NLP (neuro-linguistic programming) has been around for a long time now, most people have heard of it and a lot of sales training courses include at least some aspects of it. So how can it help you to sell?
There is a wealth of material that has been developed by various members of the NLP community and so rather let's look at one of the most basic but also most useful NLP skills - rapport.
Rapport means a great relationship between people. When people are in rapport, they literally speak the same language. When people don’t have rapport here is no common understanding. Did you ever meet someone with whom you immediately got on? Someone so like you that you practically knew what they were feeling? How at ease did you feel with that person? Did you trust them? Chances are that you had great rapport with that person.
You may have a great product or service but if your relationship isn't good with your client the chances are they'll try and get the same from someone they feel more comfortable with - people buy from people is the age old saying.
We develop rapport easily with people who are like us. It is very difficult to understand or feel comfortable with people who are not like us. We see them as different or strange - so how do we develop rapport? One powerful way is through physiology. A skill called mirroring lets us develop rapport rapidly. What you do is mirror the other person’s physiology or body movements. If the person leans back in the chair, you lean back. If the person crosses her legs, you cross your legs. If the individual sits forward, you sit forward. Your goal is to get your prospect to feel comfortable with you being there so she will be open to what you have to say.
Mirroring should be very subtle - don't immediately copy your client or it will have the opposite effect. Wait before matching your client and make the shift gradual. Mirroring, done elegantly, is a continuous and fluid process but done badly is mimicry. If your prospect scratches their head, don’t do the same the idea is to match posture not gestures.
The technique of mirroring takes practice to learn effectively. Try it first in safe non threatening situations so it becomes a skill for you to use. When you are good at using this technique, your client will not realize what you are doing but will feel more at ease with you.
You can extend this principle of being like your client to finding other things you have in common. There may be skills you both enjoy, values or beliefs that you find you share or maybe a common community of friends. Anywhere you can find similarity is a great place to start increasing your client's sense that you are like them and so increase the rapport.
We'll cover more aspects of NLP in future as it has a massive impact on increasing sales success.
