Genuine Sales Professionals Ditch The Filtered Lifestyle, Will You?

"In this modern world, where we have filters to make us look as nice as possible, it's good to take off the filter and go, 'I could look stupid here.' You'll learn something and be better for it."

Aisling Bea

In the world of social media, social acting and fantasy island has become the norm.

Social platforms have become the hot spot for distortions, filters, and where the real versions of who we are remain backstage. We take selfies, photoshop, curate, and upload the best we got.

Then we hold our breath and pray for some attention.

Think like your client or a buyer for a moment... do ever wonder if this runs through their mind?

"Stop trying to impress me. I can make up my own mind about whether I like you; trust you; or even believe you. You don’t have to make up my mind for me."

Human connection must be placed front and center. We're all wired to connect. It is part of the prescription for health and happiness. It's how we influence and lead.

Are you letting people see the real you?

If you're looking for a true human and heartfelt connection, then I encourage you to ditch the filtered lifestyle and positioning.

Follow along with me on this one...

Erving Goffman was a Canadian sociologist who developed the concept of Dramaturgy.

It’s the idea that our lives are on constant display as if we’re actors.

He believed that when we are born into the world, we are being placed on a stage. And this stage is called everyday life.

He believed all of our interactions consist of adjusting to other people and our roles in their lives. We enact these roles in the company of others, who are in turn enacting their roles in interaction with us.

He believed that whatever we do, we are playing out some role on the stage of life.

In his work, he noted there is a front stage and a backstage. As we go on with our lives, we are mostly on the front stage. This applies to how we are at work, at the grocery store, or when meeting someone new. And the backstage is where we become our true selves. It’s our private place.

Only our closest friends see us when we’re backstage. But since many fake their personality with everyone, all they see is the front stage.

So, imagine for a moment, if you allowed your clients backstage, what could possibly happen?

The backstage of life is where true connection happens.

It becomes hard to connect when many position themselves with filters, distortion, and misguidedness.

All this mindless, self-serving appetite for attention, validation, and acting has me coining the term Social Attention Disorder. Others may call it digital narcissism. I call it acting.

Zoe Williams wrote a piece in The Guardian titled "Me! Me! Me! Are We Living Through A Narcissism Epidemic?", the narcissist’s failure to achieve intimacy with anyone — as the result of them seeing other people like items in a vending machine, using them to service their own needs, never being able to acknowledge that others might have needs of their own, still less guess what they might be.”

Question for all of you to think about... Are you being the real YOU on the front stage of life?

“The privilege of a lifetime is to become who you truly are.”

Carl Jung

CLEAN THE FILTER, AUTHENTICALLY CONNECT

I encourage you to bring your backstage self to the front stage by bringing your authentic self to the forefront. Rediscover who you are, commit to yourself instead of endlessly tweaking your online persona and your social acting skills.

Conversations allow you to connect, whether this be online, face to face, phone, or through virtual platforms. These are the strongest sales tools you have to effectively build credible relationships as you bring your backstage self to the front stage.

Are you having meaningful front stage conversations?

When's the last time you had a conversation and heard this...

“Wow, this was one of the best conversations I’ve ever had!”

Conversations build relationships, and relationships build businesses. The way this happens is through backstage conversations that you have on the front stage of business.

On the front stage of business, what do your clients care about? What does your marketplace care about? They don't care about your canned pitches, outlandish pattern interrupt videos and braggadocious messaging.

Nobody cares that your sole intent is to win the social academy award.

Imagine for a moment, if more salespeople and leaders ditched the empty rhetoric on the Internet and invested in personal and heartfelt growth, there wouldn't be as many empty suits, digital narcissists, and bad sales actors.

BACKSTAGE LEAVES LASTING IMPRESSIONS

"Anything with your name should leave a lasting impression!"

Marcia Brown

What impression are you leaving on the front stage of your business life?

I must go back to Erving Goffman to round this out. Keep in mind, his studies were done in the 1950s through the 1970s and are super relevant today.

He coined the term Impression Management. This refers to the desire to manipulate others’ impressions of us on the front stage. According to Goffman, people use various mechanisms, called Sign Vehicles, to present themselves to others.

The most employed sign vehicles are the following:

• Social setting
• Appearance
• Manner of interacting

This is decades-old research. Now think about how this is magnified through all the social platforms and front stages... first impressions matter backstage and they sure matter on the front stage.

If first impressions matter, then what are you doing about it?

Unfortunately, many prance around as social painters, painting the social canvas with crapola as they jockey for front row seats on the main stage, striving to win the Oscar for best social picture.

I would ask you to remember the person you're in front of, your clients, as they may be saying this to themselves:

• Do you see me?
• Do you hear me?
• Does what I say matter to you?

Allow me to leave you all with this...

Allow the real YOU to shine onstage for all to see. Watch what happens to your client relationships.