The Element Of Surprise

I enjoy comedy.

Of course, I have my own preferences when it comes to “good comedy.” For late night, I’m a Jimmy Kimmel guy with Conan and Fallon close seconds. Sitcoms – it will be hard to ever top Seinfeld. That said – last week’s end to The Office was a special moment for this comedy aficionado and 30 Rock’s series finale a few months back was a personal day of mourning. But hey – we still have Honey Boo Boo!

Have you ever thought about what makes something funny?

There’s no one simple answer. But there is a factor that’s pretty widely recognized as being key to funny – surprise (no – not “Surprise!” that there is a factor – surprise is the factor). It seems that when our brains encounter words or images or thoughts that surprise us, we laugh. That’s the reason the punch line is at the end of the joke – we set the stage and then surprise you. And you’re interested. What’s interesting to those of us in sales is that the same factor – surprise – can be a very effective tool to help our message rise above the noise of the marketplace and actually get the attention of a prospective customer. I’m not suggesting that we need to be funny (not that there’s anything wrong with that), we just need to ensure that there is an element of the unexpected in our message. That is particularly true at the beginning when we are first attempting to persuade a prospective decision maker to commit the time to engage us in conversation.

Let me give you an example of the opposite of surprise.

How many of your prospective customers do you think would be interested in a solution that could actually reduce their operating costs by a significant amount? I think all of them would. And yet how many of them would be receptive to a conversation with a sales rep who suggested he may be able to “save them some money”? I think very few – for a couple of reasons. First, strangers who call us and offer to save us money are “sales reps”. We know a few things about sales reps, one of them being that they don’t normally save us money. Second reason – everybody offers to save us money. Every other pitch from every other product is saying the same thing. “We can help you save some money.” We hear it so frequently that we are beyond skeptical. It just doesn’t register anymore. It’s not interesting. It’s not engaging. It’s just noise.

So what do we do to rise above the noise?

Surprise people.

Here’s a challenge. Write down your introduction – you know, what you say to a prospective customer when you’re trying to persuade them to invest a few minutes in a conversation with you. Now look at that through the lens of comedy. Is there anything about what you say that would catch someone off guard? Anything unexpected? A surprise?

If not, tweak it and try it. Surprise somebody.