Marene Allison describes the "3 Cups of Tea" approach to selling cybersecurity: the first cup is a cold contact, the second builds rapport, and by the third, you're discussing crown-jewel data and reputation risks with senior leadership. Once trust forms, clients recognize their own exposure and drive security initiatives themselves.
Yeah, go talk to them. It's really easy. Go buy them a cup of tea. You know, and I have a little program, people who know me, I call it 3 Cups of Tea. And, you know, the first time you go and they're not even talking to you, they like talk to the hand. The second time you're there, you know, you can start to have a conversation. They think you might be their help desk. And then by the third time, you're talking strategy, what is their important data, how you can work with their senior leaders to be able to identify what their crown jewels are and what's important to their reputation. And then, then you're golden. I mean, then you're into your business continuity planning and your recovery. You're ready for a tabletop exercise. And once they see the exposure they potentially could have, they're the ones— they're driving you. I mean, there's a lot of business leaders I had to say, "Wait a minute, we can't do all that this week." Let's Let's look at a plan on how we can get that in to do this, and what are the necessary steps so that you can have the assurity, the availability, the confidentiality of your data.
Yeah, no, that's a great point. And you had all this tea back in the day. Now the Gen Alpha kids are saying, you know, I got the tea here. That means the gossip, the juice. So, uh, you had the tea back in the day before the tea was cool.
Exactly. Well, it comes from an old, uh, a parable about, you know, you make friends after 3 cups of tea.
There you go. Nice.
