I'm spending most of my time this year rebuilding our sales team and process. This includes polishing our messaging. I recently read the excellent book "New Sales. Simplified." by Mike Weinstein and in it, he offers a framework to help craft a compelling sales narrative.
After reading the chapter on crafting a Sales Story, I thought it would be interesting to see if I could use ChatGPT to help me find crisp, compelling language to use in our sales process.
The Sales Story Framework
In his book, Weinstein offers a framework he calls the "Power Statement" to help salespeople craft a compelling sales story. The framework is calls for five sections:
- Headline
- Transitional Phrase
- Client Issues
- Offerings
- Differentiators
The sequence of these sections is important. Most salespeople start with their products and services. This is a mistake and makes you a commodity. Instead, start with the issues you solve for clients. That's how you get their attention. It also sets you up to ask probing questions to learn more about their issues.
The Headline
The headline is a short phrase that places you in a category. For example, if you're cybersecurity company, you might say "Autohost is the premier provider of cybersecurity solutions for the hospitality industry in the USA. We work with property management and real estate companies to deliver true integrated security solutions."
The Transitional Phrase
The transitional phrase is a short phrase that sets the stage for the client issues you solve. It grabs their attention. For example, "Property management companies turn to Autohost when they need to protect their guests and or suffered financial losses due to fraud."
We use the third person to describe the client issues. This is important because it helps the client feel like you're not selling to them. Instead, you're describing the issues that other clients have.
The Client Issues
In this section you describe in bullet points the issues you solve for clients. Focus on pains, and don't talk about your solution. For example:
- Eliminating financial losses due to fraud, property damage, and legal complications.
- Overcoming the limitations of current systems that fail to deliver on their promises.
- Addressing the increasing liability exposure and rampant fraud cases in the hospitality sector.
- Reducing the guest frustration impacted by inefficient info collection processes.
- Desiring peace of mind against emergencies, with a provider that has the technology, expertise, and experience to manage crises effectively.
- Struggling with manual guest screening processes, hindering business scalability.
- Balancing ethical guest screening with effective risk management.
- Seeking an edge in the market with effective, non-intrusive guest validations.
The Offerings
In this section you describe your products and services. Keep it brief and use simple language. This should be the least important section of your sales story.
The Differentiators
In this section you describe what sets you apart from the competition. This is where you can talk about your technology, your team, your experience, etc. Start with an intriguing statement that grabs their attention. For example, "Autohost contrinues to grow because we are very different from what you'll find in the market today."
- Differentiator 1
- Differentiator 2
- Differentiator 3
- Differentiator 4
- Differentiator 5
The chapter continues to provide some examples of how to use this framework. I've spent some time using this framework to craft our sales story at Autohost. After I finished, I thought it would be interesting to see if I could use ChatGPT to help me other versions of our sales story that might be more compelling.
I'm happy to report that it worked! I was able to use ChatGPT to generate several versions of our sales story, almost all were great. I edited and merged several of them to create a new version of our sales story that I'm excited to share with our team.
GPT Agent
OpenAI recently released a new feature called GPTs. GPTs are a way to create "custom versions of ChatGPT that combine instructions, extra knowledge, and any combination of skills."
Thanks to GPTs, I was able to create a custom agent that I called "Sales Story Builder". I used the Sales Story framework as the instructions for the GPT. I also added some extra knowledge to help the GPT understand the context of the Sales Story framework.
You can see the GPT Agent here:
Using the GPT Agent
To use the GPT Agent, edit the following prompt, paste it into the GPT Agent, and hit enter. The GPT Agent will generate a Sales Story for you. If you are unhappy with any version, tell the GPT Agent what you don't like or what to change, and it will generate a new version for you.
Help me craft a Power Statement sales story for Autohost considering the information below.
### What is the clear plan we’re delivering to Autohost customers?
Value Prop: short description
Here’s what we deliver:
- Deliverable 1
- Deliverable 2
- Deliverable 3
- Deliverable 4
- Deliverable 5
### Stakes
**Failure**: what negative consequences are we helping Autohost customers avoid?
- Example 1
- Example 2
- Example 3
- Example 4
- Example 5
- Example 6
- Example 7
- Example 8
**Success**: what success can Autohost customers look forward to if they work with us?
- Example 1
- Example 2
- Example 3
- Example 4
- Example 5
- Example 6
- Example 7
- Example 8
Conclusion
ChatGPT and similar AI tools are changing the way I work. I'm feeling more productive and creative than ever before. I can distill more information in less time. I can generate more ideas and solutions than ever before.
I'm looking forward to see how quickly these tools evolve and how they will change the way we work and live.
As a hacker, coder, and entrepreneur, I'm excited to see how these tools will help me build new products and companies with less effort, time and funding.
Postscript
I used a similar approach to create a GPT Agent to help me write voicemail scripts for cold calling. I'll share that in a future post and link to it here.
Check out the Semantic Knowledge Search with LLM I created to help me find relevant information in my notes and documents. I updated the tool to allow users to select different types of agents to use. We use a similar app at Autohost instead of paying the $25 team fee for the business version.
