The Psychology of Persuasion is
a Valuable Skill to Learn

What separates a professional network marketer from an amateur network marketer? Professionals have learned the psychology of persuasion. It is a skill that can translate into massive amounts of people joining your team and buying your products.

The psychology of saying YES is “a revolutionary way to influence people.” Saying YES happens by prospects BEFORE the presentation. So, if we are to get prospects to say YES before the presentation, we must learn the psychology of persuasion.

Robert B. Cialdini teaches there are 50 scientific proven ways to be persuasive. 

Interaction with prospects on websites, social media, belly-to-belly contact, by phone or email can only happen if trust is created.

How is it that a prospect sees your website or your social media presence or meets you face-to-face or talks to you by phone or communicates with you through email and decides to interact?

The decision to say YES happens BEFORE there is interaction.

Here is what happens with the prospect BEFORE they interact with you.

— Mass acceptance.

— Testimonies.

— Positive Actions and Words.

— More is less.

— Trust, Likability and Belief.

— Presentation.

Mass Acceptance

If we were to walk by one person that is looking up and gazing at the stars, we would probably ignore them. If we were to walk up to five people that are gazing at the stars, we would take notice immediately.

We call this social proof. The psychology of persuasion uses social proof. Prospects don’t like being the “lone wolf.” They want to know that other people have done our business or bought our products before the prospects try it.

Magic words help us with social proof. “Most people,” “Everybody says,” or “Everybody knows” are magic phrases that speak to the prospects’ survival instincts in their subconscious minds. If “Most people,” “Everybody says,” or “Everybody knows” are doing it or saying it, then it is okay if prospects join our team or buy our products and services too.

Because others have gone before them and proved it works, they are easily persuaded to join or buy.

Testimonies. 

Most prospects are persuaded by people who think, and act like them. Prospects like certain testimonies over others because they follow the actions that are close to their own.  

What kind of testimony works best? Word pictures. Word pictures use the psychology of persuasion to speak directly to prospects’ experiences and actions.

Word pictures paint a picture of what will happen if you follow a certain course of action. “When you use our services, here is what happens to you.”

Examples of word pictures:

— “Do you feel your 9 – 5 job is boring as a VCR tape on constant rewind getting played repeatedly and wishing for something to change? How about fast forwarding to the end and putting in a CD with a new business opportunity from “XYZ Network Marketing Company” placing you in a new home and new car and making you 4 X the amount you make now working 20 – 25 hours a week from home?”

— “I’ve got a short story. Want to hear it? How much fun it will be driving slowly through the neighborhood in your new Jaguar XJ X351 bonus car earned by working only 15 hours a week from home and watch those stuck-up neighbors wonder how you can afford what they cannot.”

Positive Actions and Words.

The psychology of persuasion uses positive actions and words. Focus the prospect on all the people who do engage in positive actions and words with your business opportunity, goods and services.

Rather than call attention to the new distributors who missed a training meeting, you could not only express your disapproval for that behavior, but also highlight those who don’t attend the training are in the minority by pointing out the number of people who do turn up and attend.

There is an old saying that chaos brings chaos and order brings order. Positive actions and words encourage socially desirable behavior.

More is Less.

The psychology of persuasion teaches us that we talk our prospects out of buying our products and services or joining our team because we present too much information.

Instead of offering prospects the entire line of weight loss products, offer them only one.

Instead of showing fifteen different bonus programs with our compensation plans, show them the benefits of one bonus program instead.

Keep it simple. Keep it easy. Keep it to no more than two benefits.

The more we give fact upon fact to our prospects, the more we will lose the sale.

Trust, Likability and Belief

If the prospect does not trust us, they can not like or relate to us. Brain science teaches us that we have 15-seconds to create trust, likability and rapport, or else we lose the prospect forever.

Brain science teaches us that rapport is created when we see the world through the same eyes as the prospect sees the world. So, let’s work with the hand that is dealt to us.

If we can speak one fact that the prospect thinks is true and reasonable, the prospect will like us and trust us and believe other information that we give the prospect.

— We don’t want to work until we are 65. But we will retire on 40% of what we can’t live on.

— Taking care of your skin is important, and we never want our face to look older than we are.

— Jobs interfere with our week. We can’t get ahead by working on our boss’ dream.

Presentation

What kind of information do we give our prospects? Do we give our prospects 30-minutes of facts? Or, could we shorten it to less than two to three minutes?

Ask yourself, which works best for the prospect? A 30-minute presentation? Or, a three-minute presentation? The answer is obvious. Three-minute presentations always win out over longer presentations.

What kind of information could we present in two to three minutes?  

— What kind of business are you in?

— How much money can I make?

— What do I have to do to earn the money?

Answer those three questions and you have your two- or three-minute presentation.

— We are in the health and wellness business, which means people drink our healthy coffees, teas, shake and energy drinks every day. You can earn $10,000 a month if you talk to 250 people into drinking our products every day. Now, you don’t know how to talk to 250 people, but you can learn. You learned how to surf the internet, you learned how to use your cell-phone, and you certainly can learn a system of getting 250 people to drink our products every day.

We have answered all three questions in less than one minute.

Prospects make judgement about us. You will be judged, so let’s be judged in the best possible light. The psychology of persuasion is about influencing prospects to think positive about us.

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