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Future Hope "If you want to build a ship, don't herd people together to collect wood and don't assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea." -- Antoine de Saint-Exupery Avoiding Distracting Chit Chat Americans love to talk. Americans also love to be talked to -- listening to the TV or the stereo or talk radio -- anything so that there's no silence. Silence we seem to delegate to those few days a year when we get back to nature. In conversations, especially, there's a real fear of silence, an awkwardness that sort of permeates the in between spaces where there is no one talking and most people will do anything possible to fill up that silence with noise regardless of whether or not it's going to damage their chances of selling their product or service. Eliciting Definitions There's an English idiom that goes, "The devil is in the details." I'm sure you've all heard it. It implies that the small things in plans or schemes are often the things that take the most time in the long term. Well, in criteria elicitation, we need to dig a little deeper than just the surface act and get a little dirty with the details. The Most Important Tool "The most important persuasion tool you have in your entire arsenal is integrity." --Zig Ziglar What's Luck Got To Do With It? "Luck? I don't know anything about luck. I've never banked on it, and I'm afraid of people who do. Luck to me is something else: Hard work -- and realizing what is opportunity and what isn't." --Lucille Ball On Gratitude "It is necessary, then, to cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you, and to give thanks continuously. And because all things have contributed to your advancement, you should include all things in your gratitude." -Wallace D. Wattles, The Science of Getting Rich or Financial Success Through Creative Thought Persuading Elegantly "Human subtlety will never devise an invention more beautiful, more simple, or more direct than does Nature, because in her inventions, nothing is lacking and nothing is superfluous." --Leonardo da Vinci The Territory of Self Persuasion "Don't ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive." Howard Thurman Framing the Question Try this: I'm sure you'll get it real quick but because you're all such good folks out there, I want you to spell the word 'folk' three times. Do it right now in your mind. Spell the word 'folk' three times as fast as you can. Hammers and Nails: Framing Challenges "When you are inspired by some great purpose, some extraordinary project, all your thoughts break their bonds: Your mind transcends limitations, your consciousness expands in every direction, and you find yourself in a new, great, and wonderful world. Dormant forces, faculties and talents become alive, and your discover yourself to be a greater person by far than you ever dreamed yourself to be." -Patanjali (author and yogi) Exposing the Core "It is your work in life that is the ultimate seduction." -- Pablo Picasso Let's Get Emotional Forget about appealing to your prospects and clients with logic. Sales is all about appealing to emotions and logic comes a (way) distant second. To illustrate my point, I'm going to tell you a story about some college students who figured this out and put it to the test. Persuading from The Zone We've all heard of athletes who say they were really in 'the zone'. The zone is that perfect point where whatever we're doing is accomplished with ease and elegance whether it be playing an instrument, driving down the perfect road at the perfect speed on the perfect motorcycle, or selling to one prospect after another. Misery Loves to Spend The John F. Kennedy School for Government at Harvard University recently released a study that found that even momentary sadness causes people to increase spending. Gratitude and Persuasion "It is necessary, then, to cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you, and to give thanks continuously. And because all things have contributed to your advancement, you should include all things in your gratitude." -Wallace D. Wattles, The Science of Getting Rich or Financial Success Through Creative Thought What Happens When You Refuse to Persuade "No oppression is so heavy or lasting as that which is inflicted by the perversion and exorbitance of legal authority." --Joseph Addison What's Going On? "You must take personal responsibility. You cannot change the circumstances, the seasons, or the wind, but you can change yourself. That is something you have charge of." - Jim Rohn Eliminating Procrastination "We shall never have more time. We have, and always had, all the time there is. No object is served in waiting until next week or even until tomorrow. Keep going... Concentrate on something useful." --Arnold Bennett Inoculating Yourself Against Rejection We all had them as children -- those painful shots that prevented all sorts of nasty diseases. Now that we're grown ups, we know why we needed them, but when we were little kids, it didn't make any difference because the only thing we understood was that they hurt and left us sort. Attitude is Everything I AM YOUR ATTITUDE! I AM YOUR MASTER. I can make you rise or fall. I can make you a success or failure. I can work for or against you. I control your feelings and actions. I can make your heart sing with happiness. I can make you wretched, dejected, or morbid. I can make you angry and resentful. I can make you lonely, discouraged or depressed. I can make you sick, listless. I can be a shackle, heavy and burdensome. I can be a prism's hue, dancing bright and colorful. I can be nurtured and grown to be beautiful. I can never be removed, only replaced. I AM YOUR ATTITUDE! (author unknown) Don't Shove Your Prospects Down a Rabbit Hole Former students of mine, without naming names, have gone on to attempt to teach criteria elicitation. For what it's worth, this synthesis of a very complex body of knowledge down to one question, is absolutely fine if you're not interested in working with high end and affluent clientle. Jumping Off the Bandwagon Yeah, I know, things are getting expensive. Grocery prices are soaring because gas prices are soaring because there's a war going on because a fear of scarcity has been instilled in us because . . . well, it's complicated, right? Regardless of the reasons, I get back to the point that things are expensive. Drinking from a Fire Hose Every year around this time, I start a new cycle of classes and as usual, I've got some eager, excited, anticipating students, many of whom will (I can already tell) work themselves into a bit of a frenzy wanting to soak up as much persuasion as possible in a short period of time. As one client put it, "I kind of feel like I'm drinking water out of a fire hose." The Brain and Persuasion "The existence of forgetting has never been proved: We only know that some things don't come to mind when we want them." ~ Friedrich Nietzsche Binds in Buying Binds are a fascinating strategy in persuasion which should be used sparingly, a little 'persuasion seasoning' so to speak. Persuasion Without Thought I recently saw a humorous bumper sticker that read, "Don't believe everything you think." I liked it because it made me ponder thought and how at times, I find thinking to be somewhat overrated. Open Your Ears "It is the province of knowledge to speak, and it is the privilege of wisdom to listen." -- Oliver Wendell Holmes Using the Law of Resonance Not long ago I heard a story that had something to do with one of the natural laws of the universe -- the Law of Resonance. This is similar but not exactly like the Law of Attraction which says that what you put out there is what you're going to attract into your life. Like attracts like. The Power of Focus in Persuasion If you're anything like me, your life is full of distractions. From every direction we are bombarded with one thing or another. Just in the course of this paragraph, I've had one 'new e-mail' alert, some instant messages from my assistant, in the other room I can hear my kids arguing over the remote, my dog wants to go for a walk, I'm a little thirsty, the phone will ring any second. . . One simple paragraph can be exhausting in light of all the other things that are vying for attention. Choose Your Frames "Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances - to choose one's own way." - Victor Frankl Attaining Persuasive Productivity A huge bonus of learning persuasion is that we gain the ability to persuade ourselves. This enables us to easily accomplish whatever we attempt. Good Habits Out of Bad Habits, by definition, are habitual things we do. Whether it be a habit of needing that after dinner cigarette or biting your fingernails during a stressful period, we all are creatures of habit no matter how spontaneous we like to think we are. Peeve Number One: The Victim Mentality "Thou shalt not be a victim. Thou shalt not be a perpetrator. Above all, thou shalt not be a bystander." --Holocaust Museum, Washington, DC Cleaning Up Your Language: Persuasive Oration Language, like persuasion, is an art. It's an art that can be mangled, yes. And as with any art, unless you're a prodigy, as Mozart was with music, as H.P. Lovecraft was with poetry, as Pablo Picasso was with painting, then most likely you will have to practice to be good at the art of language. Reframing With Authority: Whoever Has the Best Frame, Wins Here's a scenario that's probably never happened to you (or anybody). You're driving down the freeway and maybe you're going a tad too fast, and you look up and see the old blue and red lights flashing in your rear view mirror. Bummer. So you pull over and wait. The officer walks up to your window and says, "Hi there. I'm so sorry to inconvenience you. I think you might have been going a little to fast and I'm wondering if you wouldn't mind showing me your license, registration and proof of insurance? Again, I'm so sorry to bother you." Two Sides of the Same Coin "You will make more friends in a week by getting yourself interested in other people than you can in a year by trying to get other people interested in you." --Arnold Bennett auditory adventures As you listen to what I'm going to tell you, you'll begin to hear the way in which you can use these words to describe most anything. You can orient your phrases and the way in which you talk such that people will resonate with what you're saying very well. If you make your voice calm and smooth you'll probably have an even greater appeal as you verbalize the message you want to get across. You can tune in to what people are telling you as well, becoming more empathic with them and helping them to understand exactly your meaning to all the words that you have. going above and beyond for an affluent clientle I recently read a story about the Ritz Carlton Hotel that got me to thinking about how to really cater to and take care of a wealthy client, thereby keeping them interested and connected to you and your product or service. self persuasion through organization If you're anything like me, you're a very busy person. Not only am I busy with regular things--teaching, family, health maintenance--I'm also in the midst of a moving, requiring an added list of what needs to be done. It's hard to believe how much has to be done in a day and because this is on my mind, I'm inspired to write more on the topic of organization as I believe it has helped keep me on even footing in a time of change. softening language There's something I'm curious about. . . persuading personally In business, we have rules of decorum, obviously, but I am of the opinion that some rules were meant to be bent. Not broken entirely, but molded and bent to suit your persuasive needs. Cultivate Your Curiosity I recently came across the following list written/compiled by David Heenan: Ten Keys to Life Fulfillment: 1. Listen to your heart 2. Take one step at a time 3. Deliver daily 4. Maintain a maverick mind-set 5. Focus, focus, focus 6. Never stop learning 7. Build a brain trust (network of knowledgeable people) 8. Reinvent Yourself 9. Sell Yourself 10. Start now! Framing History "If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail." --Abraham H. Maslow The Final Four: Linguistic Pitfalls Part Two It seems a few of you are paying attention. That thrills me. In part one of this article I talked about the eight pitfalls we have in language though I only cited four of them--but, if, try, might. The comments at the end of my blog entry on the above topic proves that open loops work. Scapegoating And Persuasion Seems like for a while there nearly every car in the U.S. had a "United We Stand" bumper sticker. These stickers imply that our standing united was our only salvation. When we don't stand united, what happens? Of course, we fall divided. Hocus Pocus: Reframing Sugar I recently came across a banner ad on the internet that read: "Skip artificals. Go natural. Sugar: sweet by nature. Only 15 calories per teaspoon." How To Not Become Rich 1. Wait for approval or permission from society. I Presuppose So At the core of presupposition is the idea that we can assume a mental position or thought which our prospects or clients must take for granted in order for everything else that we say to make sense without us actually having to name the core concept. Building Your Persuasion Muscle If you don't know it by now, I'm a changed man. My life and health have become drastically improved in the last few years by way of shedding 140+ pounds of fat, adopting a healthy relationship to food and learning to love the gym and exercise. The Synergy Of Affluence As a recent addition to my coaching club, I've added one-on-one calls. Together, my students and I have delved into all kinds of stuff from persuasion and affluence attraction to more spiritually oriented matters to, you name it. It's open, personal access in which my members come to me with things that maybe they're stuck on or things they just want to get better at. Slipping Into Our Prospect's Skin You've heard the saying; you can't know someone until you've walked a mile in their shoes. This is a technique on how to gain rapport by jumping into another person, figuratively walking a mile in their shoes. Harper Lee wrote in To Kill a Mockingbird, "You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view...until you climb into his skin and walk around in it." Self Persuasion: Begin By Beginning I've said it before, and I'll say it many times: Persuasion is first and foremost the study of human nature. And despite the things that are understandable about human nature, we are still very intricate and complex creatures. If all things were equal, there would still be some people who excel and others who get stuck. Do You Need A Swift Kick In The Butt? Ever since I can remember, starting from when I was a young boy, I've struggled with my weight. I was stuck in a body that didn't represent my mind's view of myself, but did represent a weakness I had in relation to food. It always brought to mind the Andrew Carnegie quote, "People who are unable to motivate themselves must be content with mediocrity, no matter how impressive their other talents." I knew that this struggle was holding me back from total mastery and it frustrated me to no end. Are Presuppositions Sneaky? Recently a student of mine posted a comment about my use of the relationship between teacher and student in an example of presupposition. They suggested, with a wink and a smiley face, that maybe I was being a little sneaky in using the example in a persuasive way. Practical Persuasion: Ways We Learn One of my newer students asked me on a recent call, "Kenrick, how are you able to keep track of all of the different language patterns and persuasion techniques that you know and use? I mean, each time we're on one of these coaching calls, it seems like you're not only using new techniques, but combining two or three or more techniques at once. Sometimes I can't even remember the first step. How can I remember to remember?' Overcoming The Collective Negativity "Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity." --Seneca, Roman philosopher, mid-1st century AD Rapid Rapport With Storytelling Here's the scenario: you are face to face with a new prospect and they've heard a little bit about you or your reputation and the kind of person you are to work with, but maybe they still have a few questions, a few defenses up. It's your job to overcome these before they can trust you with their business. Organizing For Persuasion "Three Rules of Work: Out of clutter find simplicity; From discord find harmony; In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity." -Albert Einstein Spare Parts: Segmenting Personality For Sales Persuasion Parts. We are all made up of parts. A part of me wants a bagel with cream cheese, but another part of me really wants to continue to become healthier. Part of me wants to go take a nap, but this other part wants to finish the project I started. We divide ourselves into parts as a way to talk about our experiences. Enough Blame To Go Around "All blame is a waste of time. No matter how much fault you find with another, and regardless of how much you blame him, it will not change you. The only thing blame does is to keep the focus off you when you are looking for external reasons to explain your unhappiness or frustration. You may succeed in making another feel guilty about something by blaming him, but you won't succeed in changing whatever it is about you that is making you unhappy." -Wayne Dyer Small Changes/big Changes 'Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.' --Albert Einstein Persuading With The Thirty Six Chinese Stratagem "So it is said that if you know your enemies and know yourself, you will win a hundred times in a hundred battles. If you only know yourself, but not your opponent, you win one and lose the next. If you do not know yourself or your enemy, you will always lose." -Ancient Chinese Proverb Visual Represetational Systems: See The Light In a previous article, I discussed the basics of the VAK (visual, auditory and kinesthetic) representational system and it's value in gaining rapport with an affluent clientle. In this article, I'm going to go more in depth with visual language. Persuasion And The Media "The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself." -Friedrich Nietzsche The Structuring Of Reality "I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy." -Tom Waits Stop Selling On Autopilot I've been updating my computer system (again!) lately and have been making periodic trips out to the local super computer chain store in my area for this or that. A fair amount of the time, I'm able to find what I need, get in and out, without much hoopla. But when I'm looking for a more expensive piece of equipment, I have experienced a little of what I'm calling the Attack of the Sales Zombies. Obstacles Into Opportunities "It still holds true that man is most uniquely human when he turns obstacles into opportunities." --Eric Hoffer Silver Linings And Watchtowers Of Imagination "Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it's always your choice." --Wayne Dyer The Relativity Of Luxury "The saddest thing I can imagine is to get used to luxury." --Charlie Chaplin Selling Through Future Pacing Here's a bit of an advanced technique. It's called future pacing and it works to remind your prospect or client of all the reasons they made the decision to buy your product or service. It transfers all of these reasons to a future point in time and triggers your prospect to remember them when an anchor is fired off. Appealing Emotionally In Business Here's a wild suggestion: I think rationality is overrated. Yup. It's true. I realize it's important to have a good foundation with your feet planted solidly on the ground, but rationality has taken over the realm of business (though it has not yet taken over the world of romantic relationships. . .) and we've lost an integral part of ourselves that makes us appealing: emotionality. We have moved from mom and pop businesses into the age of faceless corporations and in doing so, things have become so sterile. How To Maintain Good Boundaries In Rapport "It is the business of thought to define things, to find the boundaries; thought, indeed, is a ceaseless process of definition. It is the business of art to give things shape." -Vance Palmer Persuasion Metaphors From Around The World While the concept of 'energy' may seem new-agey, I personally find it integral to the understanding of self, which is the first step in understanding persuasion. Using The Forbidden To Persuade 'Forbid us something, and that thing we desire.' - Geoffrey Chaucer Persuading With The Awareness Pattern "The moment one gives close attention to anything, even a blade of grass, it becomes a mysterious, awesome, indescribably magnificent world in itself." -Henry Miller Repetition In Threes: Soothing Persuasion "Rhythm is something you either have or don't have, and when you have it, you have it all over." -Elvis Presley Master Your Fears "Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear-not absence of fear."--Mark Twain Persuasive Blaming: Use With Caution In previous articles I've written about using superstition and people's beliefs as a means to persuade. The term 'everything happens for a reason' is one of these concepts; 'there are no accidents' is another. If you've read these articles, you're already familiar with the power that they can hold in persuasion. Genie In A Bottle: Your Universe In Pictures We've all had the experience of wanting something that has eluded us. Maybe it's wealth, possessions, maybe it's a relationship, maybe it's optimum health or other physical attributes which for some reason or another we have not been able to conjure up. How To Adjust Your Lens I've written about framing basics in previous articles. Framing is a vast subject and couldn't possibly be summed up in just a few articles, but it's a foundation. Self Improvements For The New Year Yup. It's that time of year again. Fresh starts, new beginnings, an opportunity to recreate ourselves anew. . . I love welcoming a new year with hope and optimism. I love to set out a game plan for the upcoming year. The New Year's resolution is a concept devoted to self improvement and I am relentless about self improvement. Calibration Effect When I was a young man my first job in sales was selling gym memberships. One of the trainers that worked at this gym was a great guy, funny, sociable, and well liked, but he had tremendous difficulty communicating with certain types of people. My favorite thing about him was that he was always himself. This character trait had the downside of putting him against a wall where he became ineffective in his job. Relentlessly Yes! "All that man achieves, and all that he fails to achieve is a direct result of his own thoughts." -James Allen Setting Your Frame From The Start Everything has a beginning. A starting point. And when we have clarity and intention when we start something, it sets the way for what we can expect. When you sit down to start a presentation or begin to talk with a new client or prospect, how do you start? Very Superstitious: 'there Are No Accidents' 'Very superstitious, writing's on the wall Very superstitious, ladders bout' to fall Thirteen month old baby, broke the lookin' glass Seven years of bad luck, the good things in your past Persuasion Through Competition Lately I've been really dedicated to working out and recently I noticed something interesting at the gym. My gym is most definitely not a meat market. A very large percentage of the patrons are there because they care about their health and not for dating purposes or to see and be seen. So Much Persuasion: Ways To Learn I had a student ask me recently, "Kenrick, how do you keep track of all of these persuasion strategies? Every time we have a conference call or seminar, you pull out another technique adding to the dozens and dozens of techniques we've already learned. I can't even remember to use the 'unconscious hello'." An Exercise In Rapport: Trying On Someone Else's Skin You've heard the saying; you can't know someone until you've walked a mile in their shoes. This is a technique on how to gain rapport by jumping into another person, stepping in, sliding in, moving in, being in that person, figuratively walking a mile in their shoes. Harper Lee wrote in To Kill a Mockingbird, "You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view...until you climb into his skin and walk around in it." Short Circuiting Buyer's Remorse It's human nature to want to believe that we have done something of value when we make a purchase. We like to feel we've used proper sense and keen determination in choosing things that are going to be good for us and of the greatest use. And we most certainly want to know we'll feel good about the choices we've made in the long run. Short Circuiting Buyer's Remorse Every single human being on the planet today wants to believe that they have done something of value for themselves when they've made a purchase, and that they've used their ability to choose well and make a good decision. And as a result of this they want to know they're not going to feel bad about the choices they've made. On Being Receptive To Our Prospect's Energy From time-to-time I like to bring up some concepts that might be considered a little woo woo. I ask your indulgence with this and suggest that if it works, even woo woo has value. Self Calibration And Gut Instinct Intuition is defined as "the immediate apprehension of an object by the mind without the intervention of any reasoning process" [Oxford English Dictionary]. Are You Full Of It? Confidence . . . when we interact with our affluent clients and prospects, we need to exude confidence. We need to show them what we are made of. There's a point where confidence becomes over confident and self assuredness becomes arrogance. These are not good things to be full of. Being competent, self assured and having a solid sense of self are excellent things to be full of. Tangible Symbols of Affluence Amulets (or objects that protect a person from trouble) and talismans (objects intended to bring good luck or protection) have been around since the dawn of man. Seriously, the first man probably saw a shell or a rock, picked it up, and thought, 'Hey, this is a great rock (or shell). I'll bet it's a special rock (or shell) and will bring me good luck and protect me from evil." The Persuasion of Isolation Last year I saw a documentary about the cult leader Jim Jones called "Jonestown: The Life And Death of People's Temple". It is the history of the murder/"suicide" of 913 members of the People's Temple in Guyana through photos, clips, recordings and interviews of surviving members. Base Desires And Persuasion Persuasion has always been my passion. Self persuasion and self mastery have become extraordinarily important to me over the last year and a half. I have had some tremendous changes in my life as a result. Group Rapport: Shovel It Up and Filter It Out When I was first starting out in the business of persuasion, I had some difficulty with anxiety surrounding live events and seminars. Prior to a seminar for about a week, I'd become unbearable to be around. The wife and kids avoided me, even the dog steered clear. I didn't like it, but thought it was just the cost of doing business. And as if that weren't bad enough, after the event, I'd have an equally difficult "crash" or let down, not because the event wasn't successful, but because a huge amount of energy was expended and released and left me feeling as if I needed some recovery time. The Intent Behind Persuasion: I'm a Believer There's a term we like to use in our culture which seems to be relatively new and quite pop psychology (if you ask me): baggage. It seems to describe and cover the gamut from dashed hopes, to tragedies, to past relationships that went awry, to frustrating experiences or setbacks in our businesses. Emotional Persuasion Through Storytelling I cry during movies. I'll admit it. I'm absolutely comfortable with it and not ashamed in the slightest. Stories have been used to elicit emotional responses, whether by design or by accident, since the beginning of man and some of the best stories are extraordinarily moving. That emotion may manifest as heartbreaking or uplifting or revolutionary or life changing-but the important thing to remember is that it is an unbelievably powerful opening-a hole, so to speak-that can be filled up with a message. I Am An Onion: Layers of Complexity in Persuasion and Life I love a good metaphor. An especially powerful metaphor for me lately has been that of an onion. The Cleveland Method deals with a deep understanding of our core drives and unconscious motivations. When we focus inward, only then can we genuinely understand others.
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