What if you had to tell your story without using numbers? No Spotify plays, hard ticket sales, soft ticket sales, Instagram followers, conversion rate, chart position, video plays, likes, comments, comments vs. likes…etc, etc, etc.
What if all that was off the table…That’s pretty scary.
What would you tell instead? And would the powers that be even care about a story that wasn’t filled with numbers as reassurance?
Maybe not.
Then perhaps a question to go along with this idea is…are YOU willing to listen to someone else’s story without numbers? Are you willing to make a judgement call based on what YOU think and know, instead of what the numbers may or may not indicate?
What are you doing? What conversation are you having with the audience? How do you want to matter? What do the diehards understand that the fence-riders don’t? Who are your people and why do the like you and listen to you?
None of those answers require numbers.
***I’ve offered this idea up to a few people lately and the knee-jerk reaction is to say “the people I’m talking to WANT the numbers”.
Of course they do!
But I’ll argue they aren’t actually wanting the numbers…what they’re actually wanting is to feel safe and less risky about working with you. And numbers can be a shortcut (albeit watered down, cheap, temporary, less unique) story to help them feel safe and less risky about you.
But you have to understand that very few people are actually interested in the numbers themselves. So whether you ‘have the numbers’ or not, this is an invitation to tell a story that actually speaks to the heart of the humans involved in the meeting. With or without numbers.
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I’m always interested in your perspective, whether affirming or dissenting. Continue the conversation anytime: gabethebassplayer@gmail.com
