Your customer's pain and prize

Engage more potential customers by NOT to talking about products

So what instead?

Pain and prize

Let's take engineering 

(Where there is a tendency to lean immediately towards products/services)

Plenty of 'pain' to talk about 

Downtime
Cost overruns
Risk
Inefficiency
Missed targets

All valid. All real

But pain on its own rarely drives action.

Because pain explains why something is uncomfortable

It doesn’t always explain why change is worth it

That’s where the 'prize' comes in

The prize is what life looks like when the problem is solved

Fewer outages
More predictable delivery
Lower risk
Less firefighting
More control
Less personal stress

Good selling understands both while poor selling obsesses over one (or misses them entirely)

If you only sell pain, you create anxiety

If you only sell prize, you create scepticism

The skill is in connecting the two

You sell the 'bridge'

And that starts with mindset

If you think like a partner, you’re not trying to scare someone into a decision... you’re helping them weigh up whether change is worth the effort.

This is exactly what the VALUE Framework supports.

🔸Validate = right opportunities

Is the pain real enough to justify change
Is the prize meaningful enough to pursue


🔸Align = right research

Understand how that pain shows up day to day
And what “better” actually means to them


🔸Leverage = right conversations

Explore impact and aspiration
What happens if nothing changes
What becomes possible if it does


🔸Underpin = right solutions

Position the solution as the bridge
Not a product. A path


🔸Evolve = right outcomes

Stay focused on whether the prize is being realised.
That’s where credibility lives.


Pain creates awareness

Prize creates momentum

When you help customers see both clearly, you’re not pushing a sale... you’re supporting a decision.

And that’s what good selling should look like

Are you clear on your customer's pain and prize?