Selling with Empathy

Humour me for a few minutes. You’re a Director of Marketing at a 30 employee startup that is growing fast.

You’re sitting at your desk, and on a daily basis, you’re bombarded by messages from people looking to see if your interested, looking to confirm that you’re the right person to talk to, looking to book some time on your calendar, hoping to sell you something you don’t yet understand.

You think to yourself.. Man, these reps are selfish, ruthless, and don’t get me at all. They probably sent this off to 500 other marketing managers with the exact same copy, spraying and praying for someone, somewhere, to listen.

You read these messages, and think to yourself.. None of these people took the time to make me feel like they actually care about me, like they want to offer me some real value I can use in my job, rather than help themselves hit a quota.

This is happening. And it’s happening a lot.

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Back to reality

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The term “selling with empathy” is thrown around all the time, but the meaning isn’t tangible, or actionable.

Empathy is one our guiding lights here at GrowthGenius, with respect to messaging. We define it as putting ourselves in our customers shoes, and working backwards. We try to reverse engineer their wants and needs, starting with the end product in their hands, and circling all the way back to what compels them to respond with interest.

Whether we are working to attract new business internally, or working on behalf of our customers to help them generate qualified interest, every single action we take is calculated. We are committed to better understanding how folks on the other end of the email with empathize with the content we are pushing out.

If you’re wondering how to be more empathetic with your messaging, ask yourself a few of these Questions before you send your next email.

• Does this person actually have a need for the service I’m offering?
• Do they know that I took the time to do more than 5 seconds of research on them?
• Does this message offer value?
• Does this resonate with something that is important to the recipient, right now?
• Does this align with their strategic goals? Are there any metrics in their annual report that you’re referencing?
• Are you hitting on any perceived ‘guiding lights’ or ‘north stars’ they’ve broadcasted on their website or social pages?
• Does this message actually read like something I’ve written myself, or just as another templated, mail-merge blast written to {!Contact.FirstName} at {!Account.Name}.

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We get it. Quotas are high, activity metrics are becoming borderline unattainable, and spending the time personalizing content in emails becomes an afterthought. If you’re not answer a resounding “YES” to these questions, the unfortunate reality is this: Unless your product changes the world, and that value can be described in the subject line, your email is likely getting deleted.