Thursday 18 January 2007

If Only This Was My Office!

Is it just me or is this the best looking building in the country?

If you can't catch someone, do it yourself

I have heard of the Old Bill burying evidence but this is ridiculous.
Cut out the middleman and do it yourself.

I present...

The Old Bill Flytipping!










"Leave me alone love, you are obstructing police business"










"Bosh! Now to nick that bloke behind me for watching"

Monday 8 January 2007

The Raft of Knowledge

Have you ever read a post on here and wondered what it was about and then, for whatever mysterious reason, you started to think differently and realise that this is one of the most relevant posts to you?
I find that when I, think about the other possibilities these teachings will give you, and you open your mind, to me, its as if this is going to help take you to the next stage.
For all the people out there new to selling, NLP or to persuasion, the leap from newbie to Closer/PUA is a small but difficult leap. There are a lot of patterns, exercises, beliefs, understandings and attitudinal work that you need to take on board.
There are lots of people who have a wealth of knowledge and there is lot to be said for reading tons of info before even thinking of doing something yourself.
In my career I have trained people in how to sell. That's what I do. I teach people how to Firewalk, Glasswalk and smash wood Karate style. I also teach people how to get laid. I have done this all over the world. In all that time I see common thread throughout all of those seminars. The successful people are the ones who study, listen, learn and then go out and do it. The Mega-Successful are the ones who do it without thinking about it. It has become part of them, its second nature. Selling is the oldest profession there is. Some say prostitution is the oldest but even that is someone selling themselves to someone else.
Wherever you are reading this, if you are at work, in an Internet cafe or at home, look around you. Apart from nature, everything you see was sold to someone by someone else. If you have skill in selling you can sell yourself. We put ourselves in the market and we make ourselves a hot commodity. We have all the tools we need within us.
I run workshops and seminars on a number of subjects and all the time I hear of "rejection" and "objection". These are related, you reject because you object and vica versa. In a sale, in a pick up, if they object, what do you do? I spent years looking at and learning different ways to counter objections, what to say when they say...etc. These were really good but they didn't work well in the real world and then I had what is known as a BGO. A Blinding Glimpse of the Obvious. Objections are state related.
I hear people like Bandler and Ross Jeffries saying the same thing. If you don't like the answer, change the state! The objection is now over there, they can't cling onto it.The point I am making is that in the teaching of all of these tools and techniques you have to take them on and make them second nature.
Basic facts of approaching anyone, be it pick up or to sell them something (yourself?) are:
1. Never take their first response as being something written in stone.
2. Anything they offer is a toy for me to play with. Like Jeet Kune Do.
3. They can say and do what they want; I control where my energy goes.
4. Anything they offer is information I can use.
5. 90% of people are running on autopilot 90% of the time.
6. Never attach excessive meaning. Nothing has any meaning except the meaning you give it
7. Never think by your own agenda. Don't bait your hook with food you like.

Visit Ross Jeffries' links for more info in transferring that into personal situations.

That is the 7-step rule that will allow you to walk through the world getting the best of anything you want. Do not make the mistake that these tips are exclusively for sales. You can use them on anyone to get anything. You will have the tools and techniques at hand and you can call on them without thinking.
Once you have the techniques, don't stress about them. Don't even attempt to remember them. Just use them. It’s like a new language.
After a while you think in two ways.
We have 2 brains. We have 2 different kinds of intelligence; rational and emotional. When we cannot decide we say we are 'in 2 minds'.
The techniques you are learning form a part of your EQ. That's your Emotional Intelligence. Your EQ is more important than your IQ. The IQ test may help you get a job but your EQ will help you keep it. A high IQ is around 135. Many people with IQ's of 135 and above work for people with IQ's of 100 or less. Why? Because the person with the high EQ, the one who knows how to relate to other people, talk to other people and interact with other people in a manner they like, is always going to be way ahead of the game and have people following him. Because they do it naturally.
I always, now, describe the techniques, tools, patterns, closes, etc as a raft. A raft is very handy if you want to get from one side of a river to another. You may want to get from the unsuccessful side of the river to the side where infinite power and success are available. But once you have reached the other side, you no longer need the raft itself. In fact, if you want to grow, and continue your journey, you have to leave the raft behind. The challenge that we have, as humans, is that we tend to fall in love with the raft. We start to think, "This raft has been good. It's a useful raft. It's served me well. This raft is tip top!" But if we hang on to the teachings they will become a hindrance.
No words, not anyone's, can see, hear and feel for you. You must do that yourself.
The trick is this.
By integrating the raft, or what we took on board while on the journey, into our being and into our unconsciousness it becomes second nature and we see opportunity, we hear opportunity and we create opportunity all around us. Being awake to openings, opportunity and life is the best way to be. Your energy level is high, your awareness is at peak level and your state is at a higher level. You become a magnet for opportunity. It seeks you out.
And once you become one with the teachings, you will always be ready.

DM

Tuesday 2 January 2007

Ask A Great Question, Get A Great Answer!



There are three things to focus on when putting questions to a PB…..

1. Buyer comfort.
2. How to phrase each question.
3. When to ask it!

In order to retain maximum buyer comfort you must always ensure that you ask "open" questions first of all. The buyer gets used to talking (and you get used to listening!). Open questions usually start with Who, What, Where, When, Why and How.

For example;"What prompted you to call us in at this time?""How can I help?"

This type of questioning settles the buyer and this is vital in the early stages of the meeting. It also lets the seller relax a little and makes it easier to keep talking in the right ratio, the Pareto Principle,which should always be 80% buyer / 20% seller. It's early "buyer comfort" we're aiming for and open questions are the easiest and most straightforward of ways to achieve this.

Secondly, we need to be aware of the different ways in which we can ask the same question. If you ask "Why exactly do you want to change your windows?" you'll more than likely get a response such as "Well, we're just getting quotes at the moment".

The question implies "order" and may well make the buyer nervous. You, the seller, have raised a barrier here. A much gentler way would be "What started you thinking about changing your windows?" This question will produce the answer you want without raising any barriers.

The third thing we need to give attention to is WHEN we ask the question. In general terms, the meeting should flow as a natural conversation. Top sellers know what they need to ask, but wait for precisely the right moment, every time.

If the meeting sounds like a pleasant conversation, the buyer will freely answer the questions. Keep him comfortable at all stages, but especially early on. If you don't work to achieve this, it may well rebound on you later - attempts to close the business will fall on deaf ears.

Questions are a seller's best friend.

Sales Tips And Secrets


Sales Tips And Secrets

Understanding your customer is so important that large corporations spend hundreds of millions annually on market research.


People buy for their own reasons, not for yours. Until you know your customer's reasons for wanting, or not wanting, to buy your product or service...you're in the dark! It doesn't matter how many reasons you give for believing your product or service is a great buy, they will mean nothing unless your customer has solid reasons of his own for wanting to do business with you.

Customers face new problems every day that can radically alter their needs for your products/services. The key is to stay in contact with your PB’s (Probable Buyers)...and ALWAYS ask questions to learn where they are in terms of needing your product/service.

You need to be able to use questions to stir up buying emotions. Improving your questioning techniques will help you to more easily find out what it is your PB wants, why they want it and what they intend to do with it. Master this important selling technique and closing will be so easy, it’s almost a non-event!

What people buy are solutions. We buy a car so we can go places, clothes to make us look good, gadgets to play with, books to learn from, etc. What we buy is a 'solution' to a need, desire or problem. Keep this in mind when you make a sales call to sell your product or service. Put yourself in the buyer's shoes. Sell 'solutions' - not 'things'.

The understanding of thinking and learning styles is also a very useful sales skill in its own right. In learning about your own style, you will appreciate that other people each have their own preferred styles for communicating and receiving information. This relates strongly to the style in which people prefer to receive sales information from a sales person. By learning about this, you have already begun to increase your selling capability - because you are increasing your appreciation of how and why people prefer to make decisions and to buy.

Sales Tips

Focus on the customer
- One of the most common mistakes that salespeople make is focusing on their product exclusively and neglecting to talk about the customer. It's a common mistake, from both the greenest rookie to the most experienced professional. While the product is important, focusing on the customer is even more important.

Be on time - When you tell someone you'll meet them at a specific time, they are counting on you to be there. They take you at your word. They give you theirs. They may go to extraordinary lengths to be there and if YOU aren't there on time, it shows lack of consideration for their time and you have not kept your word. People will remember this!

Asking questions is one of the most effective sales techniques you can use. By asking questions you begin to uncover the PB's pains, wants and desires.

Listen! - Too often, people think that to be a super sales person, one must like to talk. Unfortunately, this misconception causes more lost sales than anything else. If you are truly a sales professional, you will learn to LISTEN more than you talk. That's why we have one mouth and 2 ears!


Return on Investment - Most businesses are only interested in saving money or increasing profits. Keep ROI in mind when you're making a proposal or recommendation to a potential customer. Understanding the ROI helps a PB to justify the expenditure for buying your product or service in most cases.

Develop URGENCY to buy - When a PB avoids making the decision to buy from you, it's typically because they have no sense of urgency to buy. Your challenge is to prove to the PB that buying now is best for them and you must be able to offer solid reasons why. What will they miss if they wait even one more day? What are the benefits if they go ahead now? In other words, what's in it for them? Remember...the reason a customer buys your product or service is because of what it can do for them. Tell them!

If the product you're selling is something your PB can hold in his hands, get it into his hands as quickly as possible. In other words, get the PB 'into the act'. Let him feel it, weigh it, admire it.

Don't stand or sit alongside your PB. Instead, face him while you're pointing out the important advantages of your product. This will enable you to watch his facial expressions and determine whether and when you should go for the close. In handling sales literature, hold it by the top of the page, at the proper angle, so that your PB can read it as you're highlighting the important points. Regarding your sales literature, don't release your hold on it, because you want to control the specific parts you want the PB to read. In other words, you want the PB to read or see only the parts of the sales material you're telling him about at a given time.

When you get no feedback from your PB, you must involve him in your presentation. Stop and ask questions such as, "Now, don't you agree that this product can help you or would be of benefit to you?" After you've asked a question such as this, stop talking and wait for the PB to answer. It's a proven fact that following such a question, the one who talks first will lose, so don't say anything until after the PB has given you some kind of answer. Wait him out!

Remember that in selling, time is money! Therefore, you must allocate only so much time to each PB. The PB who asks you to call back next week, or wants to ramble on about similar products, prices or previous experiences, is costing you money.

After the introductory call on your PB, you should be selling products and collecting money. Any call backs should be only for reorders, or to sell him related products from your line. In other words, you can waste an introductory call on a PB to qualify him, but you're going to be wasting money if you continue calling on him to sell him the first unit of your product.

When faced with a reply such as, "Your product looks pretty good, but I'll have to give it some thought," you should quickly jump in and ask him what it is that he doesn't understand, or what specifically about your product does he feel he needs to give more thought. Let him explain, and that's when you go back into your sales presentation and make everything crystal clear for him to enable him to buy.

You must spend as much time as possible calling on new PB’s. Therefore, your first call should be a selling call with follow-up calls by mail or telephone (once every month or so in person) to sign him for reorders and other items from your product line.

Gather new ideas - Read, read, read. You will seldom read a selling book or article that does not inspire a new idea. Many
sales books will cover some of the same ground; however, within each author’s mind lies a wealth of information and knowledge that, when shared, will help you to grow and succeed.

Update your skills - Do sales professionals today use the same sales techniques as they did a decade ago? If they are, they shouldn't be! Just as hairstyles, music, automobiles, clothing, and other things change, so does business and the skills needed to be successful. To be effective in selling today, you must move forward! Update your skills, your techniques, your tools, and your mind!

Listen and learn, especially while driving. Use this 'dead' time to listen to sales training and communications
audio-tapes and CDs. Listen to anything about communications and behaviour, personal development and confidence, goals and aims, relationships and psychology, ethics and philosophy, marketing and business. All these areas directly relate to and give depth to your sales and selling capabilities.

Read all you can about behaviour and communications. Subscribe to sales and selling newsletters, especially to the many good
free newsletters available from sales and selling websites, and other websites relating to behaviour, business, marketing and communications.

New Phone Message for Psychiatric Hotlines

Hello and welcome to the mental health hotline

  • If you are Obsessive Compulsive , press 1 repeatedly.
  • If you are Co-dependent, please ask someone to press 2 for you.
  • If you have Multiple Personalities, press 3, 4, 5 & 6.
  • If you are Paranoid, we know who you are and what you want. Stay on the line so we can trace your call.
  • If you are Delusional, press 7, and your call will be transferred to the Mother Ship.
  • If you are Schizophrenic, listen carefully and a small voice will tell you which number to press.
  • If you are Dyslexic, press 96969696969696.
  • If you have a Nervous Disorder, please fidget with the hash key until a representative comes on the line.
  • If you have Amnesia, press 8 and state your name, address, phone number, date of birth, social security number and your mother's and grandmothers' maiden names.
  • If you have Post-traumatic Stress Disorder, slowly and carefully press 000.
  • If you have Bi-polar Disorder, please leave a message after the beep. Or before the beep. Or after the beep. Please wait for the beep.
  • If you have Short Term Memory Loss, please try your call again later.
  • If you have Low Self Esteem, please hang up. All our operators are far too busy to talk to you.
  • If you are manic-depressive, it doesn't matter which number you press. No one will answer