- The Obstacles That Keep You From Closing The Sale
The very first obstacle that many persuaders experience is prejudging a prospect. They set up an appointment, hang up the phone and then immediately say, “Oh, great. - Psychology Of The Sales Professional
One’s attitude has a lot more to do with the level of her/his success than one’s aptitude, ability, IQ, education or other factors do. - Genuine Acceptance
Help your listeners and prospects feel appreciated, that they are personally accepted, and that their contributions are essential. When they feel accepted unconditionally, with no strings attached, their doubts, fears, and inadequacies will go out the window. - Praise Effects
You know people are more likely to be persuaded to say "yes" when you make them feel good about themselves, their work, and their accomplishments. People will do almost anything for you when you treat them with respect and dignity and show them that their feelings are important. - Emotional Word Choice
The words we use can hurt others and cause tension and resentment. Words can even cause wars. Humans tend to create and use words that hurt or label. As you design your persuasive message, you must consider the emotional impact of each word and phrase. - How to Use Silence
Sometimes the right word is no word. On occasion we need to remain silent and let the other person talk. We have heard in sales that the first one to talk after the close loses. After the persuasion process and the final decision is ready to be made, make your proposal and shut up. The silence is nerve-wracking, but it’s a critical time to let the prospect make the decision without you rambling on and on about the product or service. - How to Use Word Choice in Marketing
Word choice in marketing and advertising is absolutely critical. When advertisers spend millions of dollars each year, you can bet they have tested every word they are going to use. They want their word choices to psychologically lead you to believe their product is the best, that it will change your life. Skilled advertisers can get us to absorb their message unconsciously. They might even package an identical product with different words and phrases to reach a wider segment of the public. - The Value of the Simple Statement
It is best to assume that with spoken language, simple is better than complex. Since we are unable to recapture or replay our spoken words, we hope that they will be correctly interpreted the first time they are heard. Unfortunately, spoken words can be the most misread and misinterpreted form of communication, and therefore, can be a great hindrance to effective persuasion. When you’re in a persuasive situation, use simple, direct, and concise language, rather than fretting about how eloquent you’re sounding. If you are preoccupied, you’ll miss a lot of important cues. Moreover, complex language may not effectively deliver your point. - How to Increase Credibility
Credibility is in the eye of the beholder and it is a quality that is constantly changing. In fact, your credibility can shift from high to low in the same presentation with the same audience. Credibility can also alter with respect to time, presentation or somebody else's opinion. - How to Increase Congruence In Present Day Chaos
Agreement and harmony in verbal and nonverbal messages increase your ability to influence. When congruence is lacking, a red flag is raised and, either consciously or subconsciously, your listener will not give you her/his full trust. It's like the clothes you wear every day. - Winning Structure
Confidence and conviction during your call to action is a critical persuasive component. The effectiveness of your call to action is all about how the audience perceives you. Because it is such a crucial component, I would suggest that you write your call to action before beginning any other phase of your presentation. When doing so, ask yourself what exactly it is you want your audience to do upon completion of your presentation and then build your presentation around the answer. - Tactis to Deal with All Audience Types
In my years of speaking, I have dealt with many unique and challenging situations. I have listed tactics to work with each audience and how to turn your challenge into a success. The Hostile Audience - Persuasion and Presentation Obstacles
Fear is so debilitating, and yet it is so prevalent. I would say, in fact, that it is probably the number one obstacle standing in the way of having a solid, positive mental mindset. Yet when its true nature is revealed, we are no longer bound by the mental and emotional limitations it imposes upon us. - Persuasion and Presentation Obstacles
Fear is so debilitating, and yet it is so prevalent. I would say, in fact, that it is probably the number one obstacle standing in the way of having a solid, positive mental mindset. Yet when its true nature is revealed, we are no longer bound by the mental and emotional limitations it imposes upon us. - The Secret of Stories
Stories draw your audience in and they help an audience understand and appreciate your message. We can all think of a time when we were in an audience where we were not paying attention to the speaker. We were off in our own world when, all of a sudden, we perked up and started to listen because the speaker had shifted to telling a story. - How to Strengthen Your Character
Having integrity is like having a rock-solid dam. People know a good, solid dam will hold and will provide many benefits, such as electricity, water and recreation. If you are perceived as lacking in integrity, however, it's like having holes and leaks in your dam. When the leaks appear, everyone downstream abandons their trust in the old dam and seeks higher ground. Respect is lost and people place their trust in someone else they believe has greater integrity. We can all learn from the wisdom of the ancient Israelite, King Solomon. He is recorded as saying, "A good name is more desirable than great riches." If owning a good reputation is like owning gold, then owning integrity is like owning the mine. Abraham Lincoln gave another good analogy: "Character is like a tree and reputation like its shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing." - The Success Process
We put on weight over the years, but then we want to lose it overnight. We spend years getting deeper and deeper into debt, but we want to become financially independent overnight. We decide we want to run that marathon-when it's only a month a way. We want to ace that exam, but we only allow ourselves an hour to cram all the material. We start thinking about retirement when it looms only five years out on the horizon. There are many examples of things we want to attain in the shortest amount of time possible and with the least effort possible, but it rarely happens that way. Success is a process and not a quick fix. Progress comes in steps and the foundation first has to be laid. - Roadmap to Success
Part of your discovery will be making this self-mastery journey a natural process. It will still be challenging, but you need to expand your comfort zone. The journey to success starts with belief, proven principles and a burning desire to change. - Persuasion Used for You or Against You
Advertisers spend billions of dollars researching and analyzing our psychographics and demographics to figure out how to subtly persuade us. Rosseli, Skelly, and Mackie point out that "even by conservative estimates, the average person is exposed to 300 to 400 persuasive media messages a day from the mass media alone." - The Aroma of Persuasion
Our sense of smell is so powerful that it can quickly trigger associations with memories and emotions. - The Might of Symbols
We live in an especially symbolic world. Symbols bypass our thoughts and our logic and they affect our perceptions and behaviors. - Maslows Hierarchy of Motivation
Many of us are familiar with Abraham Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. A renowned researcher and psychologist, Maslow proposed a "hierarchy of needs" that demonstrates the human needs.... - Persuasive Humor in the Real World
Often, salespeople use humor to get a prospect to relax, open up and connect. This strategy works, too. If the salesperson gets us laughing along, we like them and we feel like we're having a good time. We're glad for a sales representative who appreciates our needs and concerns but who can also take the stress and anxiety out of making an important purchase. - Factors Influencing the Impact of Humor in Persuasion
Humor's effectiveness will always ride the emotional tides of your audience members. How well a joke goes over may depend on whose company your prospects are in, whether they are winding down for the day or still up against deadlines or other workplace pressures, whether they are awake and alert or feeling drowsy, whether they have a headache, etc. - Offer Choices
There is a strange human psychological phenomenon in regards to drawing conclusions. - Transferring Emotion
More than anything else, passion recruits the hearts and minds of your audience members. When the audience can sense your passion and heartfelt conviction for your cause or product, they emotionally jump on board. We all love people who are excited, animated and full of passion. There is a difference between charisma and passion, however. Passion is a transfer of emotion. - Find the Motivator that Creates Hunger
In order to successfully motivate someone-or, to get her/him to internalize the motivation-you have to create a deep hunger or thirst. - Engaging the Five Senses
We were all born with five senses, each one helping us to make generalizations about the world. You should engage all five sensations when trying to persuade an audience. - Critical Humor
The proper use of humor in your introduction is crucial. Your opener is where you set the stage, create the mood and get your audience ready to laugh. It sets up the rest of your delivery. - Aligning All My Ducks
Time is tight, you don't have time to check the plane or see if there is gas in the tank so you just prepare yourself to take off. The consequences would be devastating. Many treat their future this way. They are so excited to do things that will return a profit that they forget to work on themselves and learn the tools necessary to make their life successful. - Pre Persuasion Preparation
In order to successfully sell, you must first know your prospect.
Beliefs
Understanding your audience's beliefs will help you know what approach to - The Persuasion Pitfall
Understand your audience and what laws of persuasion you are going to use on them. - Monitoring the Acceptance Level
An important part of the Pre-Persuasion Checklist is determining what the audience's current acceptance level is for the subject you want to present. - Social Validation Marketing
We are social animals. We all have an innate desire to belong to a social group. It is precisely because we value this sense of belonging so highly that the more other people find an idea, trend, or position appealing or correct, the more correct that idea becomes in our own minds. We tend to change our perceptions, opinions, and behaviors in ways that are consistent with group norms. Even if we don't admit it, or maybe even realize it, we care about what others think. - Secret Strengths
Everybody loves secrets. We all love to be in the know. When you share something personal or private with another person, you create an instant bond and sense of obligation and trust with them. By offering inside knowledge, you've created a sense of intimacy and made your listener feel important. - Scarce Markets Or Scarce Salesmen?
Whenever choice is limited or threatened, the human need to maintain a share of the limited commodity makes us crave it even more. Scarcity increases the value of any product or service. Scarcity drives people to action, making us act quickly for fear of missing out on an opportunity. - Questioning To The Close
Of all the tools in your persuasion toolbox, questioning is probably the one most often used by Master Persuaders. Questions gain immediate involvement. - Pre-Sell Through Branding And Exposure
The more you expose someone to a particular concept or idea, the more that concept or idea will become favorable to them. Things do grow on us. - Creating More Sales Through Active Participation
People have an innate desire to feel wanted and needed. When you fulfill this need, you open the door to persuasion, a fact that has been proved beyond a doubt by records kept on industrial workers. - Assume the Sale
The power of suggestion can also be extremely effective when you engage the emotions in your tactics. For example, when your car salesman says, "You're really going to love how this car handles in the mountains," he is shifting the focus away from the sale and creating an exciting image in your head. - Contrast Your Prospects Into Selling Themselves
Many times, we can fly under the radar with the contrast principle. There is a theory called the "Just Noticeable Difference" (JND), which means the minimum amount of difference in the intensity of the stimulus that can be detected. What does this mean? How much can you raise the price of a product without anyone noticing? How many ounces can you take out of a can of soup before people start to catch on? - Get The Decision To Buy
A critical key to persuasion is to understand and use dissonance. You always want your prospect to feel they made the decision, and they persuaded themselves. That is why we say internal pressure is the secret. Let the rubber band stretch. When talking to a prospect you want them to make a decision as soon as possible. They don’t need to know everything about your product or service. Get them involved and fill in the blanks later. - Reduce The Sale To The Ridiculous
This technique involves paring down your request to something that seems manageable to your prospect. Let's say you are trying to convince someone to purchase a life insurance policy. The client wants a $250,000 policy and you feel that is not high enough for his needs. To adequately take care of his family, you suggest a $500,000 policy. He feels that the monthly payment for a $500,000 policy is too high. - Selling to a Door in the Face
We are affected when we are introduced to two vastly different alternatives in succession. We know that contrasting two alternatives can distort or amplify our perceptions of things. Generally, if the second item is quite different from the first, we will tend to see them even more differently than they actually are. As a Master Persuader, you can use this contrast to steer your audience toward the object of your persuasion. - The Rubber Band Effect In Sales
People will naturally act in a manner that is consistent with their cognitions (beliefs, attitudes, and values). Therefore, when people behave in a manner that is inconsistent with these cognitions, they find themselves in a state of discomfort. In such an uncomfortable state, they will naturally be inclined to adjust their behaviors or attitudes to regain mental and emotional consistency. When our beliefs, attitudes, and actions mesh, we live harmoniously. - Sliding Sales
Your prospect has seen your product/service and needs it, wants it and can afford it. He is wearing a badge that says convince me. He is right on the edge and his rubber band is tight, but he always blames someone else for his inability to make a decision. Dissonance will seal the deal! - Evidence Greatly Enhances Your Ability to Persuade and Influence
Some people are suspicious of statistical proof, so make sure your statistics are credible and sound. Know where you got them and who did the research. People know you can arrange statistics to say just about anything. Use statistics sparingly and only in conjunction with other forms of evidence. Besides, a roll of statistics can be very boring. - Perfecting the Art of Mirror and Matching In the Sales Cycle
John Grinder and Richard Bandler developed the concept of "mirror and matching." The idea is to align your movements and body image with your prospect's demeanor. The goal is to mirror or reflect their actions, not to imitate them. If people think you are imitating them, they may feel like you're mocking them and they may become offended. - Have You Successfully Anchored Your Sales Associations: You Could Be Losing Millions
Anchoring is a technique that captures the feelings, memories, and emotions of certain events, places, or things. The psychology behind the technique lies in the use of elements from a previous situation or circumstance to replay the emotions and feelings of that experience. - Nine Out Of Ten Salesmen Are Repulsive: Do You Have The Necessary People Skills?
We have all had the experience of feeling an instant connection or bond with someone after just a few seconds of being in their presence. This is the Law of Connectivity. We have probably all met someone whom we instantly did not like and did not want to be around. This is caused by a lack of connectivity and usually takes only a few seconds to manifest itself. - Sales Will Increase by Applying the Law of Association by Affiliation
To maintain order of the world, our brains link objects, gestures, and symbols with our feelings, memories, and life experiences. We mentally associate ourselves with such things as endorsements, sights, sounds, colors, music, and symbols, just to name a few. This association allows us to make judgment calls when we don't have the required time to do thorough research. - Sell With Logic
The logical side of an argument appeals to our reason. Reasoning is the process of drawing a conclusion based on evidence. For an argument to be legitimate, it has to be true and valid, and logical reasoning must be used to back it up.
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