Are you the best ‘people magnet’ you can be?

Learn to be an expert about connecting with people, if you can master the art of turning contacts into relationships in business, as well as life you will have unlimited success. Establish common ground with people to initially first connect, after trust builds, the relationship will move to a deeper level. 

WOW! THEM TO WOO THEM

The secret is to give value first. The power of building the strongest relationships you can have is to have other people wanting to connect with you! Magic words are ‘What can I do for you?’ stop thinking in the terms of ‘I’ and ‘me’.

BECOME THE DETECTIVE

As you arrive at the event/place of connection, capture and take in the surroundings on all senses.

Look around for visual signs that may help build the conversation, lie pictures, awards, desk items if it is someone’s home or place of work. If an event, notice who is talking to whom, signals that can lead you to who you need to speak to.

Once you have made the connection, use your listening skills to hone in on specific areas of interest, and powerful questions to get the person talking about themselves, to revel personal things you can build on now, and in the future. (Long term relationships is the true art of networking)

Before moving onto the next person, exchange business cards, and write down some personal points for the future.

 

When you embody and become your best, most enthusiastic, charismatic version of yourself you’ll find that people will be uncontrollably and magnetically drawn and attracted to you. – source

Are your thoughts, and therefore your attitude the most positive they can be?

No one will be attracted to someone who us negative, act confident (even if you don’t feel it), smile, make eye contact and have a confident, firm handshake. Courage is like inflicting yourself; it gains momentum every time you take ownership of it! Practise makes perfect, get out there and dazzle people with your magnetic personality !!!

Developing your people skills will lead to greater success

People skills:

 

According to the Portland Business Journal, people skills are described as: understanding ourselves and moderating our responses talking effectively and empathizing accurately building relationships of trust, respect and productive interactions.
Wikipedia

 

A British definition is “the ability to communicate effectively with people in a friendly way, especially in business”

 

Successful people usually have great people skills, especially people in leadership and management roles. Effective communication is often a big challenge in business no matter what the company. Developing great people skills will assist you in communicating and understanding the employees or customers you are trying to lead/manage. We are talking in a business context but good people skills transcends business, social and personal relationships. People skills are also known as soft skills, life skills or interpersonal skills. It’s unfortunate that most individuals don’t invest time in developing these skills when they are equally as important as product knowledge and education. Here are a few tips to improve your people skills:

 

Learn to Listen

 

Listening is different from hearing, listening involves understanding non-verbal communication and verbal communication.

 

“Listening is key to all effective communication, without the ability to listen effectively messages are easily misunderstood – communication breaks down and the sender of the message can easily become frustrated or irritated.”
Find more at: http://www.skillsyouneed.com/ips/listening-skills.html#ixzz2UsaAGHnn

When you genuinely value people’s feelings and ideas, they will reciprocate and feel that they can trust you.

In our multi tasking world it’s so easy to become distracted, we are constantly checking notifications of the latest tweet or emails. How many meetings have you sat in and being checking your phone at the same time? Start paying your full attention to the situation you will be surprised what hidden agendas and opportunities you will spot!

 

Learn to Relax 

When we are nervous we tend to talk faster and fidget. Being tense is also visible in our body language which is a huge part of communication. These non-verbal signals can give clues and additional information and meaning over and above spoken (verbal) communication. You have to let your confidence shine through, make eye contact and smile.

Acquire a win – win attitude.

 

“We live in a very competitive society. There is almost always a winner and a loser. But this does not have to be. Especially, when it comes to business, you do not want your customers to feel that you sold them something they did not want. You want them to feel that they purchased a great product/service at a great value and that you helped them. Focus on converting every situations into a win – win for everyone involved and success will be the by-product.”

 

 source: http://www.roberti.net/6-people-skills-you-need-to-succeed/

Negotiation and influencing in Sales

Influencing and negotiating are things we all try to do all the time. For instance, we want to influence our children to behave according to codes and values we feel are appropriate or we want our partners to choose the holiday we want. In business and especially sales we need to master the act of negotiation and should always be looking to improve this skill.

Negotiation and Influencing

Modern influencing is an art form, it should be executed with grace and elegance!

When you influence someone – what you are actually doing is getting them to see it from your point of view. When someone agrees with you, they are much more likely to follow your request/instructions.

1^st step – is to think ‘How will this benefit them?

2^nd step- Find their ‘hot button’– finding out what their ‘motivation to buy’ is key to your sales success.

3^rd step- Find their wants and needs. (Wants are what drives a person –  needs are their emotional reasons for buying.)

4^th step- Find their pain. (What would be the consequence if they did not take you up on your offer?) When they associate more pain to not doing something, (i.e. they may lose out, fear of loss) – they are more likely to buy.

Master your beliefs. It’s virtually impossible to influence someone if you do not fully believe in your product /service 100%- it comes across!

Everyone has it within them to become a master of influence.

Always make it a win – win for each party involve.

Confidence is a must!

I think this great info-graphic from University of Kent sums up influencing.

Image credit to http://www.kent.ac.uk/careers/sk/persuading.htm

 

 

Please help me in 2013 and answer the following question in the comments below, I will be collecting your answers!

What phrases or quotes have you heard that has had an impact in your life?