Coloured Socks

I wore orange socks to a sales meeting this morning.

You probably know by now that

  1. I love colour, and
  2. I’m a fan of any unexpected additions to your world that can create positive responses, especially when they’re connected with your brand or business message.

Several years ago, at a Shirlaws conference in the south of England, my MC gift was a set of socks in the Shirlaws colours – purple, orange, and green. They were a hit. Wearing those socks, I found they had the potential to create cut through in conversations, at networking events etc. Importantly, they aligned with my personal brand (NB: Quirky) AND with the Shirlaws product architecture.

It was the latter connection that was so crucial today. Let me expand. Here is the Shirlaws logo.

Shirlaws business coaching
Shirlaws. Love Business

And here is one of the ways we like to represent the journey we take our clients on, from an initial Fact Find, through to the design of their top 3 Strategic priorities, and then supporting them (as they desire) through Implementation to ensure the full outcome is achieved.

 

Business coaching that achieves strategic results
Shirlaws Process Example (c) Shirlaws 2014

Can you see the connection? It’s hard for me sometimes to explain all of the reasons why I am a licensed Shirlaws coach, rather than independent. The contribution of my global team, even to small things like connecting our brand colours to our sales conversation, is one of the bigger reasons.

So Why Orange Socks?

My team completed our ‘Fact Find’ process with this client late last year. Today was a conversation to see if we could help them in the ‘Strategy Design’ phase (some clients have the capability or desire to do it alone – we don’t lock clients into long contracts). So the meeting was about their business moving, in our diagram, from Purple to Orange. And I wore orange socks.

Like all of these so-called ‘marketing opportunities‘, they don’t work if it’s an affection, something you do to draw attention to yourself. I wore those specific socks intentionally, and solely for my own benefit.

The fact that the client spotted them immediately and asked me about them … which led directly into the diagram above and a conversation about wanting to move forward with them into the next phase … which led directly to them agreeing to engage my team…

My coloured socks don’t help close deals. But they do help open relationships. And I’m far more interested in opening relationships than I am about closing anything.

And you better believe this client will be on the lookout for my green socks in the near future!

 

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