Everybody wants to be WOWED, we all want that amazing feeling that we get when when our expectations are exceeded and we are truly blown away, we want to be WOWED. Lately I have been having conversations with people who are of the mindset that they want to be WOWED. They deserve to be WOWED, but they aren’t willing to put in a little effort. In my world the WOW effect is not an end feeling, it’s the entire journey, a journey where we get to understand your WHY, so we can build your WOW.
It’s not incredibly difficult to deliver the WOW in an industry which typically has delivered the WTF experience. In an industry where the WOW has typically been linked to market performance, the higher markets go up, the bigger the WOW, markets fall the bigger the WTF. That’s not the journey I’m talking about. In an industry where the outcome has not been based on delivering a WOW, but rather on delivering a product in order to get paid, I can truly understand people’s hesitation and frustration, their expectations are low and the walls are up, but here’s the dilemma, how do you get the WOW if we cant understand the WHY? Apart from the mistrust and hesitation there are bigger problems, problems of uncertainty, risk, retirement, lifestyle. These problems need answers. You have worked your entire life, or will work your entire life, built a business, provided employment and for what? A line in the sand? A point in time when you can pack it all in? When is that point? What does that point look like to you? What do you need to do to make that point happen sooner, or maybe later?
In an industry where the WOW has been a by product, only to be experienced in some instances, I can understand the disbelief that you can actually experience the WOW. But you need to let the guard down, you need to want to, want to go on the journey of experiencing WOW. Life has many transitions and while the unknown is always scary it doesn’t have to be, if you know how you are going to tackle them before they happen, they can be fun, the journey of getting to and more importantly getting through life’s transitions can be FUN. It’s not like we don’t know these transitions are going to happen, so why not prepare for them ahead of time? If you never had to worry about the integrity of the person holding your hand on this journey, if you knew the person was always in your corner there to wipe the blood from your nose, when life’s transitions happen, wouldn’t that be part of the WOW?
So how do we get the WOW? Simple, we get stuck into the WHY, aaaaaaand that’s normally where we lose people because the WHY is the hard stuff, the WHY is the meaningful stuff, this helps us identify our lifestyle, it forces us to put our dreams and aspirations down on paper and if they are out there in the open, well then we cant ignore them. We become accountable for them, but surely we would want to be accountable to our dreams and aspirations? I would think so. Being accountable also makes us vulnerable, and I think that’s probably the feeling people don’t really want to experience, no one wants to feel vulnerable, no one wants to intentionally put themselves in an environment where they could face the possibility of letting themselves down. I think I can safely say, that whether you put it down on paper or not, life will get us down, life will throw us curve balls, it’s a fact, and WE WILL deal with them.
Going on a WOW journey, takes commitment and it takes a willingness to want to achieve YOUR best life, it requires ownership, it requires accountability, it may mean being vulnerable and that’s ok. It also requires us to be open with the person guiding us on the journey. There needs to be trust and yes that needs to be earned, but there are a few things that can help bridge that gap initially.
- Work with someone who is a professional
- Find out about the fees upfront, are they professional fees, or are they hidden commissions
- Is there a proven process, a journey that you will go through, one which outlines what to expect each step of the way? Or is it a haphazard sales process.
- Is this a once off interaction, or is it a lifelong journey?
- Are the services offered, the services you need? Are there even any services offered?
- Do you really want a WOW experience, or do you want to be sold to?