Maximize Your Influence

We are firm believers that we all have greatness within us. We believe that we each have within ourselves unwritten books, un-started businesses, brilliant ideas, great inventions, charitable ideas, and untapped energies. But sometimes we have a hard time knowing exactly what our purpose is. We may fill many roles—husband or wife, father or mother, school board member, coach, employee, or community advocate. How do we know which roles will give us the greatest joy and satisfaction? First and foremost, most of us would agree that investing in loving and fulfilling relationships with family and friends is most important. It is a critical part of emotional health and well-being. Beyond this fundamental basis, however, what is it that you live for? What is your purpose and passion in life? Where do your interests and gifts and talents lie? What is your mission in life? Dare to dream big. Have a purpose that will make getting up in the morning a pleasant task. Know that you are going to become what you want and get what you dream. Don't create a lifeless or unexciting purpose. Many people already know exactly what their purpose is. If you don't know, now is the time to find out. Great persuaders have tapped into and are using their purpose. Understand that for many, the self-discovery process is like sculpting. All you see at first is a big rock and you're not sure what masterpiece lies inside. You know something is there, but you don't yet know how you'll get it out.

The Hostile Prospect This person disagrees with you and may even actively work against you. For a hostile prospect, use these techniques: Find common beliefs and establish a common ground. Use appropriate humor to break the ice. Don't start the presentation with an attack on their position. You are only trying to persuade on one point; don't talk about anything else that could trigger disagreement. Because of your differences, they will question your credibility. Increase your credibility with studies from experts or anything that will support your claim. They will try to find reasons to not like you; don't give them any. Don't tell them you are going to try to persuade them. Express that you are looking for a win-win outcome rather than a win-lose situation. Show them you've done your homework. Respect their feelings, values, and integrity. Use logical reasoning as clearly and as carefully as possible. Use the Law of Connectivity and the Law of Balance.

Have you ever noticed how some people can captivate, inspire, and influence others without effort?  Other people instantly like them and want to be around them. Some individuals can enter a room and everyone notices. They seem always to get what they want because the people around them want to give it to them. How do they command such instant attention and influence everyone they meet? This is the power of charisma. Charisma is a vital persuasion and life skill that can and must be mastered if you are going to influence others. People often ask me what is the most important tool or skill in the entire influence toolbox? What is the one thing I can learn to achieve maximum success? The answer is simple. If there were one skill to master out of all the tools of persuasion and influence, it is charisma. It gives you the quickest return on your time and dramatically increases your success and income. This vital success skill permeates every aspect of your life. Your career, your relationships, your ability to influence, and your income are all related to your ability to radiate charisma. Have you ever wondered why two people with the same education, the same contacts, the same IQ, and the same experience get dramatically different results from their lives? One enjoys massive success while the other one is barely making ends meet. Some call this simple luck, but when you have charisma you are guaranteed to have good luck. Imagine your success in life when you can automatically get others to willingly do what you want them to do, beg to do it, like to do it, and tell all their friends that they should also do it. Charisma is the ability to empower and persuade others to believe in you, trust in you, and want to be influenced by you. You captivate and motivate them. You help them see themselves in the future carrying out your vision. They are moved and energized by your passion and enthusiasm. They are magnetized and driven by your charisma. They are lifted and inspired by your optimism and expectations. In essence, you’re a source of empowerment, encouragement, and inspiration.

Humor can be a powerful tool to create rapport. Humor makes the persuader seem more friendly and accepting. Humor helps gain attention, helps you create rapport, and makes your message more memorable. It can relieve tension, enhance relationships, and motivate people.  Appropriate use of humor increases trust in your audience.   Humor can also distract your audience from negative arguments or grab their attention if they are not listening.  Humor diverts attention away from the negative context of a message, thereby interfering with the ability of listeners to carefully scrutinize it or engage in counterarguments. If listeners are laughing at the jokes, they may pay less attention to the content of a message. Humor can "soften up" or disarm listeners.  Humor connects you with your audience and increases their attention to your message.   Humor must be used cautiously, however. If used inappropriately, it can be offensive and may cause your audience to turn against you. Humor should only be used as a pleasant, but moderate distraction. As a rule of thumb, if you are generally not good at telling jokes, don't attempt it. Be sure that you have good material. Non-funny humor is not only ineffective, but irritating. Modify your humor so that it is appropriate for your audience.   Another aspect of humor is the smile.  A smile is free, generates a great first impression, and shows happiness, acceptance, and confidence. Your smile shows that you are pleased to be where you are, or happy to meet this person. As a result, they become more interested in meeting you. Smiling also conveys a feeling of acceptance, which makes your listener more trusting of you. It has been shown that sales representatives who smiled during the sales process increased their success rate by 20 percent. However, as with traditional humor, use a smile appropriately.

Social Validation and Marketing The more a brand is advertised, the more popular and familiar it is perceived to be. We as consumers somehow infer that something is popular simply because it is advertised. When people are buying gifts for others, social proof is one of the most effective techniques that a salesclerk can use."   Many salespeople find great success in telling clients that a particular product is their "best-selling" or "most popular" on hand because social validation increases their credibility of the product. When customers feel that something is more popular, they spend more money to acquire it, even if there is no proof other than the salesperson's word. So it is with advertising: Asserting that a product is in super-high demand or that it is the most popular or fastest selling, etc., seems to provide proof enough. When consumers perceive a product is popular, that's often all they need to go out and purchase it. The creation and use of social validation is rampant: Clubs make their spots look like "the place to be" by allowing huge waiting lines to congregate outside their facilities, even when the place is practically empty inside. Salespeople often recount the many other people who have purchased the item in question. That's why referrals are some of your best prospects! Referrals are your greatest source of social validation.  Sales and motivation consultant Cavett Robert said it best: "Since 95 percent of the people are imitators and only 5 percent initiators, people are persuaded more by the actions of others than by any proof we can offer."

Your environment and the expectations of that environment should be persuasive. There is a concept called the Phillip Zimbado’s Broken Window Theory. This theory suggests that a building full of broken windows will cause people to assume that no one cares for the building or its appearance. This in turn will spur more vandalism and more broken windows. In other words, the environment's condition gives suggestions that lead people to hold certain assumptions, and people then act on those assumptions. The broken windows invite greater damage and crime.   Zimbardo did a study illustrating this point.  He left his car out on the street in Palo Alto California.  The first week the car blended in with all the other cars and nothing happened to it.  After the first week he broke one on the windows of the car and left it on the street.  Just by the one broken window he found that it dramatically increases the chances that it would be vandalized. In his book, The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell uses an example of the Broken Window Theory as he explains the New York City subway clean-up. The subway system was in dire need of rebuilding—a multibillion-dollar endeavor. With the system about to collapse, the focus was understandably on issues like reducing crime and improving subway reliability. As a consultant hired by the New York Transit Authority, George Kelling urged officials to utilize the Broken Window Theory. They were hired to clean up the subways, they immediately assigned people to start cleaning up all the graffiti. Removing the graffiti seemed to be of such little consequence compared to everything else there was to worry about, but Gunn was insistent. In his own words: The graffiti was symbolic of the collapse of the system. When you looked at the process of rebuilding the organization and morale, you had to win the battle against graffiti. Without winning that battle, all the management reforms and physical changes just weren't going to happen. We were about to put out new trains that were worth about ten million bucks apiece, and unless we did something to protect them, we knew just what would happen. They would last one day and then they would be vandalized.  The entire anti-graffiti campaign took years, but finally, the incidence of graffiti subsided. In another study, volunteers were asked to participate in an experiment on prison environments. Half of the volunteers posed as prison workers, while the other half posed as prison inmates. The results were astounding. Previously tested to be psychologically sound people, the participants rapidly became more and more hostile, crude, rebellious, and abusive—both those acting as inmates and as guards! One "prisoner" became so hysterical and emotionally distressed that he had to be released. The study was supposed to last two weeks, but was called off after only six days! 

Touch is another powerful part of body language—important enough to devote a whole section to it alone. Touch can be a very effective psychological technique. Subconsciously, most of us like to be touched; it makes us feel appreciated and builds rapport. It is true, though, that we do need to be aware and careful of a small percentage of the population who dislikes being touched in any way. In most instances, however, touch can help put people at ease and make them more receptive to you and your ideas. Touch increases influence.  When you are able to touch your prospect they usually becomes more agreeable, enhances mood and increases the chances they will agree and do what you are asking. Touch can create a positive perception. Touch carries with it favorable interpretations of immediacy, similarity, relaxation, and informality. In one research study, librarians did one of two things to university students: either they did not touch the person at all during the exchange or they made light, physical contact by placing a hand over the student's palm. Invariably, those students who were touched during the transaction rated the library service more favorably than those who were not touched at all.  Waiters/waitresses who touched customers on the arm when asking if everything was okay received larger tips and were evaluated more favorably than those waiters who didn't touch their customers. Touch also induces customers to spend more time shopping in stores. In one study, physical contact on the part of salespeople induced customers to buy more and to evaluate the store more favorably. We know that certain areas of the body can be freely touched while other areas are off limits. Safe areas of contact include the shoulders, forearms and hands, and sometimes the upper back. This all depends on the situation, the culture and relationship between the two parties prior to the touch.

To maintain order of the world, our brains link objects, gestures, and symbols with our feelings, memories, and life experiences. We mentally associate ourselves with such things as sights, sounds, colors, music, and symbols. These associations create quick subconscious triggers.  The feelings you generate can help or hurt your ability to persuade.   Power Persuaders take advantage of association triggers to evoke positive feelings and thoughts that correspond with the message they are trying to convey. In this sense, you, as a persuader, can actually arouse a certain feeling in your audience by finding the right association key to unlock their door. Associations are not the same for all people—obviously, each person and culture has their own set of triggers. However, once you understand the general rules, you can find the right associations to match any situation. Why do you think restaurants decorate a certain way, have their lighting just right, and play certain types of music? All these things are defined in the Law of Association. 

The Law of Scarcity plays a large role in the persuasion process.  Opportunities are always more valuable and exciting when they are scarce and less available.  We want to be the ones to own the rare items or to get the last widget on the shelf.  The more the scarcity of an item increases, the more the item increases in value, and the greater the urge to own it. Whenever choice is limited or threatened, the human need to maintain a share of the limited commodity makes us crave it even more.  Scarcity increases the value of any product or service.  Scarcity drives people to action, making us act quickly for fear of missing out on an opportunity.  Potentially losing something before we’ve even had an opportunity to possess it drives people to action.  We don’t want to miss out on anything we could have had.  We want to get around any restriction placed upon us.  We feel uptight and want back our freedom.  This causes tension and unrest.  The Law of Scarcity  not only pertains to physical products, but also to time, information, price, and knowledge.

For this episodes article, Kurt and Steve discuss the top techniques of hostage negotiators.  Admit it, you're thinking of the movie "The Negotiator" all of the sudden.  Now that we got that out of the way, we can actually talk about negotiation.  While hostage negotiation can seem intimidating and have very high stakes, there are some critical lessons that we can learn that can apply to even the most seemingly mundane of everyday business interactions. Based on listener questions that have been coming in, it's time for a rapport tune up!  As Kurt likes to say, a lot of times closing skills are like trying to get a kiss after a bad date.  All the slick one liners in the world won't matter if you haven't developed decent rapport.  On this episode, Kurt and Steve discuss rapports basic components that are sure to make you a rapport building machine!