How to Use the Seven Triggers in Your Differentiation Strategy

Get this.  I’m on my way back from New York when I get a message on my voice mail.  It’s Russ Granger, the author of "7 Triggers to Yes!"  I just about fell out of my chair I was so tickled pink.  He mentioned that he had seen my post about applying the 7 Triggers in marketing kits and was intrigued by that application of the triggers.

Since then, I’ve reviewed the book on Small Business Trends and today, as a companion to that review, I thought I’d share another application of the triggers; using the 7 Triggers in communicating and applying your Uniqueness or Differentiation.

Your differentiation strategy is what sets you apart from everyone else.  I like to think of it as a sort of marketing adverb — it defines HOW you do all these things that other people might do as well, but you deliver differently.  So, for example, the post office delivers mail and so does FedEx, but FedEx does it overnight.  Get it?  OK, let’s go on to the next step.

A Review of the Triggers

Here is a list (right off the book flap) of the 7 Triggers. 

• Friendship Trigger — Activates trust and agreement through bonding.

• Authority Trigger — Creates a perception of expertise that activates acceptance.

• Consistency Trigger – Appeals to motives consistent with past actions.

• Reciprocity Trigger – Taps into the rationale that when you give, you get something back.

• Contrast Trigger – Makes your request more appealing when compared to other options.

• Reason-Why Trigger — Gives reasons that activate an automatic “yes.”

• Hope Trigger — Instills positive expectations that deliver agreement.

How to combine YOUR Differentiator or Strength with the 7 Triggers.

1. First determine what your strength is.  I’ve just completed the "Strength Finder 2.0"  and have found it to be truly insightful.  It’s the best $20 and 20 minutes you’ll ever spend.  For the sake of our work here, let’s say you have the strength of being a great communicator.  So communication is what you do exceptionally well.  It’s what colors everything that you do in your business – the quality of your communication, it might be thorough, friendly, consistent, whatever you choose, just make sure that it’s true.
2. Now, let’s look at the Triggers above.  In what ways can you use your strength in being a great communicator to trigger that feeling of closeness and "Friendship?"  Perhaps you don’t use voice mail, you always have a person to person conversation, for example.  Think of some for yourself. And go through each of the triggers asking yourself "in what ways" can I apply my communication strength to build Authority, Reciprocity, Hope, etc.
3. Build processes and policies around these triggers and make them part of how you work and part of the experience that you promise and deliver to your customers and clients.

A solid brand strategy is nothing more than a clear representation of your strength and that special quality that sets you apart. 

Where brands fail, is in the delivery on that promise.  But it shouldn’t be hard to deliver on a promise that is rooted in who you really are and what makes you unique. 

Use the triggers to develop a sales and marketing system that makes you irresistible.

I want to know some of your examples.