Art of the deal

By Steve Nachwalter

Based on the book

“Get Them to Listen, Get Them to Buy”

About the company: http://www.stevenachwalter.com/

For questions: [email protected]

Article by the author: http://www.articlesbase.com/motivational-articles/motivation-

tackling-fuel-1614988.html

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Everybody is buying and everybody is selling

Every buying decision starts with emotions then backed up with logic.

People buy what they want not what they need. They buy what they emotionally
connect with.

People buy because they like you, and have a connection with you.

There are some unconscious connections that make them buy from you.

There is a difference between satisfaction and loyalty. You should have customers that
no matter what they will stay with you.

The more you try to sell, the less you will sell.

People don’t like choices; they hire experts to do it for them. We use experts to tell us
that we made the right decision. We need “approval”. You need to believe in the
product so you can give the advice.

The brain make” internal representations” your mind deletes lots of unneeded
information. Use the least amount of words. The brain cares about pictures not words
and numbers. When using a slogan use the minimum words. People focus on the
content / key material they care about and delete the rest of the conversation.
Decide what is the key point, that the brain is least likely to delete, and start with it.

Example: can you remember the following items: pencil, duck, cuffs, boat sail, fat man
with a hat, golf, desk lamp, skate, hat rack, Indian. Nobody can remember them all but

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if you relate them to the number 1 to 10 (as they look like them) you can even
remember them backwards too.

“Self fulfilling prophecy” if you believe you will fail, you will.

Nobody make a bad decision, but they use the available information to make a
decision. Don’t criticize your customer choices.

It is not you vs the customers

Unless you say the key words that get the customer attention, they will tune you out

The brain takes info through the senses then filter them through “generalizing,
distortions, deletions…etc). Example of generalizing is that once you have sense one
bathtub you can recognize any bathtub even if it is so different in shape and size.
Example of distortion, you can be very good at something but you think you are not or
vice versa.

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You need to let your customers save face and that they made the right decision at the
time based on the given information. Once they are embarrassed, they will not connect
with you.

The NLP, Neuro linguistic programming, http://www.nlpu.com/whatnlp.htm, explains

how and why people formulate behavior. Our internal representation pops up your
behavior. We need to make sure that the customers filter will not get in the way.

Customers close a sale because of how it makes them feel.

People are afraid to close deals.

Everybody likes to buy but don’t like to be sold

We learn more from failure than from success. Learn how to loose

We are 4 times more likely to avoid fun rather than embrace pleasure.

To close a sale, people will respond to avoiding pain / threat / danger rather than
responding to gaining pleasure / benefits...etc.

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People are too busy avoiding the pain of failure and getting out of their comfort zone.

Change is a necessity

You need a catch phase to get the attention of the buyer.

When making cold calls, start with closing them on giving you time only. Don’t
push for the sale. Example: we have some product that can help your business and we
would like to have an appointment to explain it to you.

When some say they are not interested, don’t do any of the following:-

Argue with them, Pushing, Asking why they are not interested

Dumb friends make you laugh but we don’t ask them for their advice. We only ask
advice from friends who are smarter or as-smart as we are.

Try to sound like them. If they speak quickly or slowly, do as them. Use their
vocabulary. Words help people to connect with what you say.

How many ways can you say “I ate the cookie”? Your feelings and tone of voice
make this sentence sound and mean different things.

The choice of people words tells you what they are comfortable with. E.g. I don’t feel
good. I can’t digest that. People who speak slowly and deliberately are kinesthetic.

I can’t see your point. I want you to look at it. Visual people speak fast.

This sounds like a good idea. Auditory people speak average not too fast or too slow.

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 Because

As a child we are pre-conditioned to accept “because” from our parents’ even if it is

“because I said so’. Using the word because give us instant credibility and
compliance.

The copy machine experiment: in a line of people waiting to photo copy some actor
walks in with 5 pages and ask the front person to take their place to make copies
(without any explanation). The majority refused, only 26% said yes. Next experiment
was the actor asked the front person to take their place because he is in a hurry. 94%
said yes. The third time the actor said because I want to make a copy. Although the
reason is silly since that is what everybody else want too 93% said yes.

Element of Surprise

Element of surprise is what get them to say yes. It makes you gain compliance as
they don’t have defense ready.

The camel experience: tourist was having her photo taken when the tour guide jumped
next to her, and put his arm around her. After words she felt so offended. She was so
surprised by his action that she didn’t push his arm.

In another experiment an actor asked a man for directions then simply asked him for his
phone, keys and wallet. The man gave them to the actor who walked away with them.
The man stood there for a while just not sure what happened, then started to go to the
actor who gave them back to him. The actor asked for those items AGAIN, and the
man gave them back AGAIN.

Additionally an actor walks in a super market and paid for his items with blank white
papers. The cashier looked at them and accepted them. The same thing happened
when purchasing a $4,000 diamond ring.

These experiments didn’t work with 100% of subjects but it worked with the majority.

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 Contrast Principle

Experiment: if you bring in 3 buckets one has hot water, the second cold water, and the
3rd warm water. Put a hand in the cold, and the other in the hot. Then put both hands in
the warm water. Your feeling of the temperature in the warm bucket will be different on
both hands according to its previous experience with the hot or cold bucket

Another experiment is to get something that you normally feel its heavy, and another
item that is heavier. Carry the heaviest item first. Then carry the heavy item. The
heavy item will seem lighter.

Never tell your sales representatives that it is a tough sale.

Customers are not buying the product / service. They are buying you.

You need to sell yourself to your employees first. Prove it to them first.

Always sell the most expensive item first. Lower item prices seem less after words.

If someone walks in wanting to buy a suit a shirt and socks, you shouldn’t get them to
buy the soaks first. Close the sale on the suit first.

Add-ons increase revenue by 25%. Who said that fries goes with burgers? Someone
told us so. Add ons like discount cards, batteries, warranties. Examples are “do you
want fries with the” “do you want to supersize that, or extra cheese…etc” “Do you want
the 3 year warranty with that?”. When offering add-ons like warranty you offer the 3
year warranty before the 2 and 1 year warranty. How you deliver the add-ons is what
matters not just mentioning them like a robot or machine. Notice how the impulse items
(inexpensive items such as gum and candy) are placed by the cashier at the
supermarket

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Exercise: connect with the cashier at the kiosk or on-the-run. Say a meaningful thank
you and notice how their body language changes.

Human make concessions

The G. Gordon Linddy experiment: he was working with Nixon. He offered the
congress 2 very ridicules plans for approval one after another. Both plans were rejected
by the congress. The third time he presented his actual plan which was approved as it
sounded much more reasonable. The only ones who didn’t approve it, were the ones
who were not present during the first 2 proposals

If you ask a friend to lend you $2000 and he says no, then you ask for a $1000 he may
still say no, so when you ask for only $500 there is a good chance he will say yes. Or if
you ask your friend to help you moving, lend you his car or take you to the airport. He
will agree to take you to the airport.

Using the Reject and retreat technique make it more likely to get concessions

If you get the go-betweener to commit out loud, he will fight for and support you. It will
be uncomfortable for him to say no latter than it is to fight with his boss..

Try to find the real decision maker (DM).

The group mentality / social proof

People will make a decision to follow what other people do. They become compliant
with what other people do like in riots.

A lady was running in NY streets trying to escape a killer. Lots of people witnessed the
incident and none one of them tried to help. The reason was that they saw no one else
took action.

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People need a trigger to behavior. Therefore if you need help, such as having a heart
attack, people will tend to watch you and do nothing. You will need to address
someone in particular and ask him to help you. You need to wake them.

If you ask for help by giving directions like (call the police) we are more likely to get
help without risking people not responding to us.

Try it yourself, stand in the lobby of a hotel and look up. Watch how people will follow
you and look up in the same direction.

Milgram experiment

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment

http://www.experiment-resources.com/stanley-milgram-experiment.html

The Stanley Milgram Experiment was created to explain some of the concentration
camp-horrors of the World War 2 by Nazis. Many war-criminals claimed they were
merely following orders and could not be held responsible for their actions, in the trials
following the World War 2.

The psychologist Stanley Milgram created an electric ‘shock generator’ with 30

switches. The switch was marked clearly in 15 volt increments, ranging from 15 to 450
volts.

He also placed labels indicating the shock level, such as ‘Moderate’ (75-120 Volts) and
‘Strong’ (135-180 Volts). The switches 375-420 Volts were marked ‘Danger: Severe
Shock’ and the two highest levels 435-450, was marked ‘XXX’.

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40 subjects (males) were recruited via mail and a newspaper ad. They thought they
were going to participate in an experiment about ‘memory and learning’.

In the test, each subject was informed clearly that their payment was for showing up,
and they could keep the payment “no matter what happens after they arrive

Next, the subject (teacher) met an ‘experimenter’, the person leading the experiment,
and another person told to be another subject. The other subject was in fact a
confederate acting as a subject (learner). He was a 47 year old male accountant.

The subject (teacher) saw that the learner was strapped to a chair and electrodes were
attached. The subject was then seated in another room in front of the shock generator,
unable to see the learner. For every wrong answer the teacher is supposed to push a
switch of the generator and keep increasing to the maximum.

Many subjects showed signs of tension. 3 subjects had “full-blown, uncontrollable

seizures”. Although most subjects were uncomfortable doing it, all 40 subjects obeyed
up to 300 volts 25 of the 40 subjects continued to complete to give shocks until the
maximum level of 375 volts was reached. 65 % never stopped giving shocks. None
stopped when the learner said he had heart-trouble.

How could that be? We now believe that it has to do with our almost innate behavior
that we should do as told, especially from authority persons.

That is the idea behind celebrity endorsement for products. When we are buying an
expensive coach, we want a story behind it like king XXX has one of those.

Find out why people are buying from other competitors.

Find where your target customers go to, read, do…etc and target them.

Depending on the product consider giving extra service/items instead of a discount.

People need to feel that they won. Give them concession.

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What ruins a sale?

Overselling: too much info. It will seem as if you are not confident enough.

Too many choices

People want to do business with people like them.

Experiment: A guy find a wallet with a note saying that I found your wallet and
everything is there including your credit card and your $300. Most of the people who
found the wallet and read the note tried to continue the process of returning the
wallet. When the note was then written in a broken English (indicating he is a
foreigner), the subject didn’t feel they have to do as a foreigner was planning to do.

Reciprocity

I do something for you; you will feel obliged to do something for me. We are
programmed to not like those who don’t honor reciprocity. We want to give something
back for what we get.

There are different ways to reciprocity: make an agreement (sell you this for that) or
make an offer (give something for free before the deal) so they will feel they owe you
something

Before money was created, people used to exchange services and favors. Imagine
what would happen to someone who didn’t return the favor, would anyone do business
with him in the future?

When someone gives you something for free the obligate you to buy something.
Think of the free tea offered at the Egyptian bazaars. The sample cookie or
chocolate at sweet shops and bakeries. If you want to counteract that you give them a
ridicules low price that is unacceptable.

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Vance Packard experiment

http://www.answers.com/topic/vance-packard

At a supermarket a store sold 1000 LBS of cheese by offering a piece of cheese on a

tray and letting customers cut themselves a piece to try.

Regan Experiment 1971

He proved that providing a favor for someone increases the likelihood of gaining
compliance with a subsequent request.

The experiment was set as if 2 people are volunteered to grade some art work. One of
them is an actor. In the middle of the process, the actor excuse himself for few minutes.
When he came back he had a soda for himself and another for the other volunteer (the
subject). Latter at the end of the experiment, the actor asks the subject to buy some
raffle tickets from him. Most of the people did buy the tickets even those who didn’t like
the actor.

So always carry a can of soda.

Harri Krishna followers offer people on the street a rose and they pin it to their cloth.
Then they ask them for donations. People donate even those who throw the rose away
within seconds.

James & Botstein 1992 Incentive Effects on Response

They found that giving a candy with the bill increased the tip amount

When you put visa or master card logo on the bill people tend to tip 20% more even if
they pay cash. People psychologically feel they are not spending money when using
credit cards.

Berry & Kahouse 19987 discussed the effect of monetary incentive on the responsive
of mail survey. People were offered $20 check to complete questionnaires. 95% of

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those who completed the questionnaire cashed the check. Only 26% of those who
didn’t complete the questionnaire cashed it. The rest felt guilty to cash it.

If you are offered $5 before completion or $50 after completion what would you choose?
Most of the people actually prefer the $5??.

This idea is behind try it first pay latter concept, when people are offered a basket of
goods to use before they decide if they want to pay for it or not (detergence,
sweets...etc)

Give and take

When negotiating and your first offer is too high, you don’t have to drop your price
dramatically. A little can work. So from a 100 don’t offer 50, but offer 98..

You can also ask them to come back later for a better deal. Most of the people will
prefer to close the deal now rather than having to come again.

Exaggerate: if you need 5 ask for 15.

The Zoo chaperon story goes like the zoo was looking for volunteers so they would ask
the subject to come 6 days a week, then 3 days a week, then how about 6 hours for one
day. The subject will then find it easy to say yes to the 3rd option after rejecting the first
2.

The boy scouts would come and ask you to buy tickets for their musical party for $25,
which most of us would say no to. They would ask you how about a $1 chocolate which
you will feel easier saying yes to.

Referrals are a powerful tool, so if your product doesn’t suit a customer asks him/her for
referral to whom they think can use it.

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Presenting your price. Always present the highest items first. Offer the 3 year
warranty before the 2 and 1 year warranty. The suit before the shirt. That goes for
room rates and cars too. It makes the regular price seem more reasonable.

Always present price as the very last thing.

High price = high value. Low price is not why people buy but if the price is ridiculously
unjustified higher price, people will not buy. e.g the price of BMW is USA is 1/3 the price
in Egypt. So a USA citizen living in Egypt will not buy it.

Remember that there are no discounts on surgeries, lawyers as it might indicate low
quality. IN these cases we only want the best.

Dangerous choices: choices = over-thinking. The less the choices, the easier it is to
make a decision. Furniture stores in USA hold your order for three day as people
change their minds because they have too many choices.

We trust our doctors because they make decisions for us.

On dating you may meet a girl that you really like and she likes you. But when you
decide to check other options and meet other girls, you start to have too many options.
Then you can’t pick one as you ruined your focus as you have “perceived choices”.
The result you stay single.

Offer add-ons not replacements

3 choices is a good number.

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Get an expert to explain to him why he/she should do what you tell him. e.g some one
insists on getting the advanced course when he need the intermediate first. To him you
don’t know this much about the material yourself. But if you get the advance course
trainer to talk to him, he will accept it better.

Ask lots of questions to understand then offer 2-3 choices only.

People believe that if an expert said it, it must be true “most of dentist advice to use
Colgate toothpaste” “doctors advice to eat yogurt”.

UZAL ENT

One case involved a famous air force general named Uzal Ent whose copilot got sick
before a flight. Ent was assigned a replacement who was honored to be flying alongside
the famous general. During takeoff, Ent began singing to himself, nodding in time to a
song in his head. The new copilot interpreted the gesture as a signal to him to lift the
wheels. Even though they were going much too slowly to fly, he raised the landing gear,
causing the plane to drop immediately onto its belly. In the wreck, a propeller blade
sliced into Ent’s back, rendering him a paraplegic. When they took the copilot’s
testimony, they asked him, “If you knew the plane wasn’t going to fly, why did you put
the gear up?”He said, “I thought the general wanted me to.”

Although the copilot knew that it was too soon, he followed, what he thought, the pilot
orders.

Foushee research on aviation1989

It was found that the crew usually will not correct the pilot even at the price of their
own life. The expert is too powerful. This reason was found to be the main reason
behind plans crashes.

Khan and Baron 1995 proved that we trust doctors, accountants, and lawyers

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So be an expert. Know your product inside out. Understand your prospect. Be ready
to handle objections. Being an expert about your product means you have confidence
that customers can’t win over you or stop you. Not that you will vomit all your
information.

Motivation

Think of someone you really like. Now think of someone you really don’t like. Check
how you felt the 1st and the 2nd time. There is a difference in how you feel about them.
The emotions they raise in you.

Think positively about yourself and your product.

Train our brain and you body language show it, and your customers will sense it. Try
to grab a mirror or tape yourself. Criticize yourself and correct what you do wrong.
You are a great judge of yourself. Nobody is perfect

Motion = Emotion

Focus on something you want that makes you feel good to keep yourself motivated.

Branding

Branding is the feeling you get when you hear the name of the product. It is how you
connect emotionally.

We want your customer to be loyal not satisfied (only). If you are thirsty any bottle of
water will make you satisfied but what you want is that your customer will only drink
your water no matter what. Branding is about loyalty.

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Decide what you want your brand to make them feel. Your customers need to trust
your brand by setting rules.

Use social proof: how long have you been in businesses, who are your clients? . Why
should a prospect customer become your customer? Use testimonials. Have referrals.
Train your sales to behave.

Ask customers what made them choose your product/ service to understand what
triggered their behavior. This also will allow your customer to talk. The more they talk
the more they will like you.

Win Back. Spend time to find out why they didn’t purchase and keep the relation even
when they don’t buy. As long as they still take your call.

If you are in a new area and want to choose a restaurant what do you do? You choose
a crowded restaurant.

Stay away from shortening you name. It is “Yellowpages” not “YP”.

Sell your brand to your employees and staff.

Remember:

 Find a way to use reciprocity

 Use the contrast theory
 Don’t burn the bridges if they say no
 Give and take
 Tape yourself
 Figure what motivate you
 People buy because they like you
 Be an expert. Understand it very well and be prepared for questions and
objections
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