Lesson 5 | Structure of The Bridge Talk™ (3:18 minutes)

So, let's dig into the actual structure of the Bridge Talk™. The design of it is incredibly simple. It's also the kind of thing that once you have this, you need to practice it because under pressure, you'll go back to saying what you used to say, as opposed to this new way. So practice will matter. So it's important to do the work and make sure you lock this in. So here's the structure. Two things and two things only. Who do you help and what problem do you solve? So who do you help? And what problem do you solve? When someone says, "What do you do?" You're going to say, "I help," or "We help," or "I have a company that helps." But you're going to start with the words, "I help," or "We help." Why are we going to do that? Well, the law of primacy and recency says that the brain's going to remember the first thing it hears and the last thing it hears.

When they forget everything else and they can't remember what else you said, and they say, "Ah, I can't remember what that person does, but they help..." If that's the message that they get and that you communicate to other people, then at least we're good there.

Next we want to name who we help. And then what problem do we solve? So we're handling two things here. The first is, who's the niche market we're dealing with? And the second is, what's the key problem you solve for them? Now, why does this structure work? There's a few reasons. The first is that it's really, really conversational. It's going to lend itself to creating some permission along the way. And there are no stereotypes in it. And as you go through the list of dangerous to avoid and requirements to handle, it addresses all of them. There are no gimmicks. We're not selling. It's really clean. We're going to create a little interest, not education.

So let me give you an example. Someone says, "So, what do you do?" You say, "Well, we help families in Boston retire on their terms." Now this is just an example, but is there effective ambiguity there? Yeah. We know it's the financial services world somewhere, but we don't know exactly what it is. We've declared a niche market. It's families in Boston. Really simple. Does it open us up for permission when we say, "We help families in Boston retire on their terms?" Well, it does. "Well, what do you mean retire on their terms?" When they say that, your brain is going to say, "I'm so glad you asked, because now I have permission," and away we go. Now you can share lots. There's no gimmick to it. We're not invading or hiring. We're staying away from stereotypes. We're not selling. It's really clean. We help and in this case, our niche market is families in Boston.

What's the problem that we solve? It's not retirement income planning and it's not investments. It's not insurance. What we do is we help them retire on their terms, even though we might do all those other things. That's what these people really want. Help me retire on my terms.

So here's another example. I help hard-working business owners keep what they've built. "Oh, well, what do you mean by that?" "Well, so glad you asked," my brain says. "I've declared I help hard-working business owners. That's who I help." And what's the problem? They want to keep what they've built.

They've worked so hard to build their business to create income and then it gets taxed and taxed and taxed and taxed and taxed. We're going to help them keep what they've built or I help family businesses make the most of everything they've got. I've declared a niche market. It's family businesses. What's the problem? They need to make the most of everything they've got. If they don't make the most of their business, their family suffers. And if they don't make the most of their family, their business suffers. So they've got to make the most of everything that they've got. And that's not always easy.

So it's these two pieces together. Who do you help and what problem do you solve that focus your conversations on people in your niche, and that have a specific problem you solve. If I said, "So, what do you do?" And you said, "Well, we help families in Boston retire on their terms." If I have a family in Boston, I'm probably going to perk up on that. It's like, "Oh, I have a family in Boston." If I don't, but I know people who have families in Boston, I'm probably still interested. Now, if I don't have either of those, I don't live in Boston, I don't have a family there, I don't know anyone who does, but I have an interest in retiring on my terms, I'm still interested.

Or if I know someone else who wants to retire on their terms, I may still be interested. But if I do not have a family in Boston, I don't know any families in Boston, I'm not worried about retiring on my terms, I don't know anyone who's interested in retiring on their terms, then in that moment, you want to disengage or just leave it social. There may be some other way that you can work for them, but leave it social.

You don't have to keep pounding away at it because this is not your niche. And they don't have the problem that you solve. I know that you solve many problems and there's a core fundamental that your niche is dealing with and you want to stay focused on that. Now, remember the purpose of a niche is to accelerate your growth. So here's your action task as you think about your Bridge Talk™. I want you to take a shot at this and see what you get. And we're going to make sure that you have lots of tools available for you as well. So look at the downloads and in the workbook and we have a Bridge Talk™ Builder and a couple of other examples that you could work with. Use the Bridge Talk™ Builder to create your Bridge Talk™. 

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