This is an old story, but vitally important in understanding the power of empathy. Ben Duffy (1902-1970) was a high school dropout from Manhattan’s Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood who eventually became an icon in the advertising world.

Literally going from the mail room to the presidency of BBDO, a worldwide advertising agency headquartered in New York, he had a stellar career that advertising people still talk about today.

BBDO currently has over 15,000 employees and is the most awarded agency network in the world. Many would argue that much of that success is the result of Ben Duffy’s work.

Many years ago, a massive tobacco company’s account was available and every advertising agency in the country was aggressively pursuing it. At that time, Ben Duffy owned a small advertising agency and was eager to obtain an account of this size.

Among his competitors were several very large agencies with more money, more resources, and more staff. Ben Duffy had an appointment with the president of the tobacco company coming up soon. He thought to himself, “How can I possibly compete with these large agencies? What can I offer this company that the big boys can’t?” The more he tried to prepare, the more frustrating the situation became. He just could not see how his little company could compete.

After some time, he realized that “How can my small company compete with the big companies?” was the wrong question. He had been approaching the situation from the point of view of a salesperson, not from the client’s point of view.

On that Day Ben Duffy discovered the key to successful selling – empathy. He thought, “I’m going to put myself in this guy’s shoes. I’ll think of all the concerns and questions that I would have if I were him.” He wrote down fifty questions – then honed them down to the ten he thought would be most important to his prospect.

When the day of the appointment arrived, he sat down with his potential client and said, “In preparing for today’s meeting, I put myself in your position and thought there were probably some things that you would like to know about me, my company, how we do business, and what’s in it for both of us. So, I have prepared a list of ten of those questions.”

The tobacco company president looked surprised and said, “Well, that’s interesting, I wrote down ten questions for you, too.” They swapped lists – and six of the questions were exactly the same. Based on Ben’s preparation and the similarity of the lists, the president of the tobacco company decided that maybe the two companies did have something to talk about.

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