Jay Heinrich is the author of the New York Times bestseller, “Thank You for Arguing” and his latest book “How to Argue with a Cat: A Human’s Guide to the Art of Persuasion” is a personal favorite of mine.
On this episode of The Salesman Podcast, Jay shares how to win an argument even if the other person isn’t being logical about the situation.
Featured on this episode:
Resources:
- Book: How to Argue with a Cat: A Human’s Guide to the Art of Persuasion
- JayHeinrichs.biz
- @JayHeinrichs
Transcript
Jay:
Philosopher Aristotle said this, “The most powerful persuasion tool is the relationship.” One of the things that you have to think about is when it comes to rhetorical logos or logic, you have to work with your audience’s beliefs and expectations, and their desires.
Will Barron:
Hello, Salesnation, I’m Will Barron, host of The Salesman Podcast, the world’s biggest B2B sales show, where we help you not just take your target, but really thrive in sales. Hit that subscribe button, if you haven’t already, and let’s meet today’s guest, Jay.
Jay:
Hi Will, I’m Jay Heinrichs. I’m the author, my latest book, How to Argue With a Cat. I often advise salespeople on how to be more persuasive.
Will Barron:
In this episode, Jay shows you how to win any argument or negotiation, even when we use specific case point, if someone is using fake news or they’re using something that’s essentially totally illogical to trump up their position in the negotiation, we tell you how to knock the chair legs away from under that, how to break through, so let’s jump right in.
How to Lose Any Argument · [01:02]
Will Barron:
Today, we’re going to dive into, I think I’m going to try and title this How to Negotiate, then in brackets, How to Win Any Argument, so we cover both bases here. I want to turn things on its head, I want to start perhaps from the end and work our way backwards. How is an argument lost? Is this a logical, in most circumstances, is this a logical, well, you said this, you said this, and so you lost, or is it all perception, and is it kind of rhetoric and other things piled in on top of this?
“The philosopher Aristotle said, “The most powerful persuasion tool is the relationship.” He called it ethos, which is what people think of you, whether they like and trust you. If you can get people to like and trust you, you have not just one thing sold, you don’t just win one argument. You can win arguments for the rest of your life.” – Jay Heinrichs · [01:34]
Jay:
Well, I’d say it’s all of that, but it’s mostly something else, which is the relationship. Every salesperson knows this. The relationship comes first. If somebody likes and trusts you and you know what, the philosopher Aristotle said this, he didn’t like it by the way, he was the guy invented logic, as we know it, and he said, “The most powerful persuasion tool is the relationship.” He called it ethos, which is what people think of you, whether they like and trust you.
Jay:
If you can get people to like and trust you, you have not just one thing sold. You don’t just win one argument. You can win arguments for the rest of your lives. That’s the most important thing. How do you establish that relationship? If you work too hard on one particular argument, you can ruin the relationship.
Will Barron:
Is this the hack, is this perhaps the 20 minutes down the line at the end of the show, is this what we should conclude with here? That if you’ve got a good relationship, none of this other stuff really matters?
Jay:
Yeah. I mean, I’ll tell you what, if there’s a motto to this podcast, this particular one, the very end we should say this, and we should try it too, send love beams out of your eyes. I tell you it works. I tell people to do this and it works.
How to Avoid the Prospect of an Argument and Turn an Interaction Into a Negotiation · [02:32]
Will Barron:
Okay. We’ll use Mark the Shark here on the desk as an example. Mark is in a negotiation, which is getting a little bit dicey. It’s B2B sale, making say it’s a million quids. It’s a big deal for him and the buyer as well. It’s starting to get a little bit dicey. It’s almost starting to turn into an argument, but there is somewhat level of perhaps not a relationship as such as in, they’re not sending beams of love out their eyes. They’re not kind of embracing at the end of this, but there’s a level of respect. There is a business relationship. What should Mark the shark be doing to kind of, I guess, reduce the argument and turn it back into a negotiation or just a conversation.
Jay:
There are two things that Mark can do. And by the way, I am feeling the love beams from his eyes right now, he’s looking at me. It’s amazing. There are two things that you can do. One is to use what Aristotle called the advantageous. What’s to the advantage of the customer, saying, look, this isn’t about me. This is about what is really good for you. So let’s define this a little better. Clearly I haven’t defined it well enough. Let’s do that. And that’s a kind of framing. Let’s frame this around what’s to your advantage. The other thing to do, if things get a little bit heated, the best way to take the anger out is to shift the tense. Shift the tense to the future. One of the things you can do is to be aware of what tense you’re in, when the emotion in the room changes, because it’s probably going to be in the past tense where you screwed up or where something unpleasant happened. Or it’s going to be in the present tense, which is why you’re not the kind of person who should be selling me this thing.
Jay:
And you can say, all that could well be true, but let’s talk about how we’re going to fix the problem or how we’re going to get you what you want. And that’s how you combine the two, the advantageous with the future tense. Those are the two greatest logical tools in rhetoric.
Can We Effectively Use Logic to Win Arguments? · [04:25]
Will Barron:
And because you took the words right out of my mouth here, Jay, is this all about logic or is this logic and other things and trickery on top of it? Because I know I use my girlfriend as an example, I will use logic in a … We never argue, but in a discussion with her. And very often I don’t get logic back and it’s quite difficult to have a logical conversation one way in a perhaps an emotional or non thoughts and feeling conversation back the way, right?
Jay:
Yeah, your girlfriend’s right. And you’re wrong. Let’s just put it that way.
Will Barron:
Most of the time, perhaps.
Jay:
Well what’s logic in rhetoric is not the formal logic we use in schools. And that is what makes all the difference. So in rhetoric, if someone believes fake news, it’s a fact, as far as persuasion is concerned. It works as well as a fact. If somebody absolutely believes a fallacy that you use, that fallacy is as good as pure perfect logic. So logic and rhetoric obviously works a little bit differently. I actually call it logos just to use the Latin because I like being pretentious, but also because it gets people away from the idea that pure rational thought is what wins arguments. Aristotle was very sad about this. He said that this is owing to our sorry human nature, his words, not mine. And you know, one of the things that you have to think about is when it comes to rhetorical, logos or logic, you have to work with your audience’s beliefs and expectations and their desires.
Jay:
So when you’re talking about your girlfriend, what she’s probably doing is working first off your relationship. How strong are the bonds between the two of you. And she’s going to try to redefine that all the time. Women do that much more than men socially in our culture. So you need to do the same thing. Start with a relationship. I mean, one of the most disarming things a woman can do with a man drives him crazy, but he has no answers to say, I love you. That is a weapon you can use against her. Tell her you love her in the middle of everything. It will stop her dead or make her so angry. She can’t say anything at all. And you win.
Why Relationships Are Such a Powerful Tool in Business · [06:44]
Will Barron:
Is there a business alternative to, I love you, whether that be I respect you, but is there something along the lines of that we can use?
Jay:
You know, one of the things, you use the word love, I mean, this is a little bit different. So the UK has a different culture from America. We are much more emotionally open in our marketing. We’re much sappier, a better way to put it. We’re sappy people. We cry easily. So I often say, I use the word love all the time. I say, I love my work. I love doing this. I love working with you. So I don’t say I love you, which is a little creepy, especially I’m 63 now. I’m mostly dealing with clients who are younger than my own grown children. So if I say, I love you to a 20 something woman, that’s creepy, but I can say I really love the work I do. And you know, one of the reasons I love it is, and then you can reframe the conversation. I love it because I mostly get to work with people who really can see what’s to our mutual advantage or something like that.
Will Barron:
So is all of this then layered, if we imagine kind of like a Maslow hierarchy, is relationships at the very bottom of all of this?
Jay:
Yes. Yes. I mean, and throughout, I mean, it all starts and ends with relationship. Yes. I mean, it is such a powerful tool. You look at why do people believe in Donald Trump? Why do so many people, no matter what he does and what he says, and it’s not like lying or not lying, he will completely, totally contradict himself. I believe that the Russians interfered with the election, the next day, that’s total fake news. He himself had said it the day before. Why do people still believe him? It’s not that they’re crazy. It’s just that they really feel a bond with president Trump. And that makes all the difference. That trumps so to speak, all logic.
How to Use Relationship, Logic and Emotion to Win Most Arguments · [08:40]
Will Barron:
Okay. So if we’ve got relationship at the bottom, what are the next few runs up the ladder, and then we’ll dive into each one of them specifically.
Jay:
That’s great. So you can say, well, I’ll tell you what, we can take this the way, the greatest orator of all time, according to himself, Marcus Tullius Cicero, from ancient Rome. And I start with all this ancient stuff in part, because this is what our culture was built on and what we’ve largely forgotten. Now, modern neuroscience, a lot of really terrific linguistic research and a whole lot of really smart reteritions are still making rhetoric relevant today. But I like to start with the basics, the classics. Now, Marcus Tullius Cicero said the greatest way to give a speech, and this is true of any presentation or sales meeting for that matter, is to follow his outline. And the outline has like 12 steps in it, but it’s really three basic things. You start by establishing your relationship with your audience, which could be one person, or some people in a meeting room or a thousand people in a podcast or a hundred thousand in your case.
Jay:
So the first thing is to establish your ethos, which is how you express your character in front of your audience. And there’s several tools we can talk about that you can use to strengthen that. The next thing you do is you build your case, which what he called the narration, which is your story. That’s where you lay out the facts of your case, what you want to accomplish and how you can accomplish it. That’s where you bring in what’s your customer’s advantage. And then the last is emotion. So you start with character then logic and you end with emotion. Now, one of the things that people often make mistake on is that they will get too much energy in the very beginning. And it’s actually better to kind of build to a crescendo in the end. I say to young people who are looking for jobs, in a job interview use that Cicero outline, start with a relationship, show how much knowledge you have of the company and the homework you did, show how you were perfectly suited to the environment and culture of that company.
Jay:
And then you go into how you’re capable and make your logical case for being hired. At the very end, save this for last, and this is true of a sales call as well, say, look, I love this idea of working with you on this. This means a lot to me and let a little passion go into, or I really believe in this product. And I’ll tell you why I’m doing this instead of selling something else. This means a lot to me. Now, depending on your culture, obviously, you don’t want your client to be sort of laughing at you or thinking you’re absolutely crazy, but a little bit of motion at the end, according to Cicero, that’s the one that actually gets people to take action. So start with logic or logos then, or I’m sorry, start with your relationship, your character, then go into logic and then end with emotion.
How to Win Large B2B Deals Through Practical Wisdom · [11:44]
Will Barron:
What does established relationship, and you mentioned tools there, Jay, what does that look like? And we’ll put it in the B2B sales context of you’ve walked into a room for the final negotiation on a big B2B sales deal, perhaps million, perhaps hundreds of thousands, whatever it is. There’s a lot on the line for you and the end user as well. Clearly you’ve got a load of commission on the line, they’ve got the potential the huge problem being solved for them. So perhaps energy in the room is a little bit touchy because you want to get everything right. What does that look like? Or how does that practically look like when we want to establish that relationship or double down on that relationship at the beginning of a specific meeting?
Jay:
Okay. So the greatest rhetorical answer of all time is that depends. So not to weasel away from this, but I’ll give you an example in my own case. I was giving this big pitch for a really big business deal with Walmart, a fortune 100 company. And the way Walmart does this is they have these meanings. You sit in plastic chairs that are deliberately uncomfortable. It makes meetings shorter for one thing. And Walmart has this ethic of we don’t spend money on ourselves. We like our customers to save money. But the room itself is too small for the number of people in it. They do this all the time. It’s under ventilated. You’re actually low on oxygen during these meetings. And so the tension in the room can be very high. This was the end of a long process where you’d beat out a bunch of competitors.
Jay:
And this was our final case to choose us in front of the two finalists who were also there that day. So you can imagine how this was. And I was leading the pitch. So I said to the team and we showed up with a total of four people. That was the team that was going to do it. I said several things first, we’re going to be better prepared than anybody. And that actually meets a rhetorical standard for your ethos, your character. And that’s what Aristotle called Phronesis. And I know I’m throwing Greek at you, but just because I love to do it. But that means practical wisdom. It’s your ability, not just to know what you’re doing and convince the customer you can do it, but also to solve particular problems. So you start with the customer’s problem and exactly how you can solve it better than anybody else.
Jay:
And so you just come in better prepared and that’s one way to do it. But you know what’s the most important thing of all? I said, the moment we walk into the room and this is the ethos part, we have to make their day. We’re going to be now, partly this I was selling a content plan. So part of content is to entertain people and hold their attention. So it’s a little different if we’re just selling a widget. So that’s the that depends part. In our case, I said, no matter what we do, we have to make their day. We have to be the most entertaining, fun part of their day. And getting Walmart people are very capable people, very serious people, getting them to smile, that itself is a triumph in this under oxygenated room. So part of it was, I was relaxing the team, I was making them laugh before we even came in.
Jay:
And I said, every one of us walks in with a smile, have to do it. Like we’ve just shared a joke with one another. And I literally told them a joke. Then it was a terrible joke by the way. So people are like shaking their heads and smiling coming in. And then at the very end, I said, we show the passion at the end. We are committed to this because, and this is really important. We said, this is not just our making a sale for you guys. This is a cause for us because we really believe in what this will do, not just for your customers, but also your associates, which are the sales people within Walmart. We think this is really good. Not just for Walmart or for us. We think it’s good for people. So we expressed at the very end, our passion for the cause of what we stood for beyond money. Was there a BS factor that could be detected in this? That’s a real danger, but we actually did believe in it. And the more we talked about it, the more we did believe. We won the sale. We won the business.
The Process of Changing the Energy in a Room and Engineering a Good Vibe Atmosphere · [16:05]
Barron:
How do you, Jay, and this might be going off topic, I’m not sure rhetoric and things might fall into it, if you go into a room like that, you walk in laughing, you’ve somewhat engineered that good vibe, a good energy of you walking in the room with your team. And everyone else has sat there with your arms crossed going sodding hell that’s the third business meeting of the day, I’ve got to do this, I’m late for that, I’ve not done that. How would you, I guess you personally, how would you go about changing the energy in the room whether it be what you say or how you move or what you’re doing? How do you like drag them out of that? Because that could suck all your energy away and change the whole dynamic in instant.
“My motto before I walk into a presentation is screw the room. The room just doesn’t mean anything because we’re engaging individual people. So you may have eight people in there and seven are checking their phones. If one of them is nodding and smiling, that’s your focus, so engage directly with them. We’re a social species generally, so you start engaging with that individual, what will happen is people at a higher level will start engaging with you because they’ll be a little jealous that this person is getting all the attention. The fear of missing out, that FOMO factor is going to really kick in. So don’t worry about your audience or the entire group. You’re engaging with one person at a time and then do all you can to make that person build into other people in the room as well.” – Jay Heinrichs · [17:15]
Jay:
Oh boy, you, right. I’ll tell you what’s even worse than a C-suite meeting, is a room full of college students. They’re worse. So one of the things you could do is give a workshop that college students are all checking their phones the entire time you’re talking, yawning openly. They’re worse. Talking to a C-suite where people have their arms like this, or they’re whispering to one another about their next meeting or they’re checking their messages on their phone, screw the room. My motto, and I say this with any team before we walk into a presentation, screw the room, the room is just doesn’t mean anything. We’re engaging individual people. So you may have eight people in there and seven are checking their phones. If one of them is nodding smiling, that’s your focus, do that.
Jay:
And then engage directly with them and what will happen, we’re a social species generally. So you start engaging with that individual. And what will happen is people at a higher level will start engaging with you because they’ll be a little jealous that this person is getting all the attention. The fear of missing out is really going to, that FOMO factor is going to really kick in. So screw the room. Don’t worry about your audience or the entire group. You’re engaging with one person at a time and then do all you can to make that person be the build to other people in the room as well. You’re engaging one on one with people, even if you’re talking to a thousand people.
How to Win Over People Who Stubbornly Don’t Want to Change, Especially if They Believe in Fake News · 18:33]
Will Barron:
As you say that, I can visualise that process in my head of people getting a fear of missing out of not being in the conversation of checking the phone and be, oh, what should happen with John down the front? That was brilliant. There’s one thing I want to kind of … This might take 10 minutes to go through, 20 minutes, this might wrap up the end of the show here, Jay. And that is how do you use whether it’s language, again, all these other tools we’ve discussed so far, character relationships, to deal with a scenario when, and this happens to sales people all the time, humbly, you know you are correct. Your product or service is really going to help an individual, a brand, company. It’s going to save them money, save them time, save them assets, reduce liabilities, whatever it is. How do you deal with someone who staunchly believes fake news or not that they are fine, that they are set in the ways that they don’t need to change.
Will Barron:
That there’s no real threats coming their way. When again, humbly, as a person who’s selling this product day in, day out, and we see these scenarios, we see the puzzle pieces moving together of companies going up and down and doing well and doing bad as a genuine experts in the field. So I’m not talking about used car sales here. I’m talking about high end high value B2B sales professionals, how do we break through that barrier of perhaps they’ve given us time in the meeting? So they’ve been somewhat attentive to the fact that we might be onto something here, but they just keep saying, no, I’m not interested or no, that doesn’t work or no, this isn’t a problem. How do we break through that just constant over and over and over of no?
Jay:
Well, that is, of course you just named the biggest problem in sales. And you’re not going to succeed 100%. And that’s the important thing. So start with the worst case and we’ll build up to the better cases where you actually make the sale. The worst case is that you’re not making the sale. It’s not going to happen. You come to that recognition because you have 10 seconds left in the meeting, work on the relationship, say, look, I am just so happy to have had this meeting with you. I’m really glad we got caught up. I wish you all the very best. And let’s keep in touch. That’s the worst case. All right, little bit better is they’re still very reluctant because they don’t see a threat that you know is a threat. Then you start asking questions.
“The most powerful people in the room are the audience. And we often make the mistake of thinking the most powerful person in the room is the one who’s speaking. But when you think about it, if you have an audience with a Pope, you may be doing the talking, but who’s the more powerful person? The Pope.” Jay Heinrichs · [20:42]
Jay:
And one of the things you do, this takes a little bit of practise, but one of the things I tell people is the most powerful people in the room are the audience. And we often make the mistake thinking the most powerful person in the room is the one who’s speaking. But when you think about if you have an audience with a Pope, you may be doing the talking, but who’s the more powerful person? You’re having an audience with the Pope. And that’s what audience used to mean, meant going before the king and asking for stuff. That’s what you’re doing as a salesperson, most powerful person there is the audience. So what do you do in the case where the person doesn’t recognise a threat, you become the audience. And this is really tricky and it can really lead to bad things if you don’t do it right.
“This is something that neuroscience has proven time and again, you can moderate another person’s opinion by simply asking questions. Because then they realise that they’re not as sure of themselves as they thought they were.” – Jay Heinrichs · [21:40]
Jay:
But one of the things to consider doing is to start asking questions. Don’t try to sell, ask questions, say, I need to learn more here. I’ve done my research, done my homework, this is what I’ve found out. Clearly you have a different perspective, but you’re living this day to day and I’m not. So let me ask you some questions about this. I’d like to learn more. And when you ask questions, and this is something that neuroscience has proven time and again, you can moderate another person’s opinion by simply asking questions, because then they realise that they’re not as sure as of themselves as they thought they were. So building a little bit of doubt in their minds. One of the things that does is that increases the anxiety level. And when you talk about a threat, what you’re dealing with is not just the logic of the threat, but the emotion of it, the anxiety. Building a little bit of fear that the person doesn’t actually know what he’s talking about.
Jay:
And really can’t totally defend himself about the lack of threat. Because he starts seeing the threat. He’ll feel threatened a little bit anxious. That’s when you calm him down, say, okay, then you speak very calmly and say, all right, I understand what you’re saying. This is really interesting. What I’m seeing is I think there’s a little bit of crack in that armour. And let me define what that is and let’s talk about, now you’re no longer in sales mode because you moved away from that, you became an audience. Now you become a consultant. So you start by being the sales guy. Here’s my pitch. Here’s who I am. Here’s our relationship. I’m building on it, giving my thing, total crickets, brick wall. Then you say, Hey, let me ask you some questions. I’d really like to learn from you.
“Sales is hard as everybody knows, but you really need to stop selling, just stop. Build on relationships, ask questions, sow doubt in the other person’s mind, build a little bit of anxiety in there, and then you become the consultant that solves their problems. And that is winning in sales.” – Jay Heinrichs · [23:32]
Jay:
Then when those questions get answers, say, I’ll tell you what. I see a little bit of a thing in here that needs to be fixed it seems to me, let’s talk about the fix. And now you’ve reframed the whole discussion around the problem that you’re going to solve. So you’re not convincing that person’s a problem. He’s defined it himself by answering your questions. Now, as I started out by saying, this is really tricky, it’s hard to do. And this is why sales is hard as everybody in your audience knows. But I think that one thing to do is to think, stop selling, stop, build on relationship, ask questions, sow doubt in the other person’s mind, build a little bit of anxiety in there. That’s the threat. And you want the threat to be internal, not something that you’ve imposed on them. And then you become the consultant that solves their problems. And that is winning in sales. That’s your gold medal.
Practical Questions That Force Your Prospects to Questions Their Beliefs · [23:59]
Will Barron:
What would a couple of examples perhaps be of questions that you could ask someone, as you were saying that it seems like almost the belief is sat on a chair and we just want to remove one of the legs right? We don’t want to wipe them all out until we undermine them and make them look like an idiot in front of their peers. We just want to perhaps chop a bit off one of the legs so it wobbles or pulled one out so it’s still standing. What are a couple of questions that we need to, or we could ask to perhaps do that. And obviously it’s subjective, but feel free to make up a random example. What are some questions we should ask Jay to pull one of these chair legs away?
Jay:
I can give you three categories. And by the way, this works with your crazy uncle at a family dinner as well. Like the guy who won’t shut up about Brexit. First, you ask for definitions. So what do you mean exactly by, and so if a person is using a term that just is like a cliche. So if the person says, for example, we’ve done the fix, we’ve already done the fix. I hear this all the time. You know, we’ve fixed this before, we’ve done the fix. You can say, what do you mean exactly by fix? That’s a really interesting term to me. Or you can say, if the person says, we’ve achieved maximum ROI on this, you can say, how do you define ROI on this? You have to do it in such a way that you’re like an improv comedian and not a prosecutor.
Jay:
So you don’t do it, like don’t furrow your brows, which is a problem with me, my brows furrow themselves. You have to look super interested and say, what do you mean by, it’s definitions, right? The next thing you do is to say, so do you have data on this? I’d love to see it. Now again, you don’t want to be overly aggressive with this, but say what kind of data is showing you this? Because you know the data I’ve seen, aren’t leading the same conclusion. I would love to learn more from you. And they may say that’s proprietary and you say, oh, hands off. But it doesn’t matter because you’re not really interested in the data. You’re interested in the doubt forming in that other person’s mind. The third thing you ask for is sources. To say, oh, that’s cool, did you get it from your own marketing data? Or does this come from another source? In other words, what you’re really asking is did you Google this? You idiot.
Jay:
Did you look it up on Wikipedia or something stupid, but you don’t say that. And you’re still looking really interested. And eventually what’s going to happen is if you actually are right, then that person may start being a little bit doubtful and saying, Hey, all right, I hear where you’re … And often what will happen when I do this, people will say to me, even though I’ve done nothing but asked questions, I’ll say, I see where you’re coming from here. You’re making a good point. I haven’t made a point, but they’ve made it in their own heads and that’s ideal. And that can now … Are you going to make that sale right away? Maybe not, but you can delay their decision so that you can make the sale on a follow up phone call or whatever. That’s if things are going badly.
How to Use a Buyer’s Doubts to Increase Your Odds of Closing the Deal · [27:04]
Will Barron:
And it seems like we should be writing this down. And how do we then in a future conversation, feed this back to them without saying, aha, I got you. I caught you out. Is there a way to structure our response further down the line to refer back to something they said that brought doubt up originally?
Jay:
Yeah. Everything the customer says is brilliant. So in the follow up phone call, you can say, I’m just thinking back on our conversation and I love the way you defined whatever, as in this way. And I love the way you kind of brought it around to a more sophisticated definition. Now you don’t want to turn this into a completely egghead conversation, this is the way I talk. You have your own way of talking, but one of the things you do is you basically start, you’re planting your own definition in if you do it right. You know, I love the way we talked about this and we came up with this and you know, the conversation came around to, there’s a real opening here for you. You don’t call it a threat generally.
Jay:
You can say, I see such an opening and opportunity here because of what you said. And that can be based on the definition it can be, and the data you came up with, came to this really amazing conclusion for me. And let’s talk about that. And I think the fix that comes through all this, the real opportunity is my selling you whatever I’m selling you. And now, are you going to make this sale then? Obviously you lose more than you win in this stuff. But I think your odds increased greatly.
To Set Yourself Up as a Consultant, Stop Talking About Yourself Too Much · [28:44]
Will Barron:
Is there any way we’ll wrap up with this Jay to deal with, and I don’t want to use the term like character assassination, because that’s way too heavy, but clearly a B2B sales professional going into a meeting is perhaps labelled a salesperson that only, and you kind of alluded to this before of we want to be consultants rather than a used car salesperson, which the stereotype is. Is there any way to preframe the conversation to use rhetoric, use language, to set ourselves up as a consultant and questions might be the answer to my question here, to set ourselves up as a consultant rather than a pesky salesperson who’s just trying to suck and take from the conversation from the negotiation itself?
Jay:
Yeah. I mean, one of the biggest mistakes I see salespeople do, and I also do a lot of work with fundraisers. I’m married to one. One of the biggest mistakes, my wife doesn’t make this mistake by the way, she’s perfect, and will be watching this. One of the biggest mistakes salespeople in particular make is the really good ones are so good at what they do. And it’s so hard to do. And they’re so good. They’re so articulate and so smart that they talk about themselves. And so the one big motto of rhetoric is it’s not about you. It’s about the audience. So before you walk in, remember the love beams, you’re going to send them out of your eyes and think it’s all about them. I care about nothing but what they want. What their desires are, and I’m going to meet those desires. And you come in with that attitude and try to be as genuine as you can about it. It’s not about you. Don’t talk about yourself. It’s all about them. When you feel the urge, ask questions, don’t try to sell, ask.
How to Argue With a Cat · [30:26]
Will Barron:
That makes lot of sense. And just before we wrap up, I want you to tell us a little bit about your book, How To Argue with a Cat. Is there anything in the book that we’ve not covered here, perhaps, anything unusual that would be useful for an audience of sales professionals listening to this?
Jay:
Why thank you for asking Will. You know, one of the reasons I wrote this book is that cats have a rather limited vocabulary. So one of the biggest problems I have in teaching people this art of persuasion, is that they get hung up on the words. Like what’s the perfect thing to say, what’s my script. Cats rule the world, or at least the households of people who claim to own them. How do they do that? They do that with things like posture, gesture, tone of voice, all these purring, which we can learn to do by the way. And the book shows how to do it in a way that you don’t seem creepy. All those things are more important than the actual words you use. So if you’re not the most articulate person in the world, you don’t have a brilliant vocabulary. You can learn a lot from cats.
Will Barron:
And we’ll wrap up with this. When you say that the body language if nothing else is more important than the words, did you say that flippantly or do you mean that, that you can say something perhaps less intelligent, but everything else is altogether, it can have more of an effect.
Jay:
Yeah. Remember we talked about relationship. Your posture actually can reveal how you feel about yourself. So this is the character you are portraying. So the posture is hugely important. You know all about eye contact and but at the same time, the warmth of your voice, and we’re back to love beams again man, your ability to prove that you love the people you’re with, that is what the ancient revolution is called decorum, which is the art of fitting in. And you may be completely different from your audience. You may not share the same values, but you can love them. And cats do that. I mean, that’s at least their owners believe this. That’s more important than the words you use. And they will think you’re the most articulate person in the world. If you show that love.
Parting Thoughts · [32:24]
Will Barron:
That makes total sense or Jay, other than the book, which we can find an Amazon will link to the show note to this episode of a salesman org, where can we find out more about you sir?
Jay:
In the usual fine social media places, hashtag Jay Heinrichs, at Jay Heinrichs or Jay Heinrichs.com.
Will Barron:
Perfect. A link to all that in the show notes, and that Jay, thank you again for coming on the show. I appreciate this. I love these conversations, mate. Tonne of value for the audience. I will thank you again for your time.
Jay:
Will, it’s a pleasure, love and kisses to Mark the shark.
