I’ve spent 3 decades studying top sales professionals, and the last 15 years training sales people from a broad cross-section of industries and measuring the results they’ve achieved. There is a very clear picture of what aspiring professionals need to master if they, also, are to gain control of their income.
INCREDIBLE RAPPORT
Matching and mirroring (which you may have been taught) is merely the kindy level of rapport. Top performers have such incredible rapport skills that they’re often able to build rapport very rapidly, even with people who initially don’t like them.
Let’s hope the online dating gurus don’t ever find out that this highest level of rapport even exists!
It probably wouldn’t do much good anyway, because they’d use it to try to manipulate, and manipulation is an automatic rapport breaker. To achieve the results you really want, these rapport skills must be used to enhance your relationships so that your level of connection with people is deep and genuine.
What’s the secret? Well partly of course it takes practice, but it’s important that this is correct practice. Some of the things you can do to increase your rapport skills are to take a leaf out of, believe it or not, the synchonised swimming teams!
These teams need to be “in synch” if they are to perform in synchronised precision. They take time before each performance to stand in a circle and really connect with each other, not just physically, but mentally and emotionally.
“SPOOKY” MIND READING
An amazing level of rapport is one thing, but mind reading, where you actually know what your client is thinking, is a skill that borders on “spooky” but is certainly achievable.
Using accelerated learning techniques, you can quite quickly develop a level of skill in knowing what your client is thinking, even before your client becomes aware of the thought!
How useful would it be, for example, to know whether your client is thinking “yes I do like that option” or “no I don’t? What about “I’m ready to buy” or “I’m not ready to buy”?
You can certainly gain this skill, and again it takes practice! If you’re willing to spend time with buddies or business friends who’ll silently think of things that for example they “like”, and then of things that they “don’t like”, you’ll very quickly notice the set of cues that are the giveaway for each person. The more you practice, the more you can pick this up quickly even with people you’ve never met before.
THE ONLY CLIENT TRAITS THAT MATTER TO THE SALES PROFESSIONAL
Although therapists work with several personality traits, most of them don’t know THESE! These are the traits that predict how a client will go through the decision making process - the traits that give away the very factors the client needs in order to say yes. Can you see why I say they’re essential for you to know? (And they should be essential for therapists too!)
It might surprise you, but once you’ve studied that collection of traits, you’ll find you’ve got a natural affinity with them. In fact if you bring to mind even casual acquaintances, you’ll find that you can now identify those traits IMMEDIATELY.
Take a look at the following trait and you’ll see what I mean. This particular trait is called “match/mismatch”.
Have you ever met anyone who, the minute you said “black”, they said “white”? If you said it was a fine day, they’ve declared that indeed it was a pretty ordinary day, or even “what’s fine about it!”. That was probably a person who focuses on the differences, or habitually mismatches. Sometimes we refer to this type of person as a “polarity responder”, which is a technical term meaning “pain in the butt” :-).
On the other hand, there’s that equally maddening person who’s constantly focussing on the things that are similar or in common, rather than on things that are different or even “new”. This type of thinking can be quite counter-productive for a student, for example, because instead of recognising new knowledge, they will discount it by saying something like “Oh yes, this is just like X, and I learned that last year!” They completely miss out on the differences, especially the subtle ones, and therefore fail to learn as well as they could.
Real Life Example
Fred the sales consultant is chatting with Macey the business owner and Macey seems “argumentative”. First she says that she has a problem with a certain manufacturing process, and then when Fred, carefully using her own terminology, refers to “the manufacturing problem” she denies that there is a problem! This woman is even mismatching her own statements. (Note from Christine: Yes! These people do actually exist! I met a very senior manager at a major utility company not that long ago who was exactly like this.)
This might seem like an impossible situation, but because the mismatcher is so predictable, it turns out they’re the easiest to influence. In this situation Fred could say “Macey, I’m not sure if you feel the same or if there’s not an easier way to run that process, but I wonder if you wouldn’t find it more effective to ….”
Later he says, “Macey, this new method isn’t for everyone and it may not suit you ” Macey is the easiest client of all, if you recognise her meta-program and respond to it appropriately! When you understand these personality traits, there’s no way you’ll make the mistakes that in the past have clashed with your client’s “style”.
MILLION DOLLAR QUESTIONS EVERY SALES PERSON SHOULD KNOW
The top performing sales people are experts at asking 3 simple little questions and using the answers effectively.
What these questions do is to take a laser light to the client’s core values in relation to the buying process. And in addition, if you’re listening, the answers will include the very words the client needs to hear if they’re to decide to buy.
These questions are pure gold. They make purchase utterly compelling, and at the same time build a great relationship that fosters streams of referrals!
FINGERTIP CONTROL OF YOUR INCOME
Do you currently know how to achieve any sales goal you choose? Consistently and persistently?
Top sales professionals certainly can and do, because they know the simple statistics that matter to every sales person, and they can turn them into a mathematical equation that literally gives them fingertip control of your income.
You’ve heard of Frank Bettger? He was possibly the first person in the world to turn his sales activities into a documented system that worked. Nowadays of course there’s just a little more to it, but not much!
To determine your own equation you need to make a list of all the sales activities that you perform (together with the time it takes to perform one “unit”), both direct and indirect, and calculate (or make a guestimate) of the sales result of each. Now you have a list of activities and time on one side, and a sales result on the other. If you wanted, for instance, to double your income, what would you have to do? What activities are paying their way and which aren’t? What else would be a better use of your time and effort?
Are you prepared to plan, document, track and analyse each sales activity? Are you prepared to be that accountable to yourself? Congratulations, you’re almost there!
TAKE OUT YOUR MAGIC WAND AND MAKE THAT FEAR OR DOUBT DISAPPEAR!
Have you ever known what you had to do, and certainly been capable of doing it very well, and yet you procrastinated or self-sabotaged so it still didn’t get done? This is what fear or niggling doubt can do, so obviously it needs to go!
What if you know you should feel confident about making those calls or speaking in front of that group, but you still feel sick in the stomach every time you think about it?
A fast and easy way to eliminate these problems has been available for several years now, but only a few especially-skilled therapists know about it.
It’s a technique called “NeuroStim” and it’s so effective that it’s been tested in clinical trials to eliminate depression and even severe chronic pain in just days. Permanently. It’ll make mince meat of your performance anxiety!
NETWORK LIKE THIS AND YOU’LL ENJOY A HUGE PAYOFF!
Up until a few years ago we would always recommend that our students and clients join a business networking organisation and we ourselves worked tirelessly to educate members and their organisations to network more ethically and effectively.
It’s a tragedy to us that business networking organisations still don’t seem to understand the principles of effective networking.
Nowadays we advise our clients and students to avoid these organisations whenever possible. They are half-baked examples of what networking should be about and our people are far better off forming their own business networks among trusted business friends. If they do this the right way, they’ll enjoy unprecedented success, including superior peer-mentoring, joint venture agreements, referrals, advocacy, and sharing of expertise and resources. And they can do it all in business hours.
No more spending money on networking memberships that don’t (or barely) pay for themselves. No more wasting time talking with people with whom you have nothing in common. No more stupid elevator pitches, putting up with complete strangers stuffing their business cards at you or pressuring you for referrals. No more robbing yourself of precious time to spend with family and friends. This is how to play the game so it’s personally and professionally enjoyable, and really PAYS OFF! Even if you’re a complete introvert like me, you’re going to LOVE networking like this!
COULD YOU DO IT TOO?
If you can only do these things, even though there’s so much more you can do in terms of skill building, you will certainly join the top echelon of professional sales people in the world today! And you’ll deserve it!