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Emotional Persuasion Through Storytelling

I'll admit it. I cry at movies sometimes. I'm comfortable with it and not ashamed in the least. Movies are stories and stories have been used to elicit emotions (either by design or accident) since the beginning of man. Some of the most fantastic stories are tremendously moving. This emotion can be manifested as a 'feel good' or a 'tear jerker', it can be uplifting or depressing, revolutionary, or merely entertaining. The most important thing to keep upper most in your mind as you think about stories, is that they are an opening, a hole, so to speak, that you can fill with a message, your message.

As storytellers in business and sales settings, we are first and foremost considering the emotional state which the stories will put our prospects or clients in. We persuade by using stories to control these states. Ultimately, the value of our stories is the state in which they put our audience.

When I tell stories I want to both make a point and put my prospect into a profound emotional state, carry them away, so to speak and open to accepting my message.

Ideally, we should have an arsenal of compelling, persuasive, powerful stories at our ready for any given situation. Think about 'respect', for example. For our affluent and perhaps elderly clientle, the idea of respect is sometimes an incredibly important and motivating factor as to whether or not they want to do business with you.

I work diligently to instill a sense of respect for elders in my children. Recently, in order to reinforce the point that respect is paramount, I was talking to his Sensei recently and I said, ''Sensei, I wanted to tell you that at the last belt advancement that I was just at with my son, I was really impressed. There was a man there that must have been in his seventies.' And Sensei smiled broadly and he said, 'Yes. He's about 73.'

And I said, 'He was up for the test to advance his rank. When it came time for his sparring, his Sensei jumped up to spar with him. I noticed that the older man was having think before reacting, he would see something coming, he would stand there for a brief second and then he would react. It was clear that his faculties weren't as sharp and his body wasn't as quick, but yet, it almost brought tears to my eyes to see this man walking into the ring, walking onto the matt and doing his level best. Moreover, it impressed me that his Sensei made him look so good. He respected him enough to make him look good. I realized this wasn't about outperforming the man, it was about respecting the human spirit.' My son's Sensei just beamed and he responded, 'That's absolutely correct. You've got it right on all fronts.'

So right there was a two paragraph story about respect that probably elicited an emotional response. My goal in the story was that I wanted my son to understand the importance of respecting his elders in the very same way his Sensei showed respect to the man far his elder.

The story worked. It did exactly what I wanted it to do. And the story really touches me, profoundly. I have great love for both the Sensei and for the older gentleman in the ring.

In emotional storytelling my goal is to constantly maneuver the emotions of my listener and open them up so that I can easily install what I want. A story about respect will show my listener that I too am highly respectful and that this is a high quality or value for me in all my interactions.

Now we have the frame of respect set. Within that let's leverage knowledge so the next story might be about the knowledge that somebody has that made them like an undiscovered hero. Then we'd have respect and knowledge.

What are some of your stories that might elicit deep emotional responses and how can you incorporate them into your persuasion repertoire?

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Kenrick Cleveland teaches strategies to earn the business of wealthy prospects using persuasion. He runs public and private seminars and offers home study courses and coaching programs in persuasion strategies. Don't reprint the same version as everyone else. Get your own unique content persuasion article here.

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