Most coaching and sales training programs highlight the importance of empathy in establishing solid customer relationships. Empathy is defined as “the capacity to participate in the thoughts or feelings of another”, or put more simply, “the ability to walk in another person’s shoes”.
But management guru Peter Drucker says, “You can’t manage what you can’t measure”. So how do you measure your empathy in an effort to take it to a higher level?
We recommend you use the Empathy Index to measure and improve your empathy.
Quite simply, review every oral or written presentation or communication to calculate your Empathy Index. Count the number of words or phrases that talk about your customer, and divide that figure by the number of times you’ve talked about yourself or your stations.
The figure is your Empathy Index, and your Empathy Index goals should be a minimum 1.5. In other words, you should be talking about your prospects a minimum of one and one-half times for every time you talk about how great you or your products are.
Don’t be discouraged if your first few attempts reveal a negative Empathy Index. It’s normal for salespeople who are excited about what they’re selling to talk too much about themselves, their ideas, and their products.
Improving your Empathy Index over time will strengthen your advertiser relationships in a world where your competitors continue to babble on about themselves and their offerings without empathy.