All business is personal, and even the biggest deals, orders, projects, sales and contracts come down to two or more people making a connection. If the 'profit' you seek is wealth, you must realize that all the money you will ever earn is currently sat in someone else's pocket. If your 'profit' is more influence, respect, clients, support, challenge, reputation or excitement, you must go through other people to get it. Being more is a cornerstone of ‘getting through’. Here are eight of my favourite strategies for ensuring people buy you, your arguments, your excuses, your services and your products.

All of your prospects probably have another bank, another law firm, another accountancy firm, another existing provider of your services in place. If they're going to come over to you, they have a right to ask you two very tough questions:

As a prospective client, why should I choose you?

What added value do you bring to me or my business that I cannot get anywhere else?

This is sometimes called the Tyranny of Choice, and all of my work is dedicated to helping you find the answers to these two questions. As a matter of fact, that's where my TRIP System^® strap line, Turning Relationships Into Profits, comes from.

So what is so distinctive and memorable about you and your product? Where are the dramatic differences between you and everyone else who does what you do? Why should people go for you over and above your competition?

If they don't see it, understand it, value it, or remember it, you're dead in the water and it's almost certain they will turn you down. You've got to emphasize the dramatic difference between you and your rivals.

You do this by illustrating and demonstrating rather than asserting and claiming. You have to differentiate through war stories, case studies, testimonials, quotes and real life examples they can relate to. They might not need you today, but things change in business, and when the time comes and 'the wheel falls off their wagon', they will DDD for you - Discern the Difference, Decide the Deed and Do the Deal!

2. Educate Yourself on Their Education!

Whether you're approaching a new prospect or cross-selling or up-selling to an existing client, you need to know what they know before you pitch. How much does your potential client already know about you and what you do? What prior knowledge do they have? It's crucial you ascertain where they are in their education. If they already know plenty, there's no need to oversell by going over all of the benefits again. Experts need more detail. If they know less, home in on the benefits, not the detail.

3. Realise When Enough is Enough!

When people go into graphic detail about things, we sometimes say, 'That's way too much information!' This also applies to you, my friend! Have you ever 'over sold'? You knew they were ready to buy, but you went on too much and actually talked them out of it! I learned the hard way when I was selling private medical insurance for BUPA. Talked my way out of a lot of good commission until my low bank balance taught me to shut up!

Master persuaders have a strong feel for how much information to give someone. Kevin Hogan, one of the world's leading experts in this area, says this is based upon whether the person you are communicating with is likely to mentally process your information peripherally or centrally. Let's explore this.

When people are considering, pondering, analyzing and thinking, they are centrally processing your message. When they rely on other cues - your appearance, your expertise, your status and your company reputation - they are using peripheral cues that often have little to do with your actual message. The more information people consider, the more they evaluate and the more information you need to give them. The less information they want, the more likely you will elicit a negative response if you go over the top on detail.

How much is too much? Hogan gives this advice:

"The more expert a person is in a given area, the more features (not benefits) that person needs to make a decision. They are going to match your message to what they already have stored in their memory and mind. If you come across as not knowing the actual working details of whatever your idea or proposal is, you lose. If you have quality information, you engage them and optimise your chances of making the sale.

When a person is not an expert in a certain area, less information is generally more likely to be processed more quickly and favourably. And because in this case, less is better, you want that message to be very different. You want to share benefits and not features with this person. When they are not an expert, peripheral cues become crucial."

4. Use the Power of Arousal!

Arousal is simply getting people excited, happy and enthusiastic. It's changing the mood. It's creating an atmosphere or enjoyment. Anyone who has studied NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) will know that getting people to laugh or think good thoughts are classic ways to influence mood. When hairdressers ask you where you're going on holiday, they know that thinking about such things puts you in a terrific mood (and open to the luxury shampoo and the big tip!).

Without getting too technical, arousal decreases central processing in the brain, and increases peripheral processing. If you want someone to be persuaded by central cues (the core message, the benefits), you will need to keep arousal to a minimum. If you get them excited, they'll miss the message and be more guided by emotion!

If you want them to be persuaded by peripheral cues, be the hairdresser and use subtle strategies to arouse them and open them up to your peripheral cues.

Rob's Quick Tips