4.05 (V) The Story Matrix

Your Story Matrix is a simple but very powerful sales tool. It's designed to capture and distill your stories in a way that makes them easy to match to your objectives. The columns of your Story Matrix represent the four types of stories we discussed earlier; Success, failure, fun and legends. The rows are meant to help you determine how to match your stories to your sales process or your specific needs in different selling situations. Think of your rose as the situations or occasions where you need to tell stories. For instance, if you're an entrepreneur, you might need a row called culture. These would be stories you would tell prospects about what kind of company you are building and how your people work together. You might also have a road called service which would just have stories around how you treat your clients. If you're a salesperson for a larger company, you might have a row called solutions that contain stories about your products and services. And you might have a row called clients, where you share stories of other clients you've worked with. Or finally, if you're seeking a job or making a career change, you might have a role called background, where you tell stories about where you came from and your prior experiences. You might also have a role simply called presentations, where you collect the stories that you will need as you present yourself. As you fill out your story matrix, this tool becomes more and more powerful. Be aware of the stories that are all around you and then capture them, categorize them and distill them down to a tight story. You are filling your quiver of arrows and you're ready to go.