Dan Ilett is a UK expert in B2B messaging and positioning. A journalist who wrote for the Financial Times and FTSE commercial director, he helps companies that are hard to explain become easy to buy, from owner-managed firms to IBM and Virgin Money. He leads The Proposition, writes The Executive Summary and chairs the City CIO Club.

What Dan does

Dan works with B2B companies whose substance is real but whose story lands badly. He interviews their customers, finds the problem the market actually buys, and turns it into one sales story the whole company can tell the same way. Then he teaches the sales and account teams to use it. The work is done by Dan personally, with specialists in research, design and sales enablement brought in when a project needs them.

Who it is for

Owner-managed and private-equity-backed firms, mid-market groups that have grown by acquisition and now find themselves hard to explain, and enterprise teams launching or repositioning. Typical buyers are the CEO, the CMO or the CRO. Typical trigger: a rebrand, a new proposition, a new leadership team or a raise or sale on the horizon.

How he works

The Mirror. Interviews with your customers and prospects, a look at the competition and a workshop with your own people. What the market thinks of you, in its words. Read about The Mirror.
The Message. The messaging framework: the story, segmented by sector and decision-maker, and how you talk about yourself in each situation. Read about The Message.
The Engine. The sales tools, the go-to-market plan and the training that embed the story in the sales and account teams. Read about The Engine.

Each stage has a fixed scope, taken one at a time. You move on when you are happy, and only then.

Two further methods sit alongside: The Value Sales Method: Selling to the CEO, the value-selling programme behind the $1bn, and The AI Leadership Hackathon, a one-day sprint that gets boards and leadership teams fluent in AI.

Credentials

What clients say

"Dan held the mirror up to us. Simple techniques, client first. Has it worked? You bet. Win rates are up." Christine Wyatt, General Manager, GBS, IBM.

"They took a complex product, turned it into a simple story with a great commercial plan, and implemented it." Iain Gibbons, Customer Director, Virgin Money.

"We had struggled for years to describe what we do. They got to know us, then created a whole new concept." Matt Sims, Managing Director, Hatch.

Elsewhere

Dan writes The Executive Summary, read by FTSE and Fortune executives, and chairs the City CIO Club in London. Personal site at danilett.com. LinkedIn at linkedin.com/in/danilett.

Speak to Dan

Dan Ilett