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Winning Through Framing Has this ever happened to you? You're driving down the freeway, maybe a little too fast, maybe not, and those red and blue lights begin to flash in your rear view mirror. So you pull over and prepare your papers. . . license, registration, proof of insurance. And the law enforcement officer makes his way to your window, quickly so as to not waste your time, and politely says, 'Hi. . .I'm just wondering if you . . .I'm so sorry to bother you. But would you mind showing me your license and registration? I think there might have been a slight infraction of the law and I'd really like to clear it up if you don't mind. I'm so sorry for the inconvenience.' Who's to blame? "All blame is a waste of time. No matter how much fault you find with another, and regardless of how much you blame him, it will not change you. The only thing blame does is to keep the focus off you when you are looking for external reasons to explain your unhappiness or frustration. You may succeed in making another feel guilty about something by blaming him, but you won't succeed in changing whatever it is about you that is making you unhappy." -Wayne Dyer When Friendlies Attack I like the way Abraham Lincoln said it best, "Am I not destroying my enemies when I make friends of them?" What's Your Story? Using Stories to Persuade the Affluent "To be a person is to have a story to tell." ~Isaac Dennison What's all the fuss about 'The Secret'? Here's a sure sign of having made it to the collective consciousness: What Are You Full Of? When interacting with our affluent prospects and clients we need to exude confidence and self assuredness. We need to really show them what we're made of. There's a point, however, where confidence becomes over confident and assuredness becomes arrogance. These are not good qualities in a sales professional. Competence, self assurance, and confidence are excellent things to be full of. Using the Law of Resonance I heard an interesting story about the law of resonance that I want to share with you. The Law of Resonance is a very similar concept to the law of attraction, but has some distinct differences. The Law of Attraction, as is widely known, is the universal law that determines what you attract into your life based on what you're putting out there. Using the Forbidden to Persuade 'Forbid us something, and that thing we desire.' - Geoffrey Chaucer Using Criteria to Find Your Prospect's Hot Button "People are generally better persuaded by the reasons which they have themselves discovered than by those which have come into the mind of others." --Blaise Pascal (1623 - 1662) Unthinkable Persuasion There's a bumper sticker I saw recently that said, "Don't believe everything you think." Ironically, I found this oddly thought provoking. Something about it resonated with me. There's something to the idea that thinking is a little bit overrated. Unstick Your Thoughts With Attitude I AM YOUR ATTITUDE! I AM YOUR MASTER. I can make you rise or fall. I can make you a success or failure. I can work for or against you. I control your feelings and actions. I can make your heart sing with happiness. I can make you wretched, dejected, or morbid. I can make you angry and resentful. I can make you lonely, discouraged or depressed. I can make you sick, listless. I can be a shackle, heavy and burdensome. I can be a prism's hue, dancing bright and colorful. I can be nurtured and grown to be beautiful. I can never be removed, only replaced. I AM YOUR ATTITUDE! (author unknown) Unselfconscious Affluence Of course, we didn't all grow up financially comfortable. Several of my most successful students are real rags to riches stories gaining their vast financial successes through single-minded perseverance, education, hard work, intention and a little luck. Two Sides of the Same Coin "You will make more friends in a week by getting yourself interested in other people than you can in a year by trying to get other people interested in you." --Arnold Bennett Too Much To Choose From Toothpaste. It's an everyday necessity (hopefully!!), something that everyone needs. And yet, I noticed myself in a grocery store recently confronted with what felt like a very daunting task--how to choose from the dozens of brands, flavors, sizes of toothpaste available. Why do we need so many flavors--cinnamon, spearmint, fennel, wintergreen, strawberry, bubblegum, berry? Too Much Choice This has happened to me. Maybe it's because I don't normally do the grocery shopping. I've gone into the supermarket or drug store for a tube of toothpaste and found myself confronted with three or four dozen varieties of toothpaste. Why? It's a fairly simple substance. We use it every day, hopefully twice. So why are there so many to choose from? We've got cream paste, gel, gel with sparkles, whitening toothpaste, some with baking soda, others for sensitive gums. There's toothpastes for kids, n To Be (Sneaky) or Not to Be (Sneaky) Recently a student of mine posted a comment about my use of the relationship between teacher and student in an example of presupposition. They suggested, with a wink and a smiley face, that maybe I was being a little sneaky in using the example in a persuasive way. Three of a Kind: Repetition as Persuasion "Rhythm is something you either have or don't have, and when you have it, you have it all over." -Elvis Presley The Use of Scapegoats In Persuasion "United We Stand". For a while there nearly every other car in the country had a bumper sticker appealing to us to stand united, implicitly suggesting that this was our only salvation, because what happens when we don't stand united? That's right. We fall divided. The Upside of Inoculations We all had them as children -- those painful shots that prevented all sorts of nasty diseases. Now that we're grown ups, we know why we needed them, but when we were little kids, it didn't make any difference because the only thing we understood was that they hurt and left us sort. The Synergy of Affluence I'm so excited about a fairly recent addition to my coaching club: one-on-one calls with my students. These calls give us an opportunity to get into all kinds of things, from persuasion, affluence, and specialized help for specific areas where there might be struggle, to more spiritual matters. It seems like I'm getting as much out of these calls as my students. The Structuring of Reality "I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy." -Tom Waits The Self Fulfilling Prophesy of Breath "Simply breathe - deeply and often, and whatever you do, don't stop breathing!" --Cheryl Lynne Rubbo This is a great exercise in leading your affluent prospects and clients and taking full credit for something they do every day, something so basic and primal that three minutes without it would kill them. I'm talking, of course, about breathing. The Power of Need: Persuading Utilizing Your Prospect's Needs "Nothing has more strength than dire necessity." ~ Euripides The Persuasion of Isolation A documentary came out late last year called Jonestown: The Life and Death of People's Temple. It's the history, through photographs, film clips, recordings and interviews with survivors, of the cult leader Jim Jones and the eventual mass murder/"suicide" of 913 members of the People's Temple in Guyana. The Martian's Guide To American Politics Indulge me for a moment while I veer off into the world of fantasy for a moment. The world of make believe, our crazy political world from a martian's perspective. The Function of Gaslighting Here's a great example of a powerful strategy called gaslighting and how to use it in your persuasive situations with the affluent... The Frame of Beginning Beginnings are everywhere all the time. Everything has a beginning, middle and end. And when we begin with clarity and intention, it sets our path for what we can expect. Sitting down to start a presentation with a new client or prospect, how do you begin? The Final Four: Linguistic Pitfalls Part Two Seems like some of my readers are paying attention and that's awesome. I wrote part one of this article a while back. It talks about eight common and avoidable pitfalls we have in language. In the article I wrote about 'but', 'if', 'try', and 'might' and how these words dilute the power of our language and dull our ability to persuade. Well, a few of my more observant readers noticed that if there are eight pitfalls and I only cited four, there must be four more traps out there with the potentia The Courage to Master Your Fears "Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear-not absence of fear."--Mark Twain The Continuums of Persuasion: Keys to Your Prospect's Particulars Recently I heard a pretty funny joke: 'I have the idea that one person's dream is another person's nightmare. For example, it's my dream to sleep with Cindy Crawford. I'll bet you anything that would be her nightmare.' The Consequences of Refusing to Persuade "No oppression is so heavy or lasting as that which is inflicted by the perversion and exorbitance of legal authority." --Joseph Addison The Benefits of Organization "Three Rules of Work: Out of clutter find simplicity; From discord find harmony; In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity." -Albert Einstein The Art of Procrastination "We shall never have more time. We have, and always had, all the time there is. No object is served in waiting until next week or even until tomorrow. Keep going... Concentrate on something useful." --Arnold Bennett The Art of Change 'Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.' --Albert Einstein The 'Misery is Not Miserly' Effect The John F. Kennedy School for Government at Harvard University recently released a study that found that even momentary sadness causes people to increase spending. Superstition As Persuasion When a person sneezes, we say 'God bless you'. That's a superstition. It started in the Middle Ages when it was thought that the devil could enter a person when unguarded, such as in the midst of a sneeze. If someone said the magic words, 'God bless you', immediately after the sneeze, then this unfortunate demonic possession could be avoided. Sugar is Essential: Reframing or Lying? I recently came across a banner ad on the internet that read: "Skip artificials. Go natural. Sugar: sweet by nature. Only 15 calories per teaspoon." Storytelling Persuasion 'Facts and figures are forgotten. Stories are retold.' -Jeffrey Gitomer Storytelling for Quick Rapport You're face-to-face with a new prospect. They know very little about you, about the kind of person you are, and maybe they've got some defenses that you're going to have to overcome before trust can be established. Starting from the Beginning I've said it before, and I'll say it many times: Persuasion is first and foremost the study of human nature. And despite the things that are understandable about human nature, we are still very intricate and complex creatures. If all things were equal, there would still be some people who excel and others who get stuck. Softening up Your Prospects There's something I'm curious about. . . Social Positioning To Persuade The Affluent "Do not worry about holding high position; worry rather about playing your proper role." ~Confucius So Much Persuasion: Ways to Learn One of my newer students asked me on a recent call, "Kenrick, how are you able to keep track of all of the different language patterns and persuasion techniques that you know and use? I mean, each time we're on one of these coaching calls, it seems like you're not only using new techniques, but combining two or three or more techniques at once. Sometimes I can't even remember the first step. How can I remember to remember?' Slipping Into Our Prospect's Skin Harper Lee wrote in "To Kill a Mockingbird", "You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view...until you climb into his skin and walk around in it." We've all heard that you can't truly know someone until you walk a mile in his shoes. . . .well, this technique is another figurative exploration in working with the energy of our prospects. Sidestepping Logic to Get To The Boss: The Unconscious Mind "Logic: The art of thinking and reasoning in strict accordance with the limitations and incapacities of the human misunderstanding." ~ Ambrose Bierce Shut Your Trap I realize this isn't a new news story, but in terms of persuasion, and knowing when to talk and when not to talk, it's a perfect illustration. Selling Through Future Pacing Future pacing is a phenomenal strategy that reminds your prospect of all the reasons they made the decision to purchase or sign up with you, and transfers all of those reasons to the future, reminding them why, through triggers and signals that you will have installed. Self Persuasion Through Organization If you're anything like me, you're a very busy person. Not only am I busy with regular things--teaching, family, health maintenance--I'm also in the midst of a moving, requiring an added list of what needs to be done. It's hard to believe how much has to be done in a day and because this is on my mind, I'm inspired to write more on the topic of organization as I believe it has helped keep me on even footing in a time of change. Seeing What Sticks: The Old Fashioned Way to Sell How do you know when your pasta is done cooking? You take one noodle and throw it up against the wall. If it sticks, it's done. The old-fashioned sales technique of 'features and benefits' makes me think of throwing a whole pot of noodles against the wall to see what sticks. Why not narrow it down to your client's criteria instead of taking a shot in the dark and throwing everything you can at it? Returning to Bondage "The average age of the world's greatest civilizations has been two hundred years. These nations have progressed through this sequence: From bondage to spiritual faith; from spiritual faith to great courage; from courage to liberty; from liberty to abundance; from abundance to selfishness; from selfishness to complacency; from complacency to apathy; from apathy to dependence; from dependency back again into bondage." --Sir Alex Fraser Tyler (1742-1813) Scottish jurist and historian Resolutions Yup. It's that time of year again. Fresh starts, new beginnings, an opportunity to recreate ourselves anew. . . I love welcoming a new year with hope and optimism. I love to set out a game plan for the upcoming year. The New Year's resolution is a concept devoted to self improvement and I am relentless about self improvement. Reframing Obstacles Into Opportunities "It still holds true that man is most uniquely human when he turns obstacles into opportunities." --Eric Hoffer Pumping Up Your Persuasion Muscle I'm a new man. Over the last few years I've shed over one hundred and forty pounds of unwanted fat. I have a new attitude toward food and have learned to love the exercising. Presupposition and Persuasion At the core of presupposition is the idea that we can assume a mental position or thought which our prospects or clients must take for granted in order for everything else that we say to make sense without us actually having to name the core concept. Pitching The Pitch, Ditching The Script "The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sells itself." - Peter F. Drucker Picking and Choosing: Power Persuasion Metaphors I understand that the concept of 'energy' seems a bit new-age to some folks. Personally, I find it to be an integral part of understanding the 'self'. Understanding the self, is the first step in learning persuasion. Persuasion Through Base Desires This is a subject that's near and dear to my heart. I've been exploring it over the last year and a half and have had some tremendous results with self persuasion and self mastery in this arena. Persuasion Continuums: The Key To Your Prospect's Particulars I heard a joke recently that I thought was pretty funny. 'I have the idea that one person's dream is another person's nightmare. For example, it's my dream to sleep with Cindy Crawford. I'll bet you anything that would be her nightmare.' Persuasion Continuums II: Getting In Deeper In the first article of this series, "Persuasion Continuums" I started to describe one of the slickest persuasion tools around. I'm going to take it a little further here. Persuasion And Your Brain "The existence of forgetting has never been proved: We only know that some things don't come to mind when we want them." ~ Friedrich Nietzsche Persuasion and Focus Here's an understatement for you: we live in a world of distractions. In every facet of life we are bombarded. As I sit here typing, for example, I'm getting 'new e-mail' alerts, my assistant is instant messaging me, my kids and dog want to play, I'm thirsty, the phone is ringing. . . you get the point. Just writing one paragraph can be exhausting when there are so many things dividing ones attention. Persuading with The Thirty Six Chinese Stratagem "So it is said that if you know your enemies and know yourself, you will win a hundred times in a hundred battles. If you only know yourself, but not your opponent, you win one and lose the next. If you do not know yourself or your enemy, you will always lose." -Ancient Chinese Proverb Persuading with the Awareness Pattern "The moment one gives close attention to anything, even a blade of grass, it becomes a mysterious, awesome, indescribably magnificent world in itself." -Henry Miller Persuading Personally There are certain cultural norms and rules of decorum people are expected to adhere to in society and in business contexts specifically. I am of the mind that rules are meant to be bent, if not broken entirely. Persuade With The Temporal Loop Pattern The language pattern is a powerful technique for getting what you want. The 'temporal pattern loop' is especially potent in persuasion. Persuade the Affluent Through Embedded Suggestions "Persuasion is often more effectual than force." -Aesop Persistence Here's a quote by Dale Carnegie. "Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all." Patient Attention As a child, I spent a few years living on my grandfather's farm where I helped him with all of the work a farmer does. One of my favorite farm activities was helping him plant little hybrid trees. Obstacles Into Opportunities "It still holds true that man is most uniquely human when he turns obstacles into opportunities." --Eric Hoffer Negating Words: But I really like you, but. . . Manifesting Your Desires with Paper Seeds When I was young I lived on my grandpa's farm and he taught me some very important lessons. Another of the lessons had to do with the Biblical verse, 'As you sow so shall ye reap.' Loops: Language Patterns for Persuasion Persuasion is made up of a lot of things and one of the most powerful techniques is the language pattern. The temporal pattern loop is one of my favorites. Listen to This "It is the province of knowledge to speak, and it is the privilege of wisdom to listen." -- Oliver Wendell Holmes Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire Under the heading of 'human nature' comes lying. Humans lie. Period. Big lies, small lies, lies to spare feelings, lies to spare trouble. Learning Persuasion I had a student ask me recently, "Kenrick, how do you keep track of all of these persuasion strategies? Every time we have a conference call or seminar, you pull out another technique adding to the dozens and dozens of techniques we've already learned. I can't even remember to use the 'unconscious hello'." Layers of Complexity in Life and Persuasion: I Am An Onion I love metaphors. And one metaphor that has been especially potent for me lately has been that of an onion. A core component of The Cleveland Method deals with an understanding of our own core drives and unconscious motivations. It's by focusing inward that we can genuinely understand others. Larry Craig's Incongruency The movie 'The Usual Suspects' has a great interrogation scene. Keeping it Simple: Persuasion for Beginners "Go confidently in the direction of your dreams! Live the life you've imagined. As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler."-Henry David Thoreau Jumping Off the Bandwagon Phew! Boy, are things getting pricey. If we don't feel it, at least we've noticed it. Food is more expensive because delivering the food has become really expensive because gas prices are insanely inflated because we're heading into summer so that fear of scarcity is being amped up and . . . well, it's pretty darn complicated, isn't it? My point, things are expensive. I Just Can't Help Myself: Framing The Third and Fourth Taboos Framing is an amazing persuasion tool which I continue to explore and in this article, I've chosen some pretty volatile topics to make a pretty powerful point. How to Stifle Your Prospect's Inner Critics Critical judgment. . . it's an obstacle for us as sales professionals and persuaders. Our main goal is shutting down the inner critics of the people we're selling our products or services to. This can be accomplished by getting them out of their lives and showing them what could be, something bigger and better. How to Persuade From Inside A Pink Bubble "It is the pervading law of all things organic and inorganic, Of all things physical and metaphysical, Of all things human and all things super-human, Of all true manifestations of the head, Of the heart, of the soul, That the life is recognizable in its expression, That form ever follows function. This is the law." ~Louis Sullivan How to Maintain Good Boundaries in Rapport "It is the business of thought to define things, to find the boundaries; thought, indeed, is a ceaseless process of definition. It is the business of art to give things shape." -Vance Palmer How to Drink from a Fire Hose Every year around this time, I start a new cycle of classes and as usual, I've got some eager, excited, anticipating students, many of whom will (I can already tell) work themselves into a bit of a frenzy wanting to soak up as much persuasion as possible in a short period of time. As one client put it, "I kind of feel like I'm drinking water out of a fire hose." How The Media Persuades "The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself." -Friedrich Nietzsche Hopping Into Someone Else's Skin You've heard the saying; you can't know someone until you've walked a mile in their shoes. This is a technique on how to gain rapport by jumping into another person, stepping in, sliding in, moving in, being in that person, figuratively walking a mile in their shoes. Harper Lee wrote in To Kill a Mockingbird, "You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view...until you climb into his skin and walk around in it." History--It's all Frames "If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail." --Abraham H. Maslow Gut Check: Calibrating With Yourself Intuition is defined as "the immediate apprehension of an object by the mind without the intervention of any reasoning process" [Oxford English Dictionary]. Good Habits Out of Bad Habits... they come in all forms. Most people think of habits as the irritating things you wish you didn't "have" to do, fingernail biting, knuckle cracking, compulsive snacking, cigarette smoking. Of course smoking is more of a psychological/physical need that is satisfied by another cigarette, so is a little bit more than a habit. Going The Extra Mile for Your Affluent Clientèle I saw an article recently about the Ritz Carlton Hotel. It's a perfect example of what needs to be done in order to court and cater to (and persuade) an affluent client base. This is exactly the way to keep your clients interested and involved with you and your product or service. Getting Touchy Feely Here's part three in the four part series of articles about the representational systems of communication. Previously I wrote an overview of the different systems and how we can use these to gain rapport for easier persuasion and then went into more detail about visual language. Well, with a title containing the words 'touchy feely' this can only be about kinesthetic language, words that describe things in a way so as to be touching and feeling. Getting Into The Flow "The real 'haves' are they who can acquire freedom, self-confidence, and even riches without depriving others of them. They acquire all of these by developing and applying their potentialities. On the other hand, the real 'have nots' are they who cannot have aught except by depriving others of it. They can feel free only by diminishing the freedom of others, self-confident by spreading fear and dependence among others, and rich by making others poor." - Eric Hoffer Getting Grateful "It is necessary, then, to cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you, and to give thanks continuously. And because all things have contributed to your advancement, you should include all things in your gratitude." -Wallace D. Wattles, The Science of Getting Rich or Financial Success Through Creative Thought Framing Out of Fear: Islamophobia Prejudice and fear, bigotry and racism exist all around us. Whether you buy into the existence of it or not, we live in a world that has some ingrained phobias and -isms. Race, sex, class, size, religion. . . some people, maybe not you, maybe not me, but some people, believe that they are superior over or have a hatred or fear of another race, gender, religion, etc. Frame, Reframe My transcriptionist lived in New Orleans until August 28, 2005, the day before Hurricane Katrina hit. She and her boyfriend and their four cats evacuated with two cars full of valuables and art and 'irreplaceables'. They rode out the storm in Tennessee in a pet friendly hotel. Exploring the Unknown with Curiosity We are born ready to suck up as much information as we possibly can. The world around us is an endless source of fascination and curiosity. And as we grow, and if we have our base needs met, we soon come to the point of requiring more--the process of self-actualization. Empathy and Persuasion When we become the ultimate empathizer, we are able to identify with, understand, and respond to other's experiences. 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 st Don't Be a Sales Zombie Lately I've been updating my computer system. Again. And this requires occasional trips to the local computer chain store. For the most part, I'm in and out in a few minutes, knowing exactly what I want and need. But when I'm looking for a more expensive piece of equipment, I have an experience I call, "Attack of the Sales Zombies'. Do You Need A Swift Kick in the Butt? I've struggled with my weight my whole life. As far back as I can remember, I've felt bad about it. I was stuck in a body that wasn't what I wanted, that didn't fit with how I really saw myself and to me, it represented a weakness. Andrew Carnegie once said, "People who are unable to motivate themselves must be content with mediocrity, no matter how impressive their other talents." In my heart and mind, I felt this struggle was keeping me from self mastery and frustrated the heck out of me.
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