Secrets of Hypnotic Influence and Persuasion Virtual Classroom Series

Isaac Newton’s 3rd law of motion

Isaac Newton’s 3rd law of motion states ‘for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction!’ And although I don’t think that is necessarily true in sales, it does bring up a concept that I want you to think about in your persuasion. We can call it ‘The first law of hypnotic persuasion’. And that is everything that you do in an interaction with a prospect and client, is going to have one of three effects:

1. It will either bring them closer to agreement
2. Push them further away from an agreement
3. Or have no effect

And I don’t know about you but in my persuasive endeavors there is really only one of those outcome that I am at all interested in.

But here is the challenge for us, the vast majority us of don’t realize the effect that our communication is having on the object of persuasive desire. In Catalyst for example, we talked about one very common thing that happens in a car transaction. That is very often at some point the car salesperson will do some version of a trial close, which is, “what do we have to do to put you in this car today? Let me ask you do you have a number in mind, if we could hit that number you could drive this car home today?”

Now I don’t know about you, but a random sampling of the people that I have talked to have been in a car buying situation have told me that, that question had them putting their sales guard up and standing back. They actually moved a little bit further away from the transaction. So skill number one I want you to work on, is the skill of developing a heightened sensory acuity. Now that simply means becoming more aware of the effect your intended communication is having on the object of your persuasive desires.

To begin, we are just going to look some very, very obvious signals. We are not going to worry too much about the third outcome, which is to have no effect at all. What we want to notice is, are we drawing them a bit closer or pushing them a little bit further away?

So let’s talk about some of the signs that we may see.

• One of the most overt signals that you can see is an involuntary head nod. Where they don’t even really realize that they are doing it, but whatever message that you are delivering is right on track and you are getting a little up and down not say, “yes yes I’m agreeing with you. This is all making sense to me.”
• Leaning in or having a more open gesture two other signals that showed that the client is getting relaxed and they are moving closer. They are moving closer to you; therefore they are also closer to the offer.
• The fourth one we can look for, which often times is also a completely unconscious and they are unaware they are doing it. This is a smile, sometimes also combined with a nod. That tells us that the message we are delivering is absolutely right on track.

Now moving away from, it’s going to be anything that looks like we are breaking rapport. They are breaking rapport with us. That could be:

• If they suddenly leaned back
• If they take a defensive posture, maybe crossing their arms over their shoulders.
• Tilting their head with a concerned look on their face or that unconscious nod or any facial expression were it looks like there is a little bit of pain associated with that.

I want you to start doing a couple of things with that:

1. Notice it! This is a muscle, this is a skill that you can develop and refine by practicing it and you will heighten your sensory acuity. Awareness of what’s going on in the world around you
2. I want you to notice if there are certain things that you say to clients or prospects over and over again that tend to generate the same type of response. Obviously if you are getting those unconscious, “yes!” signals we want to add more of that to our processes. And if we are getting multiple No’s, unconscious No’s signals from a prospect. We want to eliminate that completely from our routine. And it may be as easy as rephrasing it or putting in some of the verbal Aikido techniques in there, but you want to at the very least modify the way you are presenting that information, offer, question whatever it is you are presenting.
3. Practice watching others! If you are in a situation where you can see other people involved in sales interactions (both the salesperson and the prospect). Watch the unconscious signals that the salesperson is getting and see if you can pick up some things there. Even just in a restaurant or hotel lobby or a Starbucks, any place that people gather and talked together. Work on their sensory acuity muscles, to refine your ability to see what’s going on in the world around you.

That’s it for today. I will talk to you again tomorrow!