When most think of persuasion, or sales or seduction, we tend to think in terms of “sneaking our ideas across,” or somehow “convincing” the other person that our way of thinking is somehow “better” than theirs.
Now, if you hold this frame of mind, and many salespeople do, it can certainly work. If your product is a solid product, and the chances that they’ll find some kind of benefit out of it are high, neither you nor your client will be worse for the wear.
But this particular model is adversarial, to say the least. It presumes confrontation. They are trying to “resist” you, and you are trying to “overcome” their resistance.
Sure, if you’ve got plenty of self confidence and energy, it’s easy enough to “bowl over” a large portion of the population.
However, while you might feel some personal satisfaction of making a sale, or proving that you are “right,” you won’t “you’re really awesome!” response from them with star struck eyes.
Why?
No matter how good your product or idea is, unless it’s clearly THEIR idea, their going to feel, on some level, that they were “sold.”
That you convinced them that YOUR idea was better than THEIR idea.
Even IF your idea is better, they’ll still be resentful, one some level, that you proved them “wrong.”
Which it’s absolutely crucial, and much, much easier, to simply use their own ideas to convince them, rather than yours.
Now, this won’t make your ego feel good, but instead of thinking of yourself as some super star persuader, think of yourself as a “greeter” in front of the world’s largest department store, that has everything ever created.
They walk in, you ask them what they want, and you tell them where it’s located.
Not only that, but you whip out a full color flyer of the products their interested in, that give a detailed, side by side comparison.
Think they’d be happy? Think they’d be glad they bumped into you? Think they’d feel better about buying something?
In reality, all sales and persuasion can be like this. All you’ve got to do is talk to them in the right way, use the right language, to find out what they want. Then use those same language patterns to show them how to get it.
When you think of yourself as a “helper” instead of a “sales person,” it’s so much easier.
If you’d like those language patterns that make this easy, take a look here:
It will open up a whole new world of communication.