As we kick off our latest series on the importance of differentiation from competition in the sales process, Donald is joined by Tim Pollard to learn more about message building. As the CEO of Oratium, he’s learned the importance of messaging that delivers results and makes an impact on its audience.   The most common messaging problems: There is no differentiation. Differentiation has to be embedded somewhere. Otherwise, you will not be memorable. Three toxic mistakes characterize the way we structure messaging: We pack too much into messaging. Forty-slide decks are overwhelming, and nobody pays attention to them. Most modern sales messaging is too confusing or has an unclear value proposition. Almost all messaging is self-oriented. It’s about the salesperson or their company instead of relating it to the client. This leads to two problems: The initial sales meeting isn’t compelling.  Most messaging fails the retellability test.   The goal shouldn’t be first meeting success; it should be second meeting success. You should tell your story in that first sales meeting. But It’s even more about that person’s ability to retell your story and solution in their private meeting with a decision-maker later on (AKA the second meeting.)  Sales messaging has an important goal: retellability. You can’t speak just to the interest of the person in the meeting, you have to talk to the interests of that next meeting. This is even more difficult when virtual. It’s more complicated than remembering to wear pants; it’s moving a social practice to an asocial environment.   Think about the clarity and specificity of your message. If you have too much information, you have even less chance of keeping attention. The loss of feedback and social cues when virtual can be a barrier to success. It’s a paradox of communication - we do things we hate to experience ourselves. We go back and do the things that don’t work - it’s out of habit and it’s easy to continue to do it. And nobody has ever given a workable model.   The true key to breaking bad habits is to teach a workable and different solution. You’ve got to know your story. If you’re reading from a deck, you won’t succeed. To learn how to develop better communication habits, check out Tim’s books The Compelling Communicator and Mastering the Moment. Oratium has a ten-lesson e-learning for designing and executing a sales conversation, designed specifically for a virtual environment, on their website. Tim’s major takeaway? Many people try to whittle down their messaging by cutting a deck from 50 to 25 slides. Just stop using the deck altogether! Instead, fundamentally restructure your communication to no longer use a failed model. Create an aligned messaging structure based on what works. Connect with Tim on LinkedIn.   Join Donald’s Facebook group, The Sales Evangelizers, to find a community of people to share, reflect, and grow with!   This episode is brought to you in part by Skipio. Are you sick of crickets? As a salesperson, the pain of reaching out with phone calls or emails and not receiving a response is real.   But all text messaging is not created equal. 85% of people prefer text over email and phone calls because they want to engage in a conversation, not listen to bots. Be more like people and start having conversations that end in the conversions you want. Try Skipio at www.Skipio.com.   This course is brought to you in part by the TSE Sales Certified Training Program, designed to help new and struggling sellers master the fundamentals of sales and close more deals. Help elevate your sales game and sign up now to get the first two modules free! You can visit www.thesalesevangelist.com/closemoredeals or call (561) 570-5077 for more information. We value your opinion and always want to improve the quality of our show. Complete our two-minute survey here: thesalesevangelist.com/survey.   We’d love for you to join us for our next episodes, tune in on Apple Podcast, Stitc