Latest / What is Business Development? / Episode 150: “The Authority Gap” with Derek Little

Transcript

Episode 150: “The Authority Gap” with Derek Little · What is Business Development?

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Business Development Podcast, brought to you by
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  Speaker 1: the Global Business Development Association, delivering the strategies and tactics
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: to boost your career and corporate growth.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: Hello, BD pros, and welcome to the BD Podcast. It's
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  Speaker 2: the official podcast of the Global Business Development Association. And
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  Speaker 2: today we're with a great author of a new book,
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  Speaker 2: The author is Derek Little. And we're talking about this
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: one question. Why do highly capable firms still lose deals
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: they should win? That's a great question. And nobody likes
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: to lose in business development. And don't lose your opportunity
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: to get a copy of this book. This is the
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: Business Development Body of Knowledge. And this is our universal
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: guide for the profession. that once you read it, you
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: can go to the GBDA website at gbdassociation.org to then
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  Speaker 2: learn how you can get your business development professional certification online.
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  Speaker 2: And while you're online, why don't you roll over to
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  Speaker 2: Amazon and take a look at this new book from
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  Speaker 2: Derek Little. It's called The Authority Gap, Why Consulting Firms
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  Speaker 2: Lose Deals They Should Win and What to Do About It. Now, folks,
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  Speaker 2: Let me tell you a little bit about Derek. He's
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  Speaker 2: the CEO of TrailblazerMastery.com, and he's the author of The
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  Speaker 2: Authority Gap, Why Consulting Firms Lose Deals, They Should Win,
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  Speaker 2: and What to Do About It. Now, most of Derek's
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  Speaker 2: career has involved selling or marketing high-ticket, high-consideration products and services.
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  Speaker 2: And he's also served as a business development manager for
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  Speaker 2: two Fortune 500 companies. And today, he helps B2B consulting
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  Speaker 2: firms turn their expertise into buyer confidence so their business
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  Speaker 2: developers don't have to build trust from scratch every time
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  Speaker 2: they get into a meeting. And Derek's new book, The
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  Speaker 2: Authority Gap, well, it addresses that distance between the value
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  Speaker 2: your firm knows it can create and the value buyers
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  Speaker 2: can recognize before making a decision. The Authority Gap shows
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  Speaker 2: you how to build a connected authority system that turns
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  Speaker 2: expertise into buyer confidence because buyers need to understand your
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  Speaker 2: value and trust your judgment before the first conversation ever begins.
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  Speaker 2: And with that, let's welcome Derek Little to the show. Derek,
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  Speaker 2: welcome to the podcast.
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  Speaker 3: Thanks for having me on your show, Tony.
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  Speaker 2: Well, it's great to have you, Derek. So can you
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  Speaker 2: tell us a little bit about how you got into
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  Speaker 2: business development and why you wrote the book?
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  Speaker 3: Well, after I finished college, where I was studying engineering
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  Speaker 3: and computer science, I had a few roles in business
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  Speaker 3: development where I was under a lot of pressure to
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  Speaker 3: generate leads and sales. And I wasn't sure if that
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  Speaker 3: was the career that I wanted to stick with and
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  Speaker 3: kept considering my options. And then I got a new
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  Speaker 3: role in business development that made me think about it
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  Speaker 3: in a different way. So I started working for this
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  Speaker 3: high-tech firm selling this new security system. And it was
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  Speaker 3: pretty rough going for about five months. So I was
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  Speaker 3: working mostly on commission. It was a very complex system.
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  Speaker 3: Nobody knew us. Every meeting was like an uphill battle,
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: like objections, price pressure. We didn't even have a proper website.
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  Speaker 3: So after about five months, I got really discouraged. And
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  Speaker 3: I went to the two founders and I said, look, guys,
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  Speaker 3: if you want me to keep going with this, you're
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  Speaker 3: going to at least have to give me some budget
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  Speaker 3: for a decent website. So they did. And I built
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  Speaker 3: the website myself. And I also added some materials that
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  Speaker 3: I've been developing, some content over the previous five months
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  Speaker 3: to the site. And three days after the site went live,
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  Speaker 3: We were found by the TTC. And a week later,
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  Speaker 3: I was standing in the boardroom full of decision makers
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  Speaker 3: at this major enterprise organization, a $ 100 million company. And
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  Speaker 3: it turned into one of the easiest sales conversations I'd
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  Speaker 3: ever had and one of the easiest sales I ever made.
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  Speaker 3: There were no objections. We didn't even talk about the price.
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  Speaker 3: halfway through the meeting, we were already talking about the implementation.
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  Speaker 3: And then a week later, they put down $ 10, 000 on
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  Speaker 3: a pilot project. And a couple of weeks after that,
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  Speaker 3: I went in to pick up the check. And I
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  Speaker 3: met with the decision maker who first phoned me. And
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  Speaker 3: he told me, you know, Derek, it normally takes our
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  Speaker 3: company six months to decide on buying anything. So you've
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  Speaker 3: set a new record for us. And I made a $ 5, 000 commission.
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  Speaker 3: So I thought to myself, reflecting on the previous five
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  Speaker 3: months of struggle, I thought, this is the kind of
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  Speaker 3: business development meeting I want to have. This could be
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  Speaker 3: a really great job if all the meetings were like this.
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  Speaker 3: The funny thing was, though, at the time, I thought
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  Speaker 3: that I'd won the sale in the boardroom. So I'd
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  Speaker 3: been trained on sales. I'd taken I don't know how
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  Speaker 3: many sales training courses. And I thought it was my
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  Speaker 3: sales skills. But later, I realized, that most of the
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  Speaker 3: sale had been won before I ever walked in the room.
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  Speaker 3: And years later, that became the start of the authority gap.
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  Speaker 3: And my point of view, which I still have today,
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  Speaker 3: which is that most deals are won or lost before
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  Speaker 3: the first call.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, that's true. That's true. It is in so
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  Speaker 2: many ways. And that's business development versus sales. And I
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  Speaker 2: think so many in business development that came up through
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  Speaker 2: the years, just like you and I did, we were
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  Speaker 2: trained on a lot of sales tactics and sales methodologies.
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  Speaker 2: And that's not business development. Sales is a component of
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  Speaker 2: business development. Yes, there are business developers that do sales,
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  Speaker 2: but at the end of the day, BD is so
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  Speaker 2: much more than that. So I can't wait to jump
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  Speaker 2: into the top three takeaways and tactics from your book
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  Speaker 2: So let's jump into tactic number one, because I think
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  Speaker 2: you're going to start revealing a little bit about how
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  Speaker 2: you actually solve this authority gap, right? And how you
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  Speaker 2: win deals before you even walk into the room.
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  Speaker 3: Okay. Well, my first tactic starts with a common problem
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  Speaker 3: that I see when you're reaching out to people online,
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  Speaker 3: like on LinkedIn. And that is, it's really easy to
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  Speaker 3: create a lot of visibility. But it's very difficult to
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  Speaker 3: get attention. So people's attention spans have just shrunken right now.
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  Speaker 3: So the tactic that I recommend here is what I
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  Speaker 3: call creating an authority lane. So authority lane is one
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  Speaker 3: typical buyer, your ideal buyer, and a problem that you
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  Speaker 3: want to be known for. And the key idea here
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  Speaker 3: is that visibility is not attention. The only way to
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  Speaker 3: get attention is to be relevant to a problem that
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  Speaker 3: your buyer is already thinking about. So the way to
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  Speaker 3: create an authority lane is to identify an important buyer
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  Speaker 3: problem and then ask yourself, are we relevant to this problem?
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  Speaker 3: Do we have useful information to share? And do we
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  Speaker 3: look like we know what we're talking about? And then
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  Speaker 3: you can avoid the problem of lots of visibility and
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  Speaker 3: no traction. So the benefit of creating an authority lane
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  Speaker 3: is that you can focus on the right buyer and
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  Speaker 3: you can get the attention of the right buyer for
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  Speaker 3: the right reason.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. Okay. I like this concept of creating an
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  Speaker 2: authority lane. So what changes for the BD person once
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  Speaker 2: they have a clear authority lane?
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  Speaker 3: Well, they, their life becomes a lot easier. Yeah. they, uh, well,
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  Speaker 3: it's authority lane is not positioning. Positioning is a little different. So, uh, uh, Tony,
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  Speaker 3: you threw me right off here.
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  Speaker 2: Well, it's no problem. You know, I mean, these, these
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  Speaker 2: authority lane concepts I think are really interesting. And I
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  Speaker 2: think sometimes for folks, they, they, they, you know, what
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  Speaker 2: does it mean to build an authority lane? And I
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  Speaker 2: guess some folks would think, well, does that mean I
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  Speaker 2: have to build a niche of some sort? Is that true?
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  Speaker 2: Do people have to build a niche or is it really,
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  Speaker 2: do I have to, um, kind of establish myself at
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  Speaker 2: a broad level? How do you, how do you actually
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  Speaker 2: identify what that authority lane is?
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  Speaker 3: Well, it's, it's really, uh, just to go to market focus. So,
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  Speaker 3: You can still offer lots of services. The idea is
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  Speaker 3: to lead with one buyer, one important problem. And you
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  Speaker 3: can have different lanes for different markets. So in my book,
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  Speaker 3: I talk about two companies that I work with, Company
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  Speaker 3: A and Company B. And they had Company A had
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  Speaker 3: the problem of having lots of visibility. and no traction.
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  Speaker 3: So they were, and they were marketing themselves too broadly.
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  Speaker 3: So they had no clear specialization. So the goal is focus,
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  Speaker 3: not restriction. And today their positioning is a lot sharper.
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  Speaker 2: Okay, good. So it's really kind of having that go-to-market focus.
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  Speaker 2: understanding what your value proposition is, understanding who your ideal
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  Speaker 2: customer prospect is or ideal customer profile may be. Okay,
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  Speaker 2: that's great. I like that. Now let's move on to
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  Speaker 2: the second tactic that you would like to talk about
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  Speaker 2: from your book.
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  Speaker 3: Okay, well, the second tactic starts with a common problem
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  Speaker 3: that I see is that a lot of firms, business
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  Speaker 3: developers talk too much about what they do And the
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  Speaker 3: tactic that I recommend here is to create what I
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  Speaker 3: call a core narrative. So a core narrative is your
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  Speaker 3: point of view on your buyer's problem. And the main
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  Speaker 3: idea here is that buyers want to know that you
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  Speaker 3: understand their problem. And they want to know that you
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  Speaker 3: can help them understand their problem better. So you basically
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  Speaker 3: understand their problem better than they do. So the way
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  Speaker 3: to create a core narrative is to identify what you
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  Speaker 3: believe to be true about your buyer's problem that they
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  Speaker 3: need to understand. So maybe what they're missing. And in
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  Speaker 3: my book, I talk about company B and they really
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  Speaker 3: nailed this. They focused on a big problem in their
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  Speaker 3: industry and it helped them generate a lot of leads.
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  Speaker 3: So the advantage of having a core narrative is that
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  Speaker 3: your business developers have something worth talking about that your
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  Speaker 3: customers or your buyers are interested in discussing. And once
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  Speaker 3: you get into a conversation, then you're both on the
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  Speaker 3: same page around their situation.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I like what you said about a core narrative
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  Speaker 2: in that it's what you believe is the main problem.
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  Speaker 2: for your ideal customer profile and understanding that better than
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  Speaker 2: maybe even your prospects know themselves. But I like the
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  Speaker 2: word selection you use. You said believe. You believe that
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  Speaker 2: there is a problem. How do you actually generate that
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  Speaker 2: initial core narrative?
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  Speaker 3: Well, you start with the problem the buyer already cares about,
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  Speaker 3: and then you develop a perspective on why that matters.
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  Speaker 3: and what people usually get wrong about it, and then
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  Speaker 3: what needs to change. So you're not just describing the problem,
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  Speaker 3: you're helping the buyer see it more clearly. For example,
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  Speaker 3: with your organization, GBDA, I've listened to you being interviewed
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  Speaker 3: on podcasts, and I had a look at your book
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  Speaker 3: on Amazon, and I listened to a number of your shows.
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  Speaker 3: And I think I have a good idea of what
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  Speaker 3: your core narrative would be. So my point of view
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  Speaker 3: on your core narrative is that business development is a
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  Speaker 3: professional discipline, not something you should just figure out as
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  Speaker 3: you go. And therefore, you should buy the business development
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  Speaker 3: body of knowledge. So that's those three points, why it matters,
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  Speaker 3: what people usually get wrong and what needs to change.
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  Speaker 2: I love it. I love it. You're hired.
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  Speaker 3: I would focus on what people usually get wrong, which is,
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  Speaker 3: you know, it's not something you should figure out as
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  Speaker 3: you go along. And that's, that's basically been my whole career.
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  Speaker 3: Like just figuring out as I, as I went along
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  Speaker 3: companies hire me as a business developer, because they look
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  Speaker 3: at my resume and they go, Oh, you worked as
• 13:59
  Speaker 3: a business developer. Okay. Take, get going. So wait a sec.
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  Speaker 3: Do you have any case studies? Do you have any proof?
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  Speaker 3: Like I'm representing you. You're a company. It's not me.
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  Speaker 3: I'm not the whole trust department here, which is what happens.
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  Speaker 3: You become the trust department. You got the operations and
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  Speaker 3: then the business developer is then under a huge amount
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  Speaker 3: of pressure to do a lot of extra stuff they
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  Speaker 3: really shouldn't have to. With no core narrative, no purpose,
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  Speaker 3: no mission. You know what I mean?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, I love what you're saying here. And there's
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: a couple of things to unpack. One is, first of all,
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  Speaker 2: I love how you tightly summarized GBDA and the Business
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: Development Body of Knowledge. That was great. But I also
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: like what you say about understanding what people get wrong
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  Speaker 2: about your company or your product or your service. And
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  Speaker 2: I think that's really powerful because people do have misperception sometimes.
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  Speaker 2: They'll think of your company and go, oh, yeah, you
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  Speaker 2: guys do this. No, we don't. Or my problem is
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  Speaker 2: easily solved with XYZ. No, it's not. And I can
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  Speaker 2: show you the data to prove that. Just like you said,
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  Speaker 2: people think that they can just wing it with business development.
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  Speaker 2: You can't. You can't wing it. And then what you
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  Speaker 2: talked about is actually an example that backs that up.
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  Speaker 2: Your life experience of being a professional business developer and
• 15:25
  Speaker 2: people hiring you and you show up and then There
• 15:29
  Speaker 2: are no processes. There are no artifacts. There is no narrative.
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  Speaker 2: And so what you're saying is that's a clear example
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  Speaker 2: where companies need to have the business development body of
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  Speaker 2: knowledge and they need to have the certifications for the
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: people so they can build those processes. They can build
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  Speaker 2: those artifacts and they can build a core narrative. So
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  Speaker 2: I like that. And I also like how your core
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  Speaker 2: narrative was concise. It's here's the problem. Here's the misperception.
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  Speaker 2: This is what I can do to solve that problem
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  Speaker 2: for you. It's really simple. And you did it in
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  Speaker 2: less than 30 seconds. I mean, it wasn't, it was
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  Speaker 2: like 20 seconds and it was clear. It was hard hitting.
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  Speaker 2: I really liked that. So that, that was a perfect example. Okay.
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  Speaker 2: So let's jump into tactic number three from your book, please. Okay.
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  Speaker 3: Well, based on my own experience as a business developer,
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  Speaker 3: I know that just getting into a meeting doesn't mean
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  Speaker 3: anybody trusts you. You know, they may just have some
• 16:35
  Speaker 3: spare time to kill or they think maybe there's something
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  Speaker 3: we're talking about. They don't necessarily trust you. So the
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  Speaker 3: tactic that I recommend here is kind of a framework
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  Speaker 3: that I developed called the authority gap ladder. And this
• 16:47
  Speaker 3: is basically a framework for mapping the buyer's journey to
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  Speaker 3: a high trust conversation, not just any conversation, but a
• 16:56
  Speaker 3: high trust conversation. And the key thing to remember here
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  Speaker 3: is that trust is not a switch. You can't just
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  Speaker 3: turn on trust. Trust is like a journey that a
• 17:08
  Speaker 3: buyer goes through, like the mental stages that they go through,
• 17:11
  Speaker 3: almost mental checkpoints they're checking off and they trust you
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  Speaker 3: more and more and more. So the only way you
• 17:17
  Speaker 3: can build trust is by helping them through these stages.
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  Speaker 3: So there's five stages that I've identified. So there's... getting noticed, okay?
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  Speaker 2: Yep.
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  Speaker 3: So attention.
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  Speaker 2: If nobody knows about you, then it's a moot point.
• 17:42
  Speaker 2: Excuse the pun.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's the authority lane problem, which is getting attention.
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  Speaker 3: And then the next rung is understanding, and that's basically
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  Speaker 3: the core narrative point that I was making. And then
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  Speaker 3: the third rung is confidence, So they have to believe
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  Speaker 3: that you know what you're talking about. And then the
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  Speaker 3: fourth rung is commitment. This is where you get them
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  Speaker 3: to take a useful next step, which they're only going
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  Speaker 3: to take if they've gone through the first three rungs.
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  Speaker 3: I mean, I see a lot of people putting assessments
• 18:14
  Speaker 3: out there and nobody's taking them. They haven't really built
• 18:17
  Speaker 3: up enough trust to get to the point where anybody
• 18:19
  Speaker 3: would actually think that that's a useful next step. And
• 18:22
  Speaker 3: then the final step is conversation where you both really
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: want to meet and have a discussion. So, Go ahead.
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: No, go ahead, please.
• 18:32
  Speaker 3: Okay. I was going to say, if you want, I
• 18:35
  Speaker 3: can give you a real life example of that in action.
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  Speaker 2: Please. Yeah. Okay.
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  Speaker 3: There's a independent legal consultant who I worked with, a
• 18:48
  Speaker 3: lawyer specialized in cybersecurity. And we built a really basic
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  Speaker 3: ladder for him in under two weeks using his LinkedIn profile.
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  Speaker 3: So I'll just go through the five things that we
• 19:00
  Speaker 3: basically did for him on LinkedIn. So first, to get attention,
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: we focused him on one potentially urgent buyer problem. And
• 19:13
  Speaker 3: for understanding, we developed a positioning statement for him that
• 19:17
  Speaker 3: we put on his LinkedIn profile. So what he does
• 19:20
  Speaker 3: and why that matters. And then to build confidence, we
• 19:25
  Speaker 3: interviewed him. and gave him a chance to demonstrate his
• 19:28
  Speaker 3: judgment around the really, really difficult problems that he solves.
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  Speaker 3: He's worked for Google, he's worked for Meta. And then
• 19:36
  Speaker 3: we wrote articles with cases that he discussed and we
• 19:39
  Speaker 3: embedded video clips right in those articles with his commentary
• 19:43
  Speaker 3: so he could demonstrate his judgment, which is probably the
• 19:46
  Speaker 3: most difficult step. And then to get a commitment out
• 19:51
  Speaker 3: of buyers, we created an assessment, self-assessment that potential clients
• 19:56
  Speaker 3: could take. We're talking board members, chief information security officers,
• 20:01
  Speaker 3: where they could take this self-assessment and they could find
• 20:03
  Speaker 3: out how much legal exposure they had because they hadn't
• 20:06
  Speaker 3: prepared for a cyber incident. where they could potentially get
• 20:09
  Speaker 3: sued for millions of dollars. And they could just take
• 20:11
  Speaker 3: this self-assessment and find out in two minutes. And then finally,
• 20:16
  Speaker 3: for conversation, we created LinkedIn polls. So just basic digital
• 20:22
  Speaker 3: conversations where, you know, you create a LinkedIn poll, you
• 20:26
  Speaker 3: can add four options and people can vote on one
• 20:30
  Speaker 3: of the options. And then you can see where who's
• 20:33
  Speaker 3: voting and where they're voting. And then you can add
• 20:36
  Speaker 3: a comment to the poll. You can tag that person.
• 20:39
  Speaker 3: So you can get like digital conversations going through these polls.
• 20:43
  Speaker 3: So now keep in mind, this is just what I
• 20:44
  Speaker 3: call minimum viable authority gap ladder. So he could expand
• 20:49
  Speaker 3: on that because he now has like a repeatable system
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: for building trust. And he got, I think he got
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: 600 newsletter subscribers just in a couple of weeks. He
• 21:00
  Speaker 3: already had a lot of connections, but once he put
• 21:02
  Speaker 3: that out there and probably half of them are, would
• 21:04
  Speaker 3: be really good clients. So that's the basic idea behind
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: this authority gap ladder.
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I like it. I like it. So let me
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: ask you with the assessments. I thought that was that's
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: really interesting because you're providing value there that is essentially
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: personalized to individuals, which then leads into the conversation. What
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: what tool did you use to create that? assessment was
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: there anything special that you used or how did you
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: actually implement that because that's new to the podcast i
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: haven't heard that one before how did you do that.
• 21:37
  Speaker 3: Very simple i use the tool i mean there's a
• 21:40
  Speaker 3: number of tools out there on this the one that
• 21:42
  Speaker 3: i use though is called tally t-a-l-l-e-y i think dot
• 21:47
  Speaker 3: c-o and uh you you can i mean it it's
• 21:52
  Speaker 3: it's almost like you approach you programming language it might
• 21:56
  Speaker 3: be a little complex for what some people are doing
• 21:58
  Speaker 3: but uh it worked for me and we did uh
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: uh an assessment for them that there's a number of
• 22:05
  Speaker 3: assessment tools out there though.
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah and then i guess it just plugs into your
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: website and then it's a it's a landing page or
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: a pop-up of some sort take this free assessment.
• 22:15
  Speaker 3: Right well actually tally is just a separate website you
• 22:19
  Speaker 3: just link and uh i mean on my website you
• 22:23
  Speaker 3: just click takes you to the tally landing page. You
• 22:26
  Speaker 3: can add a, I mean, they have a tool for
• 22:28
  Speaker 3: adding an image at the top and then, you know,
• 22:31
  Speaker 3: you can go to different pages. There's really a lot
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: of tools out there to do this.
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah. So somebody takes the assessment and then what's the
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: follow on after that? Obviously they'll get their risk score,
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: I guess their exposure score. And in this example that
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: you're giving with the attorney, is there a follow on
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: kind of a warm engagement? from that assessment report of, hey,
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: thank you for taking the assessment. I see you came
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: in at a score that looks like it's pretty risky.
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: Would you like a conversation to figure out how we
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: can eliminate that risk for you?
• 23:03
  Speaker 3: Yeah, this is definitely something you want to do. Generally,
• 23:08
  Speaker 3: at the end of the assessment, you want to give
• 23:11
  Speaker 3: them options. Say, look, do you want to just work
• 23:15
  Speaker 3: on this on your own and not have us contact you?
• 23:18
  Speaker 3: That's fine. Check this box. If you want to take
• 23:22
  Speaker 3: part in a discussion group, check this box in the future.
• 23:26
  Speaker 3: Or if you want to contact us for a free
• 23:31
  Speaker 3: assessment debrief, check this box. So you're kind of filtering,
• 23:35
  Speaker 3: you know, fine tuning what people actually want. And then
• 23:39
  Speaker 3: with this particular tool, you get, I have a quiz
• 23:43
  Speaker 3: on my website. You can click and take it and
• 23:44
  Speaker 3: you get emailed a report. And then you could put
• 23:48
  Speaker 3: other links in the email and, You know, it's, and
• 23:51
  Speaker 3: you could, I mean, then this can lead to a
• 23:54
  Speaker 3: high trust conversation because you're, you're, you're finding all about
• 23:56
  Speaker 3: their problem and their, and how they, now, if you
• 24:00
  Speaker 3: have a frameworks, like if you've written a book like
• 24:02
  Speaker 3: I have, and you have frameworks, well, now you can
• 24:04
  Speaker 3: create an assessment based on your framework and give them
• 24:06
  Speaker 3: more insight. And then if that leads to a conversation,
• 24:10
  Speaker 3: now you're, you're talking, now you've pulled in your core
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: narrative and everything starts working and you've set the frame and,
• 24:17
  Speaker 3: you know, you've kind of framed the problem with your frame.
• 24:20
  Speaker 3: And now you're having a high trust conversation and they
• 24:23
  Speaker 3: trust you. So these five steps, they all kind of
• 24:26
  Speaker 3: work together and they lead up to a high trust conversation.
• 24:30
  Speaker 3: And there's a number of different ways you can do
• 24:32
  Speaker 3: it depending on your business and your industry. One point
• 24:35
  Speaker 3: I should make though is all the advice I'm providing
• 24:39
  Speaker 3: here is generally focused on expertise-driven, expertise-led firms. So if
• 24:44
  Speaker 3: you were to imagine a spectrum of companies where you
• 24:47
  Speaker 3: have like a product led company and expertise led company.
• 24:51
  Speaker 3: And then in the middle, maybe a hybrid company, the
• 24:55
  Speaker 3: farther you get over towards expertise led, the more of
• 24:57
  Speaker 3: a trust burden you have. Whereas if you're selling like
• 25:00
  Speaker 3: software products, people can objectively analyze the product and look
• 25:05
  Speaker 3: at the features and benefits. So the more trust is required,
• 25:11
  Speaker 3: the more important it is to build that trust and
• 25:12
  Speaker 3: get into a high trust conversation.
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, there are a lot of
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: folks posting on LinkedIn about those high volume business development,
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: lower trust. Like you said, software as a service is
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: a good example. But there are a lot of companies
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: out there that are those high trust services like consulting
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: firms and law firms and accounting firms where there's a
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: lot that it takes for somebody to move up that
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: authority ladder. And being able to do that at scale,
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: I think, is really interesting. That's why I'm just so
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: fascinated by your book, Derek, and the tactics that we
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: talked about today. And folks, just as a recap here,
• 26:02
  Speaker 2: we're talking about Derek Little's new book. It's The Authority Gap.
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: It's available on Amazon. It's Why Consulting Firms Lose Deals.
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: they should win and what to do about it. And
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: we talked about three key tactics on what you can
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: do about it today with Derek. We talked about tactic
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: number one, which is understand your authority lane and understand
• 26:25
  Speaker 2: who your ideal customer profile is, who they are, how
• 26:28
  Speaker 2: they think, what's important to them. And then the second
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: thing that we talked about is building that core narrative.
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: As you remember, Derek had a quick, 20-second punchy narrative
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: that he just created for GBDA. It's, here's the problem,
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: here's the misperception about that problem, and this is what
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: I can do to solve that problem. And then he
• 26:50
  Speaker 2: also had a good little example to help substantiate that
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: core narrative. So I really like what you did with that, Derek,
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: and demonstrated tactic number two. And then finally, we wrapped
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: it up with tactic number three, which is building your
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: authority ladder. Moving the prospect through the whole trust building process,
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: which is different when you have a consulting firm, an
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: advisory firm where it's really high trust, high touch, sometimes
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: people say, and really building that trusting relationships with your
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: prospects at scale. Derek, really fascinating tactics today. How can
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: folks connect with you, follow your work and get access
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: to some of the services that you provide?
• 27:39
  Speaker 3: Well, Tony, my passion is working with trailblazers and helping
• 27:43
  Speaker 3: them achieve mastery. So the best place to go is trailblazermastery.com
• 27:49
  Speaker 3: forward slash Tony. So I put together a free package
• 27:53
  Speaker 3: there specifically for your listeners. And that includes a two
• 27:57
  Speaker 3: minute authority gap quiz and that helps you identify where
• 28:01
  Speaker 3: your buyers may be getting stuck. And also an editable
• 28:04
  Speaker 3: authority ladder mapping guide. And also included is a short
• 28:09
  Speaker 3: how-to video for running a 30-day experiment on how to
• 28:13
  Speaker 3: find and fix your priority authority gap. So if anything
• 28:17
  Speaker 3: we talked about today resonates, that's probably the easiest place
• 28:20
  Speaker 3: to start.
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: Okay, great. We'll make sure we have a link to
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: that in the show notes so folks can get access
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: to that. information from you, Derek. Thank you so much.
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: And again, folks, we talked about Derek Little's book. It's
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: called The Authority Gap. You can get yourself a copy
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: on Amazon. Derek, thank you so much for what you
• 28:40
  Speaker 2: do for the business development profession. Thank you for some
• 28:43
  Speaker 2: really interesting tactics today. And I look forward to having
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: you back on the show again sometime soon.
• 28:49
  Speaker 3: Thanks for having me, Tony.
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to the Business Development Podcast. Join
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: our free community of corporate partners and business development professionals
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: advancing the art, science, and ethics of the business development
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: profession at GBDAssociation.org.