Photo by chuttersnap on Unsplash

When I was a teenager, I joined the scouts and went on many camping trips. One of the things I enjoyed the most yet felt the most pressured at the end of each camp, was the campfire.

That is when we had skits, jokes, songs, and tell stories.

For the skits, often times we don’t have enough people to play the characters. That required one person to play several characters in a single scene to hilarious effect.

Doing the skits forced us to come up with creative and interesting stories to tell, and perform. Besides just points, there was the pride of being the best, since we were ultra competitive.

People have been telling stories since the beginning of time, and probably will continue to tell them till the end of time.

When I first got into sales and a selling career, I didn’t quite connected how to use stories in my sales presentations. Obviously my sales was quite bad in the beginning.

Over time, with the help of training, mentors, and peers, my selling skills improved. Telling stories became second nature, and now, I can easily weave a story into a conversation or presentation anytime I felt it was the best way to convey a point or to answer an objection.

I learned that telling an appropriate story at the right time helps strengthen the facts and figures. Often time, it is the stories that seal the sale.

Now in the era of apps, copywriting, funnels, landing pages, and conversion ratio, all good in themselves, and skills like story telling and selling seemed to have taken a back seat.

Don’t get me wrong. I use the online strategies myself, but the law of diminishing returns happens all the marketing channels from ads, funnels, landing pages and they get more expensive, yet less effective over time.

Story telling, and selling skills will never get old.

You won’t be subject to the whims and fancies of an algorithm telling you how long your content need to be, how often should you post your content. You get the picture.

If you are an entrepreneur, these skill are worth learning since you can use them in so many situations.