EXECUTING THE CORE STORY MODEL Empire Research Group Phone: 925-240-1612 | Fax: 925-240-8496
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WHY A CORE STORY? Before anyone starts the journey of writing a Core Story, they need to understand what a Core Story can accomplish. This is important because building a Core Story is difficult and highly technical. What follows is what Chet Holmes, the creator of the Core Story concept, teaches us about the Core Story... “Research increases your knowledge. Learn how knowledge is power. Whether you are building your core story or simply looking to put together your collateral material, everything is more powerful with research. The more knowledgeable you are about your industry and the trends going on in it, the more strategic you can be in taking market share. What are your strategic objectives? Would you like to: 1) Be positioned as an expert in the eyes of your clients? 2) Dramatically upgrade the “influence” you’ll have with your clients? 3) Show market data that makes having your product more important? 4) Get people to buy more, more often? 5) Build information that positions you strategically above all of your competitors? 6) Dramatically improve and upgrade the communication experience between you and your prospects? 7) Build in a sense of urgency that makes your buyers buy faster? 8) Create an unstoppable anti-competitive strategy? 9) Breed more loyalty toward you over every other competitor? 10) Attract your buyers over all of your competitors whenever they see an ad, a brochure, a sales letter, etc… Research, carefully orchestrated, can do all this and so much more.”
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THE CORE STORY HISTORY WHO IS CHET HOLMES? Before we can understand the Core Story, we need to know where it came from or in this case who it came from. The Core Story was invented by Chet Holmes, but who is Chet Holmes and why is this important? Chet Holmes is President and CEO of Jordan Productions, Business Breakthrough International with Tony Robbins and Chet Holmes International. Chet was the number one producer in every sales position held and doubled the sales of every company given to him as a line executive working for billionaire Charlie Munger. The reason Chet was the #1 top producer in every position was because he was always positioned as a trusted advisor. The Core story is a “trusted advisor” on steroids. Chet Holmes has conducted training in more than 60 Fortune 500 and other prestigious companies and is author of The Mega Marketing & Sales Training Program, Business Growth Masters Series, the Ultimate Business Mastery Series with Tony Robbins, and Guerrilla Marketing Meets Karate Master with Jay Levinson. To quote Jay Levinson of Guerrilla Marketing: “Chet Holmes has the best skills for building companies I've ever seen.” Chet’s book, “The Ultimate Sales Machine” has been a #1 to #3 seller on Amazon for Three years now. Chet Holmes is a karate master and brings the same level of intensity and focus that brought him success in karate to marketing, sales, and helping companies grow. Chet Holmes has not only mastered his craft but he continues to evolve the tools and techniques. One of the unique tools that Chet has created for corporate marketing is called the “Stadium Pitch”. Read on to find out about this fascinating tool called the Core Story.
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THE CORE STORY HISTORY (EMPIRE RESEARCH GROUP: AS TOLD BY CHET HOLMES) “Empire's research and Core Story building services began many years ago when I was building these core stories for my billion dollar clients. Clients would pay me $80,000 to build these and I would commission out all the research to an elite team of top researchers. I would then sit around on the floor (too much data to put on a desk) with piles of the raw data all around me and begin to see where I could piece together all these disconnected pieces of raw data to create the “wow's” or find the “bad news” that would motivate -- at the same time as position my clients. This process alone is critical and difficult. In one case we were building a presentation for a client who wanted to target day-spa's. The researchers got me the numbers and I saw that there were 16,000 day spa's in the U.S. But to my utter shock, another piece of disconnected data showed that there were maybe 200 of them only 15 years ago. Bad news if you're a day spa. Your market is gruelingly competitive. Two pieces of data over a 15 year period, put together on a single panel to equal bad news! After I finished building the raw data into final product, I would then pass back my finished product to the researchers to show them how I had utilized their data. After years and years of doing this, this very bright research team began to get the hang of this process and they began to go a lot further with the assignments I gave them. Before I knew it, they were getting these things pretty far along and that's when I realized that this service could now be expanded outside of the billion dollar clients I was accustomed to working with.” So what Chet once charged $80,000 to produce, businesses can now get for a fraction of that cost, affordable by almost any company or sole individual looking to slaughter the competition.
What is the Stadium Pitch?...on the next page...
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THE CORE STORY HISTORY WHAT IS THE STADIUM PITCH? (FROM “HOW TO TRIPLE YOUR CLOSING RATIO” BY CHET HOLMES) “Imagine I could put you in a giant stadium right now as the presenter, and the entire audience is completely comprised of your most perfect prospects. Are you ready right now? Could you walk out on that stage and present to every one of them and do it perfectly? Now before you say yes, let me make the stakes higher. Before you walk out there, the audience is told: “You had to come, but you don't have to stay. If this person (you) fails to keep your interest, you can simply get up and leave.” Now let me even further complicate the situation by telling you the good news and the bad news. The good news: At any given time 3% of your prospects are currently in the market to buy your product or service and looking right now to get it. Another 6-7% are open to it, but not currently looking. The other 90% are divided into three nearly equal categories: A) Not really thinking about right now. B) Think they're not interested (but might be, if you did a good job at presenting to them. C) They KNOW they're not interested. So let's say you sell brooms. And let's say it's a fantastic broom. But remember 90% of the audience isn't in the market for your broom at this time. At least they think they're not interested. That means if you walk out there and start right off saying how great your brooms are, 90% of your audience is going to get up and leave. So you need to open your stadium pitch (as I call it), with what I call “wow's.” This means that all great presentations start off with information that makes your prospects say: “wow, I didn't know that.” The focus must be on THEM and things of interest to THEM, not you. So rule number one of a great presentation is that it must be focused on the prospect and not on you (at least not initially). Continued on the next page...
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Let me give you a case in point. I have a client who sells employee benefits and insurance to companies. His sales team would call up a client and say: “We want to come and talk to you about your health care benefits.” Since 97% of prospects THINK they are happy with their current broker, that's a really hard call to make. However, when they created a presentation that pointed out: (paraphrased) “The Five Dangers Facing All Employers and How Knowing What Those DANGERS Are, Can Dramatically Reduce Costs and Increases Profits,” it made not just the sale go better, but also getting appointments go much better. Meaning that information that is of value to THEM, like “Five Dangers Facing You In Your Business,” creates what I call a “superior access vehicle.” Another client of mine sells telephone systems. Prior to the learning curve in this article, they'd call prospects and ask the prospect: “We want to come and talk to you about getting a new telephone system.” Needless to say, the appointment setting process was slow going. However, when they built THE ULTIMATE PRESENTATION, one that offered (something like): “How You're Wasting Money In Nine Major Areas of Your Voice and Data Spending,” -- Suddenly, they went from getting three appointments per week (with four salespeople trying all day) to getting 30 appointments per week. This effort is already tripling their pipeline in a single year. So rule number one, again, for building a killer presentation, is to have information that is OF VALUE to your prospects -- even if they have never heard about your products or services. Information that is above and beyond the product or service you are offering will be considered extremely valuable to them. I had another client that was trying to sell law books to lawyers. Over the years, they had been reduced to talking to just the librarians in these law firms. And since the lawyers are the ones using the law books, their ability to get new product into the market became severely hamstrung. We helped them build a presentation that laid out: “ The Five Most Dangerous Trends Facing All Major Law Firms Today ,” which resulted in meetings with entire committees of lawyers. The data was excellent, legitimate and packed with bad news. Oh, did I mention the part about bad news? A great presentation is loaded with bad news to your prospects. Why? Because bad news motivates. We'd get in front of a group of lawyers and show them that lawyers keep growing, but the annual billings are flat (less money per lawyer): That their firms will be sued (something like 44% of large law firms will be sued by unhappy or dissatisfied clients): That the case law from which they must find their information is out of control now, with more than THREE MILLION cases to chose from when trying to find a single precedent. This presentation was packed with bad news. Much of this news had nothing to do with law books. Keep in mind, it didn't matter. Bad news motivates, even if it's unrelated. Continued on the next page...
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Your prospect, when viewing a great deal of bad news, will suddenly feel the need to take some action. Any action they take will make them feel better. In the case of the law book company, every lawyer in the room wanted more information or wanted to purchase the law books outright, after they saw the presentation. Now don't take this too far. The more the data in the presentation sets up a need for your product or service, the higher your closing ratio. So in the case of the law firm, the massive case law to be studied, created a need for law books that already studied this for you. Plus, we tied the litigation against lawyers directly to the massive case law, so that seemingly unrelated pieces of data, pieced together with other data made the bad news more excruciating. So rule number two to building a killer presentation is that the data should “set up a buying criteria” in which your product or service becomes the most logical choice. When my telephone client laid out all the ways most companies were wasting money on their voice and data spending, it made the prospects open their arms and invite my client to look at how they might help them. This almost always ended up being a new system that would help them save money in many different ways. What's your client's current buying criteria? Is it price? Easy to overcome with the right presentation. Is it that they want to buy only from the biggest provider? Easy to overcome with the right presentation. Is it that they don't think they even need what it is that you sell? Easy to overcome with the right presentation. Data can motivate your prospects in all and any of the situations mentioned.” Chet calls this “Your Core Story,” or your stadium pitch because the story serves as the core for all of your other marketing efforts from telemarketing scripts to video and face to face presentations. The Core Story even serves another extremely valuable purpose. Chet goes on to say, “I had one client who used to take four months to train a new person on all the subtleties of why a prospect should buy their product. The Core Story used data as the motivator and suddenly, this core story could train an outsider how to REALLY sell this product and in a single pass through the information.”
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SO WHAT IS A CORE STORY? The Core Story is a unique marketing tool created and evolved by Chet Holmes through many years of refinement with Fortune 500 clients. The Core Story is designed to be one key part of a full marketing effort. The story may be used in total as a formal presentation or various parts of the story may be used in scripts, advertisements and other elements of the full marketing effort. The Core Story has a clearly identifiable structure and set of elements that sets it apart from all other types of marketing presentations or studies. The most identifiable elements are as follows: 1. The story is an educational presentation based on loads of research. 2. Core Story research includes statistics, trended over time, that deliver new information to the audience that creates a “WOW” through contrasting and comparing the data in new and creative ways. 3. The story is focused on the prospect not the client 4. The title leads with possible pain, “The Five Most Dangerous Trends Facing… ...Today” 5. Loaded with bad news because bad news motivates. 6. This new information becomes the “core” of all of the client’s marketing efforts 7. The research hinges on market data rather than product data as market data is much more motivational than product data. 8. While the Core Story is a superior marketing and audience access vehicle it is neither a sales, nor features and benefits piece. 9. This means that while the elements of the story may expose certain benefits they will not be about “sell and tell”. 10.The data sets up the buying criteria. 11. Core Stories are a collaborative effort between the client team and the Empire Research team on the project. This effort produces information that provides the direction needed for the project research. 12.The Empire team searches for the key data points that slaughter the client’s competition and positions the client as the only possible. 13.The Core Story may be delivered in a variety of ways, depending on the venue, including: Executive Briefing presentations, DVDs, Video, printed materials, brochures, scripts, websites and so on. 14.Physically, the full Core Story is delivered as 55 to 65 slide Microsoft PowerPoint® deck.
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HOW DO YOU BUILD A CORE STORY? Here is how Chet Holmes describes it... “Let me tell you, it isn't easy. But greatness never is. Step One: Research your industry over a thirty year period. That's where you'll find trends that no one else has spotted. Step Two: Look for the bad news. That's what motivates. Specifically, look for bad news that you might be able to tie to a solution that involves your product or service. Step Three: Manipulation of that data is the most difficult part of it. It is an art form unto itself. Stack the info, cross reference the info, blend it with other info, etc. I do all the original panels by hand on 3X5 index cards. This way you can erase info, and keep shifting the order of how you want to present the info, all in a delicate balance of insight that eventually leads to that prospect wanting YOUR product or service over all of your competitors. Do NOT pitch your product until the very end. You want the material in the front and 3/4 through to all be a “set up.” Then somewhere toward the end, you want a section that says: “What to look for in X type of provider.” At this point you would present all this data about yourself without really saying it's you. In the telephone company example, they presented: “What to look for in your telephone system provider” and they had five things and every one of them set them up to be the most logical provider. A great title is critical. Here's a great title for everyone: “The Five Most Dangerous Trends Facing all (your prospect's type of company or issue here) XYZ Type Companies/ consumers.” The second panel is always “Areas Covered,” and is used as a teaser and pre-sell opportunity. It should make their mouth water with anticipation. The rest of the layout and ideas on graphics and how to utilize them is covered quite effectively in my module entitled “Effective Presenting” (That module is in both the Business Growth Masters Series and Mega Marketing).” After building hundreds and hundreds of Core Stories, the staff at Empire Research Group can echo the words of Chet Holmes “...it isn’t easy…”. But it is worthwhile and delivers incredible value to our clients. That is why this guide will take you on a step by step journey through building the Core Story.
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WHAT IS MEANT BY CORE STORY SALES MODEL? There are many types of sales models... Consultive Selling Persuasive Selling Collaborative Selling Continuum Selling Education Selling But there is only one Core Story Sales Model To the business person who is beginning to investigate these marketing concepts, it may appear that some other sales model are similar to the Core Story Sales Model. But, as the business person’s research deepens, it becomes apparent that the Core Story Sales Model is unique in many ways. For example: The Core Story is based on extensive research That research is then contrasted and compared to find amazing NEW insights The resulting Executive Briefing is something that the prospect cannot wait to see as opposed to any other type of “sales presentation” There are 6 distinct sections in the Core Story itself. Each has a unique purpose and must attach to all of the other sections seamlessly. The Core Story must overcome the 4 basic reasons that prospects do not buy. The Core Story must then be executed within a Sales Model that includes strategy, tactics, and marketing weapons suited to the prospect and the business. When the center of the sales model is the Core Story then all of the other parts of the sales model change. If a Core Story is considered without a full sales model, it cannot succeed. When the two pieces come together correctly, prospects are increase dramatically and the business closes more of those prospects. The increased number of prospects times the increased closing ratio results in massive revenue gains. Let’s look at what I mean by that. If you typically had 1000 prospects that you worked in 1 year and we understand that usually 90% are not even paying attention to your marketing. Then you would have access to 100 pros-
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Continued from previous page...
pects. If your close ratio is 10% then you would close 10 sales. However, assuming that you did not get any more prospects (which you should) then you would start with the same 1,000 prospects. But now you will get access to a much larger portion of that 90% that you could not touch before. So now instead of access to 100, the chances are that you will have quality access to 500 or 600 prospects. If your close ration did not improve you should close 50 to 60 sales now, but if your close ratio doubles (which it easily can) you will get 100 to 120 sales versus the original 10. Quite a difference, huh?
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The Core Story Itself IS NOT A SALES MODEL! But There is a killer Core Story Sales Model © 2009 Empire Research Group—All rights Reserved-Confidential
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The cost of attracting new business… Advertising Expenditure in Millions $400,000 $350,000 $300,000 $250,000 $200,000 $150,000 $100,000 $50,000 $0 1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2009
From $11,960 million in 1960 to $241,174 million in 2009 Source: Coen Structured Advertising Expenditure Dataset
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The cost of each new customer… Advertising Expenditure per Customer $2,000 $1,500 $1,000 $500 $0 1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2009
From $107 in 1960 to $1257 in 2009 – almost an 12 times increase Source: Coen Structured Advertising Expenditure Dataset and the U.S. Census Bureau – all adults
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Ads are having less impact CMO magazine reports that 40% fewer consumers agree that ads are a good way to learn about new products than in 2002 59% fewer consumers say that they buy products because of ads 71% do not finds ads entertaining anymore It's clear that advertisers will need to understand and target their customers more effectively
So it costs much more for much less— Savvy marketers are trying a new approach... The Core Story Sales Model
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Why is the Core Story Different and so Powerful?
It is all about the audience…
© - 2010
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The audience wants this story • Designed for a very specific audience • Based on their top-of-mind concerns and fears • Delivers real research they would be interested in • Contrasts and compares that information in new ways
• Gives value that may be unrelated to the client’s product, services or company
Business to business (B2B) or business to consumer (B2C) or even business to government (B2G) makes no difference. We all want to learn about those things which threaten our business or quality of life and well being. © 2009 Empire Research Group—All rights Reserved-Confidential
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So could you keep your audience in their seats? Could you move the 90% that are not interested in your company, products or services to a position of intense interest? And could you position yourself and your company as the only real solution? If not then you may want to investigate the Core Story Sales Model more thoroughly. Go to the Empire research Group website and request a Free Core Story training and consultation. You will be glad you did. www.empireresearchgroup.com Your Empire senior management consultant will be happy to give you all of the details and potential results of executing the Core Story Sales Model www.empireresearchgroup.com/ request-a-consultation.php
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