"I very much enjoyed your seminar. I am enjoying the flow on effects. Having more comfort when I talk with people makes the rapport deeper. My sells in the juicer have increased 30%. Even though my demo is only 90 seconds, I hold longer eye contact and do individual action to as many potential customers as possible, building a sense of connection. Also music sounds better. I am looking forward to attending your next seminar."

Andy: There are many areas and definitions of the persuasion process. People call it influence, convincing, manipulating, selling... so what is persuasion really?

Jonathan:

Persuasion is your ability to convince others of your point of view, through explanation, stories, discussion, requests, or other forms of communication. Persuasion can also be any of the things you mentioned. In other words, selling is one form of persuading. Getting a date is another form of persuading. Negotiating anything effectively is another form of persuading.

All of us use persuasion. Some people are better at it than others. I believe our success in life is _directly_ related to our level of persuasive ability.

Some people are natural persuaders, some people take training in persuading. I provide this service to those who want to become more natural at persuading other people.

Andy: Is persuasion and selling the same thing?

Jonathan:

Certainly it can be, but I don't think these are automatically the same.

I have sold things without having had to persuade anyone of anything (in other words, some people came to me ready to buy something and I didn't have to do any work at all to close the sale).

By contrast, I have also persuaded people to choose a range of things without having sold anything to them at the time. For example, I persuaded someone to join me for lunch just the other day.

And there have certainly been times when I was selling a product to a customer, where I did need to persuade them of the wisdom of the choice they were about to make.

Andy: Can someone ethically persuade somebody else?

Jonathan:

Persuasion skills, whether natural or trained, are just tools. Just techniques. The ethics of a person are separate from the tools.

I say this because I know many people who act very ethically when they persuade other people. And I know many people who act without ethics when they persuade.

Curiously, I find that most people who are trained to be more persuasive, usually act with more ethical choices. Often because those of us who train persuasion skills build "ethics" and "ecology" of our choices, into our training process.

So, yes, people can ethically persuade, and people can unethically persuade. The ethics are in the people, not the tools, and it's usually people who haven't thought through the results of their behavior who are unethical.

Andy: Can you offer us an example of ethically influencing someone's course of actions?

Jonathan:

Certainly, I can give you several examples.

1. Persuading a person to hire you, if you know you're a great candidate for the job.
2. Persuading a customer prospect to buy your product, after you've discovered that he will be able to benefit greatly from owning it.
3. Persuading a friend to discard limiting beliefs, empower themselves, and take action in a way that will build a better life for themselves.
4. Persuading that amazing man/woman you've wanted to get to know... that you're a fascinating person who will reflect what's best in them.

Andy: What makes a master persuader?

Jonathan:

Globally renowned author and trainer of Sales skills Zig Ziglar once said, "your best 'weapon of influence' is your integrity." I believe that's true thoroughly and completely.

If you come from a place of integrity, and always take into account other people's wants and needs, everything you do will have balance to it.

When you listen to other people's wants and needs, and observe their behavior, you can tune your communication skills to best bridge other people's wants and needs... to your products, services, or ideas. You'll be inviting other people into viewing the world more the way you look at it.

Then often, when people make the choices you've persuaded them to make, those choices come from a place of desire and balance, which essentially means, they'll be glad they're making those choices, and you've persuaded them well.

Last point: A Master Persuader is also someone who can easily persuade him-/herself to walk away from persuading someone -- when the outcome doesn't fit the prospect's wants and needs. Someone who recognizes a bad opportunity quickly -- and chooses to preserve the relationship -- rather than pushes their agenda and desired transaction.

Andy: Is charisma something where you either have it, or you don't?

Jonathan:

Charisma, or Charm, is something most people either have, or they don't. However, Charisma, like persuasion, can also be behaviorally trained. Which means the rest of us who weren't naturals when we were born, don't have to live with not being charismatic!!!

Charisma begins inside our minds.

We simply ask, "What about other people is charismatic to us?" And then we begin to duplicate those beliefs, values, and behaviors, in ourselves. Then, rather rapidly, we become more charismatic.

That may sound simplistic, but it works!

Andy: What are the most important advantages of learning persuasion skills?

Jonathan:

As I've said above, I believe our success in life is _directly_ related to our level of persuasive ability. So in many ways, learning persuasion skills leads to the removal of personal limitations.

The sky is the limit. Or more to the point, there are no limits.

Human beings place artificial limitations on their own behavior. We do this through limiting beliefs, and through over-generalizations. Often people do this by expecting that there are points of diminishing returns on efforts to improve our situations in life.

I.e. ...

"It would be too hard to get yet another promotion."

"She's good enough for me. I don't think I could ever find a relationship that meets _all_ of my needs..."

"It would take too much work to sell to that fellow."

"If you wanted to lose those last 10 pounds, you would have to exercise twice as hard."

These kinds of personal restrictions are often based on people poorly persuading each other (or themselves) of arbitrary human restrictions/limitations. Persuasion is one of those skills that helps us fast-track to a desired result. Finally, combining persuasion skills with the ability to create and build "empowering beliefs" in other people's minds (and our own) is a powerful weapon to use in destroying human hesitation.

Andy: What do you have to think/believe in order to "seduce" the other party?

Jonathan:

It's important to believe that....

• What you offer has immense value.
• How you offer something to other people is magnetic, fascinating.
• Other people desire listening to you.
• People want and need a sense of excitement, and other great feelings.
• If you learn that someone is a good prospect for your ideas... then it's not only a good option to influence people... it's actually your *responsibility* to share your ideas in a compelling way. It's actually morally important to influence people to take constructive action in the world.

Andy: What are some tips and tricks/ examples of what a master persuader does?

First and foremost, master persuaders listen to other people and ask very particular kinds of questions. We listen, very precisely. You may also listen. But we're probably listening for different things than you do.

Secondly, master persuaders take action and adjust their communication dramatically to suit the information they've gathered when they listened to other people. Most other people, if they even listen to other people, gather just enough information to decide whether to blindly start a sales pitch. Master Persuaders will tune every element of their sales pitch to each prospect.

Andy: Is this easy or difficult to learn?

Jonathan:

It is either easy or difficult, depending on how you make it.

If you can begin now to find it increasingly fascinating... to learn how people think, how they process information... then it can be both fun and powerfully educational to learn how to persuade people more effectively. Also, finding a dynamic trainer who can make the process pragmatic rather than theoretical makes an enormous amount of difference.

Find the right trainer, learn these skills in a pragmatic way, find every person to be a fascinating creature... and it's easy!

Try to learn it only theoretically from books, try to fit all of your old sales training into a new paradigm of thought... and it's incredibly difficult! Any pre-existing methodology may be based on old thinking patterns and not individually tuned to the psychology of self or others.

Andy: How important is the voice of the person in the persuasion process?

Jonathan:

As an expert in vocal speaking skills, I have a strong bias in this subject. I think voice skills are absolutely essential to effective persuasion in any context.

I cannot recall a single person who had a terribly annoying voice, who I ever let persuade me about anything. I couldn't wait to get away.

By contrast, anyone whose voice had flowing, almost-hypnotic tonality and rhythm... would easily get me to listen to them all day long. It becomes a pleasure to be influenced by someone with a fabulous voice.

I train those skills. My students regularly report to me that when they start speaking, sometimes people's eyes glaze over, and smiles emerge on their listeners faces, almost regardless of what they begin talking about. It's a real pleasure to use a great voice to influence people, both from the influencer's perspective, and from that of an audience (of one, or more).

These skills include both a better-sounding instrument, and also, certain kinds of vocal sound patterns, and persuasive language patterns as well.

Andy: Tell us something about listening. We have a saying here in Romania: God gave you two ears and only one mouth so that you listen twice as much as you speak. Is this true for any persuasion process? Is this a good way to think about it?

Jonathan:

I could be challenging your views here, but I think the above presupposes that the listener is not using targeted listening skills while listening. That he is listening... blindly to everything.

In other words, I think if we teach people to become _better_ active listeners, they don't have to listen... twice as much as they speak.

It's critically important to listen to people as part of every persuasion situation. I use what I learn from others to tune what I do and what I say to people.

However, when I'm persuading, I know I speak more than I listen. However I am willing and able to stop and listen to people at any point in a persuasion process. So perhaps I'm doing something more active with what I've heard when I was listening to others.

Another point. I ask very targeted questions, that sometimes, people don't know how to answer. Sometimes their answers are clear and they give me the information I'm looking for. Sometimes their answers are irrelevant and confusing. In the latter case, I will stop them, and ask my targeted questions, differently. I will often ask a lot of questions to get very specific kinds of information. Once I get that information, I'm speaking more than listening, and only stopping to listen more thoroughly if I find out later on that I didn't learn all I needed to learn, initially.

Here's an example. If someone tells me they're primarily interested in my product because they "don't want to have to deal with [x] anymore..." then I'm not going to waste time talking about all the wonderful things that can/will happen when they buy my product. Why? Because I would have learned that my prospect is primarily motivated by fear/avoidance, and I'd be wasting my breath talking about things that could motivate them through pleasure/desire. Instead, I'll talk about how not only will my product ensure they _don't_ have to deal with [x] anymore, but also, if they _don't_ buy my product, they _wouldn't_ get [all the things they'd get if they did buy my product]. In other words, I'll use more "not" words in my language to utilize their natural fear/avoidance filters/patterns. By contrast -- if I used a lot of _not_ words in persuading someone motivated primarily by pleasure, they'd probably walk out the door before buying from me.

The sad thing is most people will never learn what went wrong! And there are hundreds of such examples of specific patterns/filters to understand about how people filter/process their experience.

The above is an example of making communication choices at a process level, rather than a content level. I can tune the above to any sales/persuasion situation. The content/context (specific subject) may change, but I can use the same process in any context.

The difference between me and most of the rest of the world is that most people listen blindly, and I listen actively for certain kinds of things. I teach a more effective _process_ for persuasion that is based on how each person understands the world around them.

Andy: If you had only 3 words to define the persuasion process, what would those words be?

Jonathan:

Please pardon my adjustment... because I'd need more than 3 words!

I'd need 3 phrases: Gain rapport, Gather better information... & customize communication!