It does not matter if you meeting someone you are selling to, someone you are buying from or even just someone you meet in the grocery store….Before you even open your mouth you need to know what kind of person you are about to talk to.
Recently we have been getting bids to do some work on our house. It is about time and we have some things that we just can’t do ourselves. One thing was that we needed a dead tree cut down. So we called several people to come over and tell us what we should do.
The first guy shows up in a brand new shiny truck. He was dressed like he never did a hard day’s work in his life. He was dressed nicely… to nicely. He began to tell us about his company and all the crews they had. He was nice enough but he was not really paying attention to what we wanted. His attitude was that he was doing us a favor by agreeing to help us out.
First thing I saw was the truck. My first thought “I am paying for that”. Right out of the gate I knew he would be the highest bid. I was right.
The next guy shows up and he was a working guy. My first impression was that he knew what he was talking about and that he would be the guy that showed up to do the work. Then he offered to save us money by cutting out his company and coming over on a weekend to do it himself. Oops. I don’t deal with dishonest people. His price was half the shiny truck guy but no way was I going to risk someone cutting down a tree that I didn’t trust.
Third guy. His truck was kind of beat up but it was also clean. It looked like that truck had seen some real work time. The guy who popped out of it was covered in dirt. He worked for a living. He apologized for being messy but he was close by and wanted to get to us as soon as we needed him to. He addressed a few things right away. They were insured and they would be able to get to it in the next few days. He did not even get to the price until he explained what he would do and why. Then he gave us the price and it was just a little above the rip off guy and about half of the shiny truck guy. He got the job. Not on price but on knowing what we wanted and needed. Then if gave us those things at a fair price not a cheap price.
We made the right decision because 2 days later we came home from the gym and the tree was down. We actually called them up to ask them how they wanted us to pay since we were not home. They said they always just bill people instead of having their crews be bill collectors for them.
BTW we still recommend them all the time. Chipper tree service BTW http://www.chipperllc.com/
The problem is that so many people have what they want to say and they say to everyone as if everybody had the same personality, interest and same goals.
1 What message are you sending with your appearance?
The shiny truck guy was sending the wrong message. He was not paying attention to us and our response to his message. He could have overcome it but instead he amplified it with his attitude. He did not notice that we were very casually dressed and would not be impressed by the image he was using for his business.
2 What question do you think they are asking themselves?
The guy we used listened to us and understood what questions we would have. He answered them before we even asked. He connected and talked with us. He could tell just by looking that we were not tree experts. So in a very disarming way he told us what needed to happen and why.
3 Where is their focus?
Rip off guy thought we were only interested in price. Shiny truck guy thought we were only interested in how successful their company was. The guy we used noticed that our main focus was on getting the job done right.
4 What position of power do they present? Dominant, equal, subordinate?
Shiny truck guy tried to me dominant to use and talked down to us as if we were stupid. Not a great sales strategy BTW. The guy we used was equal to us but supportive of what we needed to know.
We needed someone to be a leader and help us navigate this decision. We did not need a lecture and we did not need the lowest price.
5 How do they need to hear your message?
You can have the best business, idea or even social opportunity but if you deliver it in a way that the person you are talking to won’t accept or is not interested in then you are wasting your breath. Our guy delivered the message like he was talking to friends. He was easy and laid back but respected that we did not have all day to talk.
I realize that none of these people were sales people and what they did was just how they were and not learned from any training It is just a good example of how different these guys were.
I know this is all great but what does this mean to you?
I know there is at least one place in your life that you want to talk to someone and be effective. It could be getting a job. It could be making a sale. It could be managing employees. It could be asking for a date. It could be just getting decent service from a business. It might even be just giving a friend some advice you want them to take.
Just by doing any one of these things you could make a huge improvement in getting what you want.
This is the kind of thing that we teach at our Total Life Transformation Retreat.
If you are not moving at the pace you want to go in order to have the life you want then you need to make the decision that now is the time to start getting what you want.
http://www.essentialskillsseminars.com/
