Did you ever stop to think about how complex a human dialog is? Let me share an experience I had a long time ago:

Back in the days when I got certified as a trainer based on the sales models from Huthwaite, I remember doing my first sales calls with that perspective in mind. One of the things that really struck me is how extremely fast paced a conversation is. All the things that take place during a simple dialog is truly amazing. It was at a much later stage, as I together with a few other professionals became more aware of the subconscious world, that I was completely blown away. In light of just pure conversation, I'm in awe when it comes to the information flow that takes place in the form of vibes and unspoken words - and that in addition to the conversation itself.

Well, during my Huthwaite sales coaching, I was happy to see that sales calls were recorded, allowing us to further scrutinize each word that was spoken. It would sometimes take several rounds of listening before I was able to pick up the real meaning behind what was being said. It was as if several layers of dialog came out in the open - bit by bit.

So one-on-one is the way to go. I love speaking in front of a big crowd of people. However, a good tip to anyone who wants to practice effective influence must be to "maintain the principle of one-on-one". One head (read: brain) alone is complex. If we make it two, which we normally refer to as a one-on-one conversation, then complexity sky rockets. Imagine what happens when you add a third person. Take my advice: If you can keep it one-on-one, do what you can to keep it that way!

Do you know what I really love about being in "sales"? (...and I wouldn't miss it for a thing!)

One of the great things about selling is how we are constantly confronted with "being good to people". Being good to people is that delicious mixture of service, patience, hard work and perseverance. It's sending out energy - positive vibes. Once sent out, there's always something coming back. Almost every minute of the day you get pretty much instant feedback on how you're doing. Of course it hurts a lot when we fail. But when we succeed, my, it's such a kick!

I remember two particular clients while working with major deals in an international IT company. My peers would tell me how bad these people were and impossible to please - how they would never express a word of appreciation and all that. You get that every once in a while, especially when you persist where others give up. What a fantastic feeling I had when I was able to keep passing on positive energy and then finally see the fruits of it. These two clients have remained till this day among my best business contacts. It seems like whatever I do now, they always have that little extra for me... almost as if I triggered something deep inside them that will never quit.

This struggle "to win the heart and mind of people" - not business per se - is so wonderful. The magic that follows from this communicative struggle is a need for self reflection, self awareness and all the emotions that follow. It makes you feel alive. It's life! This is what I wanted to highlight: I see in "The 3 Energies" a generic application to all aspects of life - self development and lifestyle, a successful marriage, quality of family life, relationships with friends, being a useful member of society etc.

Here's how I picture it in my mind:

It's as if in our deepest self there is a lot of dirt and filth. Our character needs to be "molded", our personality sharpened and our values and perspectives deepened. It's a process; not everything can be improved at once. If all at once, we'd break down. Every so often someone comes along and stirs up a little dirt. If we deal with it, we become a tiny bit more "pure", even though we're hurt in the process. Afterwards we feel better, until someone else comes along and stirs up some more of that muck. Surprised again we confront our weaknesses and patch up once more. And so it goes on... That's life, isn't it? The good thing about it is a steep learning curve. In daily battles like this we grow to mature. I believe sales people are privileged. They can, with a little extra effort, acquire hands-on practice in some of life's most important and challenging areas.

I was in a meeting today where it came out so clearly; a lot of sales people simply lack insight into basic psychological principles. It sometimes makes me a little sad. I'm NOT saying I do everything the right way. Far from it! But because I want to "help the world", I thought I'd paste an extract from the introductory pages of my book "The 3 Energies Behind Sales Success" (abbreviated 3E) here in the 3E blog. Please, tell me what you think about it. Here it is:

There are a lot of uncovered dynamics within sales, that traditionally only psychology has been preoccupied with. The sometimes artificial separation between the subjects of 'sales' and 'psychology' has kept sales people from obtaining relevant understanding of how communication really works. Sadly, sales people invest relatively little time into building a long term education through reading. Rather, they tend to focus on short term revenue generating activities and building relationships with their clients. Thus they rarely learn to appreciate and acquire deeper insight into the areas that are of far greater importance than what sales literature currently centers on. Today's literature and consequently 'sales training" is often poor and falls short of the deeper aspects of what selling is really all about. As a result the soft approach so much needed to become an outstanding (read: compassionate and human) salesman or woman is too rare! Instead business tends to be cynical and without a sense of human empathy, or to put it boldly, without love. Yes, what customers need most is in fact love and appreciation - or to further emphasize - attention from someone who cares on a personal level, beyond business only.

[...'Love', however, is but a small part of the second type of energy called 'connection'. With a bit of wit and rhyme we could say: "It's in the air when you care" (see chapter 3)...]

...effective sales and influence is all about energy. Like anything else in life - reaching out to others. It's not about quotes, closing, pipelines, PMA, a good pitch, super duper questions or all the stuff we so often hear about or spend our time doing. Yes, of course these habitual skills are critical, but still merely secondary compared to the innermost core of human interaction we call sales. If, however, we were compelled to highlight the nucleus only, clearly energy is among the absolute essential elements of sales success. In fact, once you've finished reading this book maybe you will have discovered that energy, the way it is defined here, is what selling indeed is all about. Energy is at the very heart of sales and sales success.

This is merely an extract. If, however, you would like to read more sample pages from 3E, then take a look here (demands that you register for a free log in on our site).

Did you ever find that a client or partner gave you input on your product or service, and then when you come back to your peers, they have a hard time appreciating this feedback?

In other words, you had a brilliant conversation with a customer or partner and together you made some very important discoveries. However, when you try to convey the same message and feelings to your colleagues afterwards, it just seems to fall on stony ground. What's all this about?

Well, here's an area where I've grown to understand I have 99% questions and less than 1% insight and possible answers. That 1% may be some of the following (and then - please fill me in on your understanding, cause I'd really like to know):

In the minutes of a meeting you may be able to record pure information, but the "Energy" and real interactive understanding and feelings only remain with the people that were present. Ironically, this seems to be the makings of a dilemma that really hurts:

People that were in the meeting retain "90% of the feelings and only 10% of the information" (figuratively speaking). The people that were absent - if they read the meeting summary at all - will have less than 5% of its contents, which is 100% facts / information and 0% feelings (read: energy). I believe the lack of this "Energy" is the root to the problem of why companies fail to innovate in "the right areas" with "the highest speed".

Thus, my humble assertion is this: If you're a sales person wanting to return customer feedback - i.e. market innovation, i.e. thee best type of product development - back to the team that actually delivers what should be improved, your main mission must be to:

REKINDLE THE ENERGY FROM THAT MEETING!

How one should go about doing so is a very interesting topic, I think. (In fact the book I just spent 7 years writing is all about energy; passion - connection - innovation).

...but about the dilemma itself!! a lot of it remains a mystery AND frustration to me. Please help ;-)

The longer I'm in sales, the more I become convinced that "innovation" is its closest sibling (at least in bigger, complex sales). I'm guessing you probably have the same experience. I'd love to hear what you think about it!

Today I got involved in a discussion on LinkedIn that asked about - what was it again..? Let me find the link... here it is. The question was about how even the best products or services fail, i.e. a limited number of buyers will generate poor revenue. My input was basically that it's the business model that determines whether or not we succeed (referring to David Chesbrough's book "Open Innovation"). The business model powerfully affects company culture and EVERYTHING that has to do with Innovation. If you put a lid on innovation - in any shape or form - goodbye to sales success!

I've experienced this so many times. What connects us most as humans, is when we create something together. It doesn't have to be something tangible per se. The keyword is "create", which is something I call "the stuff between heads". So, the next time you're in a sales call with a client, a partner or even with someone you just need to convince about something... If you don't want to make things too complicated, maybe the best way to go about it is to simply abdicate the know-it-all-role and recognize; "maybe I don't have all the answers - in fact, maybe I hardly know anything?" The result... the other person(s) will rise to the occasion and start giving creative input, which otherwise would never have been the case, had you dictated the conversation and direction of the dialog. (Everybody knows this, I guess! BUT, to actually DO it is something quite different.)

Looking back on my childhood, my parents did a great job at this. Sometimes they would turn to us, and just ask a question - maybe to this effect: "How on earth are we going to do this..?" or "I've been thinking about this for such a long time. What do you think..?" And here's the thought I wanted to share: My mom and dad would be 100% sincere about it. They didn't feel they had an answer and thus truly believed that we could come up with something far better. And you know what? We did! They stretched us far beyond the capabilities and limits we thought we had. And then comes the real miracle and energy in this thing: As children we respect them so much more exactly because of this than we would had they simply told us what to do (...being "experts", which hardly generates the same kind of respect).

The ownership, commitment and enthusiasm that grows out of this is what selling is all about, I believe... It strengthens the SBP atmosphere. There's probably only one way; it needs to be sincere. What do you think? Would you agree? Maybe there's much more to it? In any case; in many ways my parents were the ones to teach me that the best answers are "between heads". They taught me innovation. They didn't say it - they lived it.

Why is sales theory so superficial or shallow on the topic of push and pull? Did you ever think about that? I believe a lot of people know there's got to be more to it!

It's not a matter of push and pull only, but rather a deeper understanding of human interaction - I think. While building the eZ Systems sales force I emphasized to colleagues and partners the importance of SPP = SBP. It's always interesting to see when someone suddenly grasps the concept - it's almost as if a light switch is turned on inside; "Ah, NOW I get it", and then their behavior automatically leaps from good to excellent. And I'm not being modest. Even though it's a simple principle, most sales people don't really understand the depth that SBP provides to how we can interact with others.

If you've read the article, you may appreciate the next few paragraphs - if you didn't read it, I'm afraid reading the rest of this blog post could be like skipping dinner and going straight for dessert or "the sweet"...

I have five kids. I love them dearly and my hugging them is an absolute all-time favorite activity! But what happens when I impose my hugging on them? Everyone has experienced this and knows what happens. The tighter you squeeze someone, the harder humans will fight to be freed (...even when "love" is the initial driver!!). Robbing someone of their freedom is an absolute guarantee of antagonism. It seems to be deeply embedded into our system.

Right now I have my youngest daughter sitting on my lap. She came, just now. When she wants a hug, her desire for that cuddling is just as powerful as the antagonism would be if I came to steal a hug. Now, isn't that interesting?! Even my putting her aside to finish this blog post just makes her want that time together with dad even more. My wife takes over... Now my daughter is calling for me; "daddy" - almost in despair. You gotta love it! I'll have to go and pay her that special attention... (before I wrap up here ;-)

OK, back again.

Selling is not deciding for others. People will make their own decisions. Selling is not about coercion. The slightest hint of force or imposing our will on others is detected immediately - and most of all by our subconsciousness - which affects subconscious antagonistic impulses, feelings and decisions. Compulsion is part of those invisible negative communicative energies - it hampers connective powers. That's what happened when I went to buy those shoes, remember? I didn't even understand my own mind and behavior until later. Did you ever experience something similar?

O®O 3E audio blog - listen to this post O®O

I have so much to learn, and especially when I'm with others I find this reinforced time and time again. How easy it is to just make a slip of the tongue and blow what you've spent hours and weeks - even years - to build.

A good friend of mine said it so well: "It's like growing flowers, but every once in a while you decide to take a few steps in the flowerbed and walk around." Everyone knows flowers don't grow well if you step on 'em. Yet, we decide to step on others even more than just once or twice, and without blinking our eyes.

Of course, the social world of mutual relationships is a lot more subtle - and controlling our feet is probably a lot easier than taking charge of our mouth. But what is it that makes it so hard? Why is communication so extremely challenging?

Maybe it is because our mind and mental capacity is so much bigger than what words alone can express? When we're together with other people, the message we communicate is not in words alone. We know that! Some people say it's "body language", but I doubt that's even sufficient. There's much more to it. I call it energy. What would you call it?

In spite of the fact that no one is perfect, I still believe in the "perfect sale". And somehow that perfect sale has an almost indescribable energy to it, that I feel needs to be defined.

Actually, I believe I've been there many times. Not because I'm good at selling, not because the customer wants to accommodate me and also NOT because the product or service was perfect. What is it that brought us to that magic moment?

...and why should we care? Well. Imagine if we could apply the same principles - the same sweat and tears - in all settings. What if we could raise our marriage to new levels, family relationships, friends... every meaningful relationship. What if we discovered new powerful ways to tap into each others brains and emotions? That would really be something!

Every time I experience good communication I feel that desire for more. Do you know what I mean?