the car park where her uncle had been an attendant back when she was a child. And we visited the cafe where her aunt had been a waitress.

Hearing stories about her relatives gave me a real sense of connection to a town I'd previously only visited a few times when I'd been a kid.

And it triggered long-forgotten memories of my own. The time I borrowed my Dad’s car for a trip with mates to Whitley Bay and got stuck in mud on a side-track shortcut we took.

Or Kathy’s first ever visit to the North East where she discovered Scrantions at Pantrini’s near the sea front.

Suddenly I felt a little bit more local. The promenade, Spanish City and the grotty arcade nearby were somehow a bit more mine.

In our businesses, many of us face off against much larger competitors. Organisations that are better known than us with way more resources than us.

It's tempting to get frustrated by how unfair that competition can be - especially when we do a much better job than they do.

But you have a secret weapon. A magic power.

Something a big faceless McKinsey-PWC-DLAPiper corporation can never match.

You can make a real connection. You can tell stories that make your clients feel "local". 

Often we hide behind a mask of professionalism. Unwilling to share how we really feel or to include personal stories in our marketing.

But it's those very feelings and stories that allow clients to connect with us on a personal level before we've ever met them. That allow us to be the one they'd like to work with because we feel, well, like family.

Of course, you don't have to share details of your life if you don't feel comfortable doing so. But in my story earlier, for example, it's hardly like I'm inviting in stalkers just by telling you about my great aunt and uncle and my wife’s first visit to Whitley Bay.

But I am being a bit more friendly. Because who else would I share those stories with other than friends?

That personal connection, your ability to become a sort of friend to people you've barely met is your marketing secret weapon when you're a small firm of sole practitioner.

How are you using it?

- Ian