Sometimes it’s the little things that polarize your buyer – little things that you believe are helping to bolster your case, but in fact may be driving a consensus sale into a stalemate.

For example, those who have worked for me know my joke policy:

“If I see a logo / NASCAR slide in the first five slides of your deck, whoever put it there is fired.”

I would never actually do that, but it had a point.

When we lead with logic in a consensus sale, the brain uses that logic to bolster their feeling. If they’re with you already, logic will help them justify that feeling. If they’re against you already, they’ll counter the argument in their brain, and use that same logic to reinforce their “against you” belief.

Your “awards” slide? “Oh, great…they won the “best of” award in 2017. Guess they didn’t win it in 2018. Wonder who did. Maybe we should be talking to them!”

Your “locations” map? “They’ve got an office in Singapore? So what?!? We don’t!”

Your “ROI” slide? “Yeah, right. That’s bullsh*t. Those data points would never happen for us!”

Those “logic” slides are all doing the same thing. Those who are “with you” will find it helpful, use the logic you have presented to bolster their opinion of you, and support their justification. However, those who are “with an alternative” will use it to argue against you – configuring in their brain the “this is why that is bs” response.

Emotion, feelings and stories are binding. It’s science. Check out the video for an explanation of how to build credibility using your current customers, but without the logo slide.