Everyone is a salesperson, according to John Asher, sales and marketing consultant and author of the recently released book Close Deals Faster. “Sales,” writes Asher, “applies to anyone who understands that selling skills are part of being successful in any profession.”
As an event organizer, connecting with clients is the key to a successful business relationship. A particularly powerful way to sell your skills to clients is to use Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) — an advanced way of mirroring someone. “When highly influential people communicate with others, they match everything from the other person’s tone of voice, hand gestures, buzzwords, acronyms, and body language,” writes Asher. “Using this technique allows them to accomplish mirroring in a natural, unobtrusive way, quickly establishing uncommon rapport with little effort.”
Approximately 75 percent of individuals a person encounters in their lifetime will have a different personality from their own, according to Asher, so when it comes to the art of selling skills, this form of mirroring comes in handy. With these three mirroring techniques, event organizers can better connect with potential clients.
1. Tailor information to the client’s personality. “To effectively mirror a personality style that is different from your own, give the prospect the information that will most appeal to their personality style,” Asher writes. “This information might not be what you are naturally inclined to give based on your personality style.” For instance, if you base decisions on facts and statistics, you might prefer a data-driven pitch — but that might bore individuals who base their decisions in emotion.
2. Be mindful of your response speed. “Each personality style tends to favor a different speed in speech, movement, thinking, and action,” Asher writes. If you approach someone who is a fast decision-maker, talker, or thinker in a leisurely, methodical way, “it won’t take long before you lose the prospect’s interest,” Asher says.
3. Take your client’s personality temperature. “Each personality style has a degree of warmth or coolness in relating to other people based on their level of empathy,” notes Asher. If you are speaking with a warm personality who values close relationships, it would be wise to ask them about their family. However, when dealing with a cooler personality — someone not interested in getting personal — asking about their home life “can turn them off,” Asher writes.