I remember the first time that I was taught the power of stories in business. A vendor salesperson had come in to help us better understand their product and how we could use it. He started his time with us, not by opening up the tool and showing us examples. Instead, he had us close our laptops and chat for a half hour.
There we were, 4 technical people sitting around a table. This salesperson opened up by saying something along the lines of:
You can never get anyone to do something different if they don’t buy into the story you are trying to tell them. No one has ever bought a story that starts with “look at how many features this tool has.”
Getting people to change requires getting them to invest time into doing things differently. You need them to make the mental leap that it is better for them to take the risk of making the change than continuing on as they are. The only way you can do that is by planting the story in their head of what they get from the change. Tell them the true story of how their job will get better.
You can sell a lot of solutions by focusing on the raw numbers that you can impact: 12.3% ROI. $1m NPV. Payback in 24 days! You can sell even more solutions by getting people to understand (and believe) the story of what you are going to do for them: sell more per person while making your customers happier! Deliver faster with greater consistency. Give everyone a single place to go when they have questions.
Stories aren’t measurable, but they still have an impact. Getting people to believe a story may be harder than showing them raw numbers but it generates greater stickiness. Maybe give it a try.