CVC Succcess Group coaches Jerry & Sheryl Isenhour
Getting results requires a number of traits, strong communication skills being one of them.
In business, speaking to your community properly is of utmost importance. When you are able to speak to your community and get their attention, you can easily establish yourself as the local authority.
What are you doing to establish yourself as the authority? On this episode of The Chimney and Fireplace Network, we explain easy ways to tell your story to your client base – your community. We will discuss ways to show your community you are the best choice.
The Chimney and Fireplace Success Network. A weekly broadcast brought to you by the CVC Success Group and hosted by industry expert, Jerry Isenhour. Each week you will find new presentations to assist business owners and managers in turning their business dreams into their business realities.
Transcript
Jerry Isenhour: You know, speaking to your community properly is something that is of the utmost importance.
You see, it is how you are going to establish your authority. And even more so, it’s going to how it’s going to be the way you’re going to establish yourself as the local authority.
It’s how you say who you are.
It’s how you say what you have done.
It’s how you say I’m your best choice.
So stay tuned, as I’ll share with you shortly the rest of the story.
Who Is Your Community?
Jerry: So let’s first identify who is your community.
Your community is the people you do business with. Your community is the people that you want to establish influence with because being influential is an extremely important part if you’re going to become that authority.
Whether it’s local or it’s on a national level. We got to identify how you need to speak to them. How you are going to speak to your community?
Let’s talk during this segment, about how you talk about you, your skills, and what you bring to the table.
But let us go deeper.
The Things You Do Not Want To Speak About
Let’s also talk about what we do not want to speak about, what we don’t want to talk about. And, you know, let me explain where I came up with this concept of speaking to your community.
Several years ago, Sheryl and I were attending a Ziegler conference in Texas, I believe it was in Dallas.
One of the speakers there talked about speaking to your community.
His Words Hit Me Right Between The Eyes
This was one of those things that hit me right between the eyes because he talked about how you establish your authority, how you establish your position in the community, and who your community is.
He defined it very, very well because he said, the community that you’re speaking to is the people that you want to do business with. The people that you want to do business with, those are the ones that you want to establish your authority with.
To establish you’re the person that can handle what they need, and provide the solutions to their problems and the path to get to their desires.
Let’s Compare It To The World Of Politics Today
Before we go further, let’s compare it to our world of politics today. Now, I want to tell you before I get into this, this is not to be a political statement.
Rather, it should be a statement so you can compare your communication style and the way you speak to your community, each day.
You see we’re in the middle of an election season, and something that started some years ago, based right here in the state of North Carolina, where I live, it’s what’s called negative campaigning.
The Invention Of Negative Campaigning
Negative campaigning was invented by Senator Jesse Helms because Senator Helms never talked about what he was going to do. Rather, he tried to instill fear of what his opponent might possibly do.
And you see, this is now taken into the news media. Today’s political spectrum. You can simply just change the channel on any day, and get a different person speaking to their audience as a newscaster and sharing their concepts, their meanings of what’s going on.
The Rules For Speaking To Your Community
So, here’s a couple of rules for you to keep in mind as you speak to your community.
Number one never blame others.
Never, ever blame others for your mistakes. Don’t do it, because when you do it, it’s putting doubt in the type of person that you are and the way that you speak.
We’re All Human, We Are Going To Make Mistakes
We’re all human. We’re going to make mistakes. We’re going to have problems. And what you’ve got to do is when you make a mistake, a mistake in leadership, a mistake in judgment or whatever, you’ve got to own up to it. Stand up when you make these mistakes. Because, again, we’re all human.
Toyota Set An Example
What the leading examples of this in business is the Toyota brake failure some years ago, where there was an issue with Toyota’s, and the braking system.
We were having accidents and fatalities.
Now, did Toyota step up to the plate and start blaming the brake manufacturer? Did they come out and say it was someone else’s fault? No.
What Toyota did was they went to work on the problem. And what they did was they announced the resolution of the part of the issue.
They fixed it.
This Is The Importance Of Speaking The Truth
This is the importance of speaking the truth. There’s a really bad mistake when you try to belittle others. You try to blame them for your problems. It’s going to backfire on you. It’s going to damage your credibility. And instead of drawing people to you as the leader, as the leadership, as the expert, you may just find that it drives them completely away from you.
You see, you want to remember this, and this so often is the story in life.
Speak As You Want To Be Spoken To
You want to speak to your community and the way you want to be spoken to. You want to be spoken to with honesty. You want people to tell you how it really is. You really don’t want them to sugarcoat it. And many things that you don’t want to do is simply hide from it.
It’s A World Of Free Speech
You’ve got to understand that this is an open society we live in, it’s a world of free speech, and we each have our own choices to make every single day. But we often make these choices over the image we get of a product, of a person, of a leader.
You Can Never Force People To Do Business With You
You’ve also got to understand you can never force people to do business with you. It’s impossible. It cannot happen.
You Build A Better Mousetrap
You may want to blame others because they have a better mousetrap than you do. Do you belittle of them for the great mousetrap they built? Or do you set out to build a better mousetrap?
It’s easy to belittle someone who’s worked their butt off to bring a great product to market. It’s a lot harder to beat them, but building a better mousetrap. But by building a better mousetrap, you are going to give a reason for them of why they should come to you.
If You Do Great Things You Will Be Recognized For It
You never want to talk about how great you are. What you want to do is do great things, if you do great things, you’re going to be recognized and others will tell your story.
You see, and once others tell your story, this then becomes the proof of what you offer and why you are that expert, why you are and should be that local authority, not because the other person is worse than you, not because that other company doesn’t measure up to what you offer, but rather you set an example.
Offer Great Products And Services
By what you offer by the greatness of the products, by the services, by your customer service, about whatever it is that your customer is looking for. You’ve got to understand what your customer, what your listener is looking for. What is your community looking for?
So often, people want to sell something, but people do not even know they need it. People try to convince you of the need for their service or their products. Instead of offering the solution to the product to the problem that you may have.
Show An Example
Show an example to others how you provide the process to resolve the problems. Show others through your actions, show others through what your offerings are, where they are the most superior, you know, superior things to get.
This is how you get to the next level. This is how you get to be that local authority. Yeah, you got to speak to your community. But it is so important that you speak to your community in the way that you want your community to speak, in the way that you can help your community.
Your Community Is The People You Want To Do Business With
And again, remember who we’re defining community as your community is the people that you want to influence. Your community is the people that you want to do business with.
You know, in this world, I’ve often spoken with clients about what I call the 20/20/60 rule, or you could say it’s the 20/60/20 rule.
20% Will Never Use You Or Your Product
But what are we talking about here? We’re talking about that 20 percent of the people out there probably will never have a use for you or your services in any way, shape or form. They’re not going to believe in it.
It could be you. It could be anything. It could be the color, your hair. It could be whatever. It could be a word that you said one day 20 years ago. But that person that’s made the decision that they are not going to do business with you. They are not going to be influenced by you.
That’s 20 percent of the human race.
Do you concern yourself with that person? No, you don’t, because that person has made up their mind. You are not going to change that person’s mind.
20% Will Believe In You
Then we have another 20 percent, another 20 percent who believe in you.
They believe in what you offer.
They’ll believe that you are the expert.
They see it. The proof is there.
More than likely, this is a person that’s going to give you testimonials. They are going to give you reviews.
60% Could Go Either Way, This Is The Target To Speak To
Somewhere in between these two 20 percent factors is 60 percent of your community, 60 percent that could go either way. And what they’re going to do, they’re going to make their decision of which way they go. By the way, they are treated by the words you use, by the words that you speak to them, and also by the absence of your communication.
Your Failure
The absence, your lack of follow up, your lack of follow-through. Your failure to do what you say you’re going to do when you say you’re going to do it.
So, this has been ideas from myself today as far as communication and communicating with your community.
Now, be sure and stay tuned, because Sheryl is going to be coming up within a minute. And as always, she’s going to give you her tidbits of wisdom. And it’s going to be a valuable time with you. So, do not go away she will be coming at you in just a minute.
Sheryl Isenhour: “Blowing out someone else’s scandal doesn’t make you any brighter” – These are words to live by.
As I’m speaking, and covering some of the areas Jerry has already touched on, some of the areas that can stand repeating.
We are amid an election year. To be honest, I have lived to see quite a few of them. In my younger years, I was able to vote for the person that promised to serve with the most values, I held dear.
But now I’m forced to vote against the person that has the lesser of my values that I’m looking for. I remember the day when candidates spoke. They say good things about themselves instead of negative words about their opponents. I have got to say that this way of voting was a much better time to vote.
We Need To Know Both Sides Of The Candidates
Candidates for political office spend time making sure you judge them favorably instead of judging the opponent by his false statements. I think we as people have the right to know both sides.
But with the Internet, as it is today and a little due diligence, I can find out all the negative stuff about anybody that I would like to. I don’t need someone to tell me how bad someone is.
But I do not want this time with you, to be totally political. I’m just using this breach of politics as an example that many of you will relate to. In fact, I can look on the Internet today, and that’s all people are talking about. I wish politics were the only arena this happens in, but sadly it does not.
I see it in the work setting when people are there, and they are — What would you say, “throwing someone under the bus”? How many times have you thrown someone under the bus?
Now, let me say that if someone is doing something really bad, then, yes, it needs to come out. But if you’re saying things just to make someone look bad so you can look better, which many times is the way it is, I’m here to tell you that it may seem to get you where you want to be for a while, but it will always come back to bite you in the future.
Karma’s A Bitch
As Grandma said, karma’s a bitch and people will eventually see through the B.S. My feelings about this subject, also based on another saying, “silence is golden”.
My grandparents were very important to me. And the thing that my grandfather said was it’s always the quiet ones that you should worry about. Mainly, because they’ve been listening instead of idly talking.
When they choose to speak, they will be accurate. They will carry authority, and they will drive the knife deep. And you will listen to him.
Do You Say Things To Extinguish The Candles Of Others?
- Back to what I wanted to speak on. Leaders, as a leader, do you say things to put others candles out to hurt or belittle them? To make yourself look better? Or do you choose the words to lift them up, and help them get where they want to be?
The Examples Of Many Leaders
Often, I hear about examples of leaders who think, although misguidedly, that power comes from putting others down or telling a lie. Again, what’s wrong with being respected, and motivating, and being truthful, with treating others like you wanted to be treated yourself? I guess this theory is just about outdated.
Taking the negative approach might get people to do what you want to, but for how long, and with how much interest, and with how much harm?
Put Yourself In The Shoes Of Others
Put yourself in their shoes. Is this a way to be managed that gets the best performance out of you? Isn’t it the truth that gets way more with honey than with vinegar?
Consider the tons of research that say people leave leaders, not companies. They leave the leader; they do not leave the company. Do you think that kind of behavior might be one of the reasons why?
This Applies To All Of Us
If you’re the leader, the manager. The team member. This applies to all of you.
Getting Results From Others
Getting results from others requires a number of leadership traits.
First one being, strong communication skills. I’d also say add empathy, an ability to listen to the list, as well. These traits are what help to build trust, and trust is never given. It’s earned. Remember that trust is earned.
Whether you’re running a political office, managing a business, sitting on a board for a company or an organization or someone that people follow, which, by the way, folks, that’s everyone you need to remember, blowing out someone else’s candle doesn’t make yours any brighter.
Speaking Without Knowledge Is Bad
Also speaking without knowledge and proof of the situation is just as bad. If you’re going to lash out, at least check your facts. People will remember that you were wrong as much as they’ll remember what you said was wrong about someone else. I was brought up with “If you can’t say something good, don’t say anything”.
The World Would Be Very Quiet
The problem is that if this is why the world was, it would be really quiet, nowadays. So put these statements into your pipe and smoke them. To say it sounds like a leader, think about what you say, and how, and when you say it.
Blowing out someone else’s candle doesn’t make yours any brighter.
Silence is golden.
And to me, the most important one, “Give them enough rope and they will hang themselves”.
With that, I’m going to turn this back over to Jerry. But always remember, I’m listening.
Jerry Isenhour: So, our mission today, hopefully, has been a lesson in building your authority, your authority in your community. By the words and actions that you show your community.
You know, in my career, since I started coaching, I have worked and trained under many of the Masters in the coaching world and so is Sheryl. This includes the Zigler Corporation, Dr. John Maxwell, Jeffrey Gitomer, Larry Winget, Randy Pennington, Scott McKain, and the list goes on.
The People I Have Met Who Have Made Strong Statements To Me
But, you know, as I look over my lifetime and the people I’ve met, some of them have made statements to me and shared thoughts with me that have really influenced me for many, many years.
Many years ago, I lost a very dear friend. He was like a brother to me. Some of you may remember him. His name was Roger Charron. Roger was like a brother to me, and we lost Roger some years ago to cancer.
But when the Internet first started, and discussion groups first started, I was a man for knowing a jumping on the Internet, and doing major battles. I got to state my position.
From Across The Street Others Cannot Tell Who The Idiot Is
Roger shared some words with me at that time that it stayed with me all these years, and each and every time that my fingers challenge my brain, I remember Roger’s words, and Roger said the following, and maybe this will help you, and if it does, then Rogers legacy will continue on because Roger was a wonderful human being.
But Roger shared the following words with me. He called me on the phone one day and he said, “Jerry? I want to give you some advice”. But when Roger gave me the advice, to be honest with you, I knew he loved me and he cared for me, and it was from the heart.
He said the following, “Jerry, don’t ever argue with an idiot, because from across the street, nobody can tell who the idiot is”.
Think about those words.
When your fingers get ready to hit the keyboard and maybe say something that you’ll regret later. Maybe it’s in the pants of yourself. Maybe it’s in retaliation for something that someone else said. Remember that.
Do You Want To Be Confused With The Idiot
Do you really want to be confused with the idiot who has spoken the words that you disagree with? So maybe those words will help you?
Remember, always do as Larry Winget has shared with many people, “Do what you say you will do when you say you’re going to do it“. Also, remember this. Empty words, empty promises mean nothing. And saying these will only serve to bite you in the butt at a later point in time.
So, I sure hope that this has been a segment that has helped you.
And we’ll give you some advice, and have some processes and ways to think about speaking to your community, building your authority within the people that you want to influence, because what’s going to take you to that highest level?
Taking You To Where Your Words Have Power
What’s going to take you to where your words are the most believable, where people are going to stop and really think because of the wisdom that you express, is going to be your ability to speak to your community in a way that shows the value that you provide to that community.
And with that, I want to thank you for joining us here today on the Chimney and Fireplace Success Network.
My name is Jerry Isenhour. Myself and my team await the opportunity to speak with you and go over how we can help you turn your business strings into your business realities. We’re waiting on your phone call, right now.
Reach out to us at info@cvcsuccessgroup.com.
Let’s set up a call and let’s talk.
What We Have May Work For You If You Are Ready To Do The Work
Let’s see if the processes, and systems that we have that are working great for other people, might just be the processes and the systems that you need to take your business streams and tournaments to your business realities.