What’s your best price?  What’s it going to cost?

What clients really want is extraordinary quality, service convenience, and value. They want to work with a salesperson who can save them time and make there life easier.

Yet many clients end up buying price, and do you know why?

Because they find it so difficult to find all that other stuff.

The single biggest reason a client will buy price is that far too often it is the only alternative that you leave them with.

Each and every one of us has a systematic way to encode our sense of time in our respective minds. When you utilize the subtle yet powerful aspects of language, you can shift your customer’s perceptions and guide them in your persuasion.

This is perhaps one of the most fun concepts I learned while studying Neuro-Linguistic Progamming (NLP) many years ago, particularly when applying it to selling.

Your objective in using language is to put your product or service in their future and their objections in their past. Closely pay attention to how the customer is speaking of your product or service.  When you detect how specifically they are speaking, you can shift your words and lead them to follow you in language and in mind.

Is your customer speaking of your product or service in conditional terms? Are they saying such things like, “I would like to own this product,” presupposing there is some limiting condition present that is stopping him or her? Are they speaking phrases that indicate they are buying (in the present)? An example is “What we’re wanting is..” Are they using past tense phrases such as “Well, we were thinking about buying this…” indicating they may not be buying today?  A possible response to this may be, “So you’re now thinking about buying this…, do you mind if I ask you a question?

Why end the sentence with asking if you can ask a question? Because it distracts them from realizing what you just did – acknowledged what they said but rephrased into the present tense. But instead of focusing on that, their mind will go to answering the question you asked about asking a question.

In a future post I’ll write about how to make your customer see their decision to buy with you, something that’s already been done and already in their past (in their mind).

All of us have a metaphorical bucket representing how we feel from moment to moment. But how do we keep that bucket full and keep ourselves brimming with positive energy that not only improves our own lives but the lives of others around us?

Are you using what you’ve learned in your NLP training to shine a light on what is right in life instead of what is wrong?  How do people “feel” when they are around you? What impression do you create? What impression do you leave?

Richard Bandler stresses that NLP is nothing more than an attitude that has left in it’s trail some great techniques that have been developed as a result. This attitude of curiosity stems from the desire to understand people, how they ‘work’ (perfectly) and how to improve lives.

If our lives as practitioners of NLP is to improve those around us, than it’s worth modeling people like Tom Rath.

You can do this from reading his book “How Full is Your Bucket.” I could write a long review but it doesn’t need it. It’s an easy to read book, to the point, and if you practice the principles your interactions with others (including your customers) will improve. He’s also the author of Strengths Finder 2.0 and several other books. Here a video to give you a taste of his book.

I read an interesting article today that answers the question, “What inspires people to take NLP training?”

Here is a paragraph from it, and it’s an article worth reading:

“For a start, NLP training provides an in depth understanding of NLP itself. Neuro-linguistic programming (or NLP) is essentially the study of excellence and understanding how and why those who excel in their fields do so.”

Read the full article here

NLP is full of fancy jargon, and you need a glossary of terms when attending a NLP Practitioner Training just to make sense of it all. “Presuppositions” are no exception, even though most think they know what it means.

Presuppositions are simply the linguistic equivalent of what most people call assumptions. But with a little more art and science to it when used on purpose.

Whenever we are communicating, we use presuppositions that assume something is already true; every sentence we speak in our everyday life has a presupposition in it. In most cases, we tend not to consciously recognize what we have presupposed, and instead concentrate on what is directly stated. Thus, presuppositions are unconsciously accepted as being true and the listener will act as if they were true.

Naturally, that’s the powerful part.

Think of it like this. Every sentence you speak contains a noun and a verb, so, with each sentence you speak you actually presuppose that something exists (noun) in the past, present or future.  You also presuppose that some action did or did not take place, is or is not taking place, or will or will not take place.

Great salespeople know how to use this to their advantage.

Some of my favorite “presuppositional” categories are:

Cognitive qualifiers: “Surprisingly, interestingly, amazingly, fortunately, luckily, happily, curiously, uniquely, naturally, obviously, etc.”  Everything that follows this word is assumed true as the focus is on the word (the cognitive qualifier) that starts the sentence assuming it so.  For more info on Cognitive Qualifiers – click here.

Presuppositions that shift space (in the mind of your prospects): “Along side of that, stacked on top of that, in addition to that, adding to that, instead of that, in front of that, inside of that, outside of that, behind that, underneath that, between that, above all that, etc.”

Presuppositions that shift time (in the mind of your customers): “look back on, in the future, right now, before, once, look ahead, finally, after, long awaited, everlasting, accelerate, presently, yet, carry through, then, when, now, etc.”

Presuppositional words that say something is factual, actual, or the truth: “actually, genuinely, unquestionably, surely, certainly, proven, obviously, self evident, valid, absolute, clearly, surely, naturally, etc.”

Presuppositional words of power: Realize, aware, notice, discover, uncover.

Future posts will have some examples of these, but this should get you thinking and more importantly, creating.

Metaphors. That’s the secret.

Surprised? You shouldn’t be. Using metaphors appeals the your prospects or customers right brain. It helps them visualize, instantly relate, and connect the dots to what you are saying or recommending. And it’s memorable.

The process behind a recommendation that’s rephrased framed with a metaphor is actually simple.

First, ask yourself: What am I actually recommending?

Second, determine the problem your recommendation will solve.

Third, run through various possible metaphors, selecting the one that communicates most clearly and vividly what you’re urging.

For example, let’s say you are recommending that your team goes through some team building training to improve collaboration on projects. The problem to be solved is lack of communication, morale, and productivity. Here is a sample metaphor you could use:

“It will move us from a company of stray shooters to a team of marksmen.”

Here is another example. You are recommending someone replace their current software system with the one you are selling. The problem is the old system is too slow. An example of a metaphor you could use is:

“When we’re done, it will be like replacing a horse and buggy with a Porsche.”

How can you work on this? Just follow these steps each time:

Step 1 – List out a recommendation you’ve recently made to a client.

Step 2 - What problem does it solve ?

Step 3 -What metaphor can make that recommendation more vivid in your customer’s mind?

Resource: You learned how to construct metaphors in your Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) practitioner training. David Gordon’s book on Therapeutic Metaphors is a great place to start, and while not overtly so in the book itself, it’s just as practical for business applications as it is therapy.

It’s easy to tell when your prospect or customer is talking to themselves because they will often lean their head to one side, nestling it on their hand or fist. Some call this the “telephone position” because the posture often resembles talking on the phone. Looking down to the left or right while doing this is also a good indication of someone talking to themselves.

NLP teaches us to track eye movements and calibrate the responses. Once you’ve calibrated their eye movements (don’t just rely on the “eye movement chart”) you can then adapt your language to pace their thinking.

Examples of what you might say include:

“Well, when you say to yourself…”

“When you tell yourself…”

“What do you tell yourself when…”

“What if you told yourself…”

Each Friday I conduct two sales training classes, a basic “fast track” class followed by a more advanced “sales mastery” class on behalf of The Performance Group, a sales development company in Des Moines, IA.

What I’ve learned most, recently, is that salespeople have become really skilled at getting in their own way. Or perhaps letting their “thoughts” get in their way.

Luckily, Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) has taught us some specific ways to use our brain.  That doesn’t mean we always “use” what we know.

Most people do not use their brains deliberately – if you stop and think about it. Instead your responses are automatic. If you have a sales presentation that ended up bad, do you walk away and find yourself re-living the experience? Five hours later and you are still in the same state, re-living it over and over. Beating yourself up over it, mentally. “If only I would have…” “I should have said this…” “I didn’t ask the right questions…” “This damn economy!” Whatever.

I invite students to listen to the voice inside their head. Notice the tonality, the volume (how loud are you talking to yourself!?), the pitch and rhythm. And then notice how you feel when you speak to yourself this way.

I had a salesperson say to me last week, “It’s hard to figure out what I did or what to do differently after I’ve done a bad presentation.” I responded, “No kidding. How could you expect to with all that you have going on inside you head afterwards. There is not room for resourcefulness when you are drowning everything else out.” Literally.

Once you understand, deliberately, how you are thinking, you can begin to do it differently.

It takes a conscious, deliberate effort to think of someone that has said something to you that was particularly pleasing. Then to take those sub-modalities and talk to yourself in that way, with the same critical ‘content.’ Noticing how differently you are able to respond to the same critical words is your test. If you aren’t getting the change of state you desire, change more sub-modalities until you get the results you are after. Perhaps you hear the critical voice in the voice of someone that makes you feel great when they talk to you. Why not?

But is this only for dealing with your “self-talk” after you have a sales call go bad?

No.

It’s for before you have a sales call go good.

So before you sell, “use your brain for a change.” (In the words of RB).

Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) arms us with the language tools to develop our skills at making our products and services (sound, feel or look) interesting. Unfortunately, it’s easy to get caught up in what do I say versus what do I ask so I can learn what they want most out of what I’m selling.

What matters to your customers? Answer: Not what you are selling.

What matters to them is what your product or service will do for them. That’s it. What’s in it for them.

Does it matter how long your company has been in business? No. Unless you can tie it to a reason that is compelling enough for them to benefit from the company longevity (or brevity).

Does it matter if you are bigger or smaller (or more or less experienced) than your competitor? No. Unless you you can wrap it around how it impacts them in a way that contributes to why they’d buy your product.

In sales we sometimes mistake our primary role for presenting, packaging, and telling our story. This is only because we forgot to remember it’s about asking questions, the right questions to figure out which benefit is most important to your prospect.

The next time you are in front of your customer, remember to say something similar to: “One of the things my customers have found is really helpful in prioritizing what’s most important is to ask you to complete the following sentence regarding this product/service.” “All I really care about is _______________________.”

Another way to say it: “Let me ask you one more questions to help prioritize your needs. In terms of why you are buying this product/service, how would you complete this sentence: “All I really care about is _________________________.”

Your customers will thank you for it. And  you’ll know what to focus your presentation on.

The short answer is yes. Watching (and learning from) this video below, you will quickly see why he’s one of the most successful actors of our times. I invite all NLPer’s to listen to his language patterns, where his focus is, notice his physiology, and perhaps the most important thing to model is his attitude.

I state frequently in my blog, the gift that Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) gives us, is the skills to model successful people and their patterns. That is where NLP got it’s roots. Too many people think NLP is just about using the techniques and forget that it’s more than that. It’s an attitude towards discovering and learning how to achieve excellence. From that will come the methods, the techniques.

While most people know that movies such as “I am Legend”, “Ali”, “Hancock”, “The Pursuit of Happyness”, and “Hitch” helped make him one of the highest movie grossing actors, Entertainment Weekly recently named him one of the “Top 15 Entertainers of the Decade.”

Following a customer presentation gone south, have you ever found yourself saying things like, “They took me the wrong way,” or “They just didn’t understand what I was trying to say,” or “They didn’t get it,” or “The misinterpreted what I was meaning to say,” or “They were looking at it from the wrong perspective,” or “They misunderstood the presentation,” etc.?

My guess is from time to time, we’ve caught ourselves saying this and thought nothing of our own reaction.

One of the more valuable presuppositions taught in Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) is that the meaning of your communication is the response that you get.

If I asked you, do you like to be in control? What would your answer be?

My guess is your answer would be “yes.”

Most salespeople like to feel somewhat in control of their situation. If that is the case for you, why would you forfeit control to your customer by allowing the blame to go to them for misunderstanding you?

While it can be fun to point the finger or blame someone for “their misunderstanding” of what we were “trying” to communicate, it’s not useful for improving our communication.

If instead you adopt this empowering self-responsibility mindset of “the meaning of my communication is the response that I get”, you will find that it puts you in control of changing the outcomes.

I encourage you to approach each sales presentation, each customer encounter with this mindset, always asking what you could say different, how you could position your product in the way they will understand it best, based on how they buy, how they make decisions, and based on how they interpret the value best.

]]> http://nlpdaily.com/nlp-for-selling/feed 1 http://nlpdaily.com/seth-godin-gets-it http://nlpdaily.com/seth-godin-gets-it#comments Tue, 22 Dec 2009 05:49:33 +0000 nlpdaily http://nlpdaily.com/?p=287

NLP gives us the tools to understand people differently. The premise of Perceptual Positions is to develop the flexibility to consider a situation or customer interface from the perspective of self (1st position), another person involved (2nd position) or from a neutral, objective, detached point of view (3rd position; like “a fly on the wall”).

When I observe poor salespeople, they tend to have repetitive patterns in how they sell, and little flexibility to adapt to how someone buys. They tend to sell how they buy, therefore selling to those people who buy (and think) the most like them.

Seth Godin Gets It. In a recent blog entry on his popular (and worth reading daily) blog, he adds additional insight that can help you in your marketing as well as your selling. He states, “The challenge doesn’t lie in getting them to know what you know. It won’t help. The challenge lies in helping them see your idea through their lens, not yours.”

He’s dead on. Read the rest of his post here (in fact, if you want to be a better marketer – read his blog daily). I also recommend reading all of Seth Godin’s books.

If you’ve attended an NLP training or you’ve read any NLP books you’ve learned (and possibly adopted) the presupposition that there is “no such thing as failure, only feedback.”

In this video, it’s suggested that you can fail your way to success. It’s powerful and motivating. Watch it and enjoy, Joe.

There really isn’t just one governing body with a universal list of established competencies that one has to demonstrate in order to “earn certification” in NLP. There are several certifying organizations and they all have their own criteria for “NLP” certification.

This means there are many different levels of “NLP Practitioners” out there claiming different levels of expertise and competency on the subject.

Of course anyone can read a few books on NLP and then call themselves “practitioners” and even a “NLP trainer.” Why not?  Here is the shocker: Some of these people may actually be better NLP Trainers than those who have gone through many weeks, even months of NLP training with a certifying organization.

How could that be so? Because the real test of NLP is application in the real world. Using it to better your life and those around you and getting results.

In my case, I studied with Steve Andreas and his training team at NLP Comprehensive 15 years ago, and to this day there is much of what I learned during that training that has impacted my life and career.

I have since studied with NLP Co-Founder Richard Bandler and John LaValle and feel strongly they have the best set of standards for measuring a person’s competence in NLP and I’m confident they wouldn’t recommend someone who didn’t have skills. I also learned a great deal from Rex Steven Sikes, a master trainer and now performing mentalist. They provided the more advanced foundation for my NLP learning experience. Their certifying organization and one I recommend is the Society of NLP.

The rest came in applying NLP in the real world. In my case, in business and life.

But none of that training would matter if I didn’t use it. I’ve witnessed (too) many people who have studied NLP, attended all the training’s and yet still don’t advance in their skills or application of NLP to business and life.

As a business practitioner of NLP and Trainer, I’ve been training managers and salespeople each year how to improve using NLP methodology. From this comes a new attitude, new approach, and new techniques they apply to growing their business. This application of NLP has also kept if fresh for me. It’s helped me grow as a trainer and expand my knowledge base of NLP.

I believe there are MANY different levels of NLP Trainers out there (despite how much training or how many years of courses they’ve attended).  I’ve met some trainers (and watched NLP trainers on video) who claim they are “experts” on NLP but they bore the socks off of you in 5 minutes because they don’t know how to manage their own state.

I’ve met others who are passionate about what they are teaching, and have demonstrable knowledge of NLP in the words they use, and the state they are in when you are with them.

My recommendation is to train with a trainer who makes you feel good. A trainer who appears motivated and can motivate you. A good indication of their ability to be effective training you, is to take a look at how they’ve advanced their life (personally and professionally) using NLP – if they can do it, you can learn (model) it from them.

I once asked a prospective client, “What kind of person do you trust will do the best job for your company?”  They thought about it briefly and then started ‘describing’ (by slight gestures and small glances, angled to the right) what a trustworthy person was to THEM.  Guess which angle I stood at for the rest of the appointment before walking out with a contract for MY services?

If someone is talking about ‘someone’ they are really happy with and feel comfortable with, where do they gesture?  Where do they look when referencing to these positive feelings?  WHERE do you stand (at what angle) in relation to them to have the most impact?  What happens when you stand at the angle in front of them that they are most comfortable with having you stand (or sit)?

Doubts and Good Decisions

Observe where people have their doubts.  They will often show you with their gestures, or their eyes will fixate in a particular spatial location out in front of them while they discuss their doubts, or bad decisions of the past.

Equally as much, if you ask the right questions, people will show you where their good decisions are as well.  When they discuss something they are certain about or things they’ve purchased in the past that they believe strongly was a good purchase, notice where they gesture or refer to out in front of them.

Once you’ve observed and have made sense of their patterns, you then can use this information powerfully.  You’ll find yourself closing deals easier, with little resistance if you know “where” to place the contract in front of the customer, at which angle and location in front of them.  You’ll have enough 3 dimensional data to know where to stand or sit, where to gesture, and most importantly where spatially to anchor your company and product to.