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Persuasive Oration: Watching What You Say Language, like persuasion, is an art. It's an art that can be mangled, yes. (Just look at poor Miss Teen North Carolina for a classic language malfunction.) 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), most likely you will have to practice to be good at the art of language, and subsequently the art of persuasion. Need: Persuading Prospects Based On Their Deep Values "Nothing has more strength than dire necessity." ~ Euripides Framing Taboos To further illustrate the persuasive power of framing, I've chosen a few pretty hot topics. I'm hoping to stir us all up a little. Reframing Framing An employee of mine, my transcriptionist, was living in New Orleans until August 28, 2005. On that day, she and her boyfriend and their cats drove north to Tennessee to ride out the storm in a pet friendly hotel. Gaslighting: Stirring Up Doubt Here's a great example of a powerful strategy called gaslighting and how to use it in your persuasive situations with the affluent... Self Motivation With Your Other-Than-Conscious Mind "It is as if evolution has built a safety device in our nervous system that allows us to experience full happiness only when we are living at 100% - when we are fully using the physical and mental equipment we have been given." ~Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi Persuasive Words: Framing Islamophobia Phobias and isms... they come in all shapes and sizes. There's racism, sexism, classism, sizeism, anti-Semitism, anti-intellectualism... All of these represent a belief of superiority of one race, gender, class, size, or religion over another or a hatred of one against another. What The Martians Must Think Indulge me for a moment while I veer off into the world of fantasy for a moment. The world of make believe, our crazy political world from a martian's perspective. Allowing and Embracing the Flow "The real 'haves' are they who can acquire freedom, self-confidence, and even riches without depriving others of them. They acquire all of these by developing and applying their potentialities. On the other hand, the real 'have nots' are they who cannot have aught except by depriving others of it. They can feel free only by diminishing the freedom of others, self-confident by spreading fear and dependence among others, and rich by making others poor." - Eric Hoffer Understanding VAK When we're persuading the affluent, (which is after all, where the money is) it's useful to be as much like them as possible. The Path to Activating Your Affluence My belief is that we create our own destiny. The lives we have are the lives we have made for ourselves--good or bad. Clean Out Your Trash There's a common saying, 'taking three steps forward and two steps back'. We've all felt this sort of frustration at some point in our life. Luckily you're reading this article and I have an exercise to show you how to eliminate the 'two steps back'. The Frame of Revivification To revivify is to restore the old, a renewal of life, the act of recalling something that was once in use to an active status. Too Much To Choose From This has happened to me. Maybe it's because I don't normally do the grocery shopping. I've gone into the supermarket or drug store for a tube of toothpaste and found myself confronted with three or four dozen varieties of toothpaste. Why? It's a fairly simple substance. We use it every day, hopefully twice. So why are there so many to choose from? We've got cream paste, gel, gel with sparkles, whitening toothpaste, some with baking soda, others for sensitive gums. There's toothpastes for kids, natural toothpastes, and all come in various flavors. Once we figure out what brand and flavor we want, then we have to figure out what size we need. Travel? Economy? Family sized? Superstition As Persuasion Here's a common superstition. . . We say "God bless you" when a person sneezes. Why? Well, this particular superstition started in the Middle Ages when it was thought that the devil could enter a person in unguarded moments, such as when they were in the midst of a sneeze. If someone said the magic words "God bless you" during or after the sneeze, the demonic possession could be avoided. Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire Under the heading of 'human nature' comes lying. Humans lie. Period. Big lies, small lies, lies to spare feelings, lies to spare trouble. Determine The Sum of Your Values "Our value is the sum of our values." --Joe Batten Persuading with The Competitive Edge The gym I attend is by no means a meat market. There are few mirrors, and the clientle appears to be there to maintain and/or work on their health, not to see and be seen. And I noticed something amazing at the gym that I want to share with you. Stifling Their Inner Critics One of the main goals we have as persuaders and sales professionals is to suspend the critical judgment of our affluent prospects and clients. To accomplish this, we need to shut down their inner critics by getting them out of their lives and showing them something bigger and better (what life will look like once we're a part of it.) Persuading Through Embedded Suggestions "Persuasion is often more effectual than force." -Aesop Breath: Self Fulfilling Prophesy for Persuasion "Simply breathe - deeply and often, and whatever you do, don't stop breathing!" --Cheryl Lynne Rubbo In this exercise, you're going to learn to lead your wealthy clients and prospects with a simple word: breathe. It's something they do to stay alive, and yet, you're going to take credit for this biological function for persuasion purposes. A Return to Bondage (No! Not that kind of bondage) "The average age of the world's greatest civilizations has been two hundred years. These nations have progressed through this sequence: From bondage to spiritual faith; from spiritual faith to great courage; from courage to liberty; from liberty to abundance; from abundance to selfishness; from selfishness to complacency; from complacency to apathy; from apathy to dependence; from dependency back again into bondage." --Sir Alex Fraser Tyler (1742-1813) Scottish jurist and historian First Step: Create Your Universes "Civilization advances as more and more of life's essentials are absorbed by the unconscious." -Diane Ackerman, "An Alchemy of Mind: The Marvel and Mystery of the Brain" Old Fashioned Sales: Features and Benefits If you've ever cooked noodles you know that you can determine if they are done by throwing the noodle against the wall to see if it sticks. If it does, then it's done. When I think of 'features and benefits', I think of someone throwing a whole pot of noodles against the wall to see what sticks. Attack of the Friendlies I like the way Abraham Lincoln said it best, "Am I not destroying my enemies when I make friends of them?" Is it true? Does Everything Happen for a Reason? Last week I got a call from an acquaintance of mine. He said, 'Remember that conversation we had about Africa a few weeks ago? Well, I just checked my e-mail and you won't believe it. I won an international lottery originating in Africa. You know, I'm just convinced everything happens for a reason, don't you think?' Is it true? Does Everything Happen for a Reason? I got a call from an acquaintance a while back. He said, 'Do you remember the conversation we had about Africa? Well, I checked my e-mail and found, unbelievably, that I won an international lottery which originated in Africa. I'm just convinced that everything happens for a reason, aren't you?' Negating Words: But I really like you, but. . . Eliciting Peak Emotional States for Persuasive Power Have you ever had this experience? You're driving down the road and a song comes on the radio and suddenly you're transported to a time and place. . .maybe ten, twenty years ago, when you were having the time of your life, or falling in love for the first time, or struggling through a broken heart. The Continuums of Persuasion: Keys to Your Prospect's Particulars Recently I heard a pretty funny joke: 'I have the idea that one person's dream is another person's nightmare. For example, it's my dream to sleep with Cindy Crawford. I'll bet you anything that would be her nightmare.' On the Contrary: How To Deal With a Polarity Responder All of us have known a polarity responder at one time or another. A polarity responder, regardless of the situation, will respond in opposition to anything you say. 'It's a beautiful day.' Persuasive Storytelling 'Facts and figures are forgotten. Stories are retold.' -Jeffrey Gitomer Beyond Boxes If you're in the world of sales, it's likely you've gone through traditional sales training and learned that there is 'a way' to sell. Maybe it was the Carnegie method. Maybe you learned 'features and benefits'. Maybe you learned some other easily definable, package-able way to sell to clients or prospects which sort of hammers away at their defenses and attempts to corner them into buying. These techniques are responsible for boxing in many excellent sales professionals. I admit to having been hindered once by these techniques but I had an awakening. Paper Seeds: An Exercise in Sprouting and Manifesting I lived on my grandpa's farm as a kid and he taught me some very important life lessons including the Biblical verse: As you sow, so shall you reap. Be Like A Magnet A very spiritual woman I know shared the following with me: she said, 'I used to have unfortunate beliefs about myself and I received back from external influences unfortunate results. When I decided to take control and raise my resonance, to be the change I wanted to become, to allow abundance and love come flow through me, absolutely everything fell into place. I am now living a life of leisure with a beautiful husband and I can draw what I want into my universe at will.' Reveling in Unselfconscious Affluence We didn't all grow up affluent. I know for a fact that several of my students, in fact, are literally rags to riches stories. Through single-minded perseverance, intention, education, hard work, and maybe a little luck, they have created financial universes for themselves that are quite enviable and outstanding. Framing The Big Picture Framing is the most powerful concept in persuasion. When we look at the big picture we see that everything can be thought of as a frame. By using political or religious examples (and any other taboo/controversial thing I can come up with), I am in no way endorsing one side or the other-though of course I do have personal opinions-rather, I'm showing that we all have blind spots. Find a belief that you believe fervently, feverishly, fanatically, even, and I'm going to suggest that you may be blind to the opposite side of the issue. 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. 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. 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. 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. 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. 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. 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." 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. 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]. 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. 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. 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. 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." 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'." 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. 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 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? Relentlessly Yes! "All that man achieves, and all that he fails to achieve is a direct result of his own thoughts." -James Allen 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. 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. 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. 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. 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. Master Your Fears "Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear-not absence of fear."--Mark Twain 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 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 Using The Forbidden To Persuade 'Forbid us something, and that thing we desire.' - Geoffrey Chaucer 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. 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 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. 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. The Relativity Of Luxury "The saddest thing I can imagine is to get used to luxury." --Charlie Chaplin Silver Linings And Watchtowers Of Imagination "Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it's always your choice." --Wayne Dyer Obstacles Into Opportunities "It still holds true that man is most uniquely human when he turns obstacles into opportunities." --Eric Hoffer 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. The Structuring Of Reality "I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy." -Tom Waits 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 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. 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 Small Changes/big Changes 'Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.' --Albert Einstein 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 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. 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 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. Overcoming The Collective Negativity "Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity." --Seneca, Roman philosopher, mid-1st century AD 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?' 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. 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. 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. 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." 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. 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. 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. How To Not Become Rich 1. Wait for approval or permission from society. 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." 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. 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. Framing History "If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail." --Abraham H. Maslow 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! 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. softening language There's something I'm curious about. . . 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. 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.
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