Have you spent this week listening to the different yeses that you got from friends, family and colleagues? And seeing who is fobbing you off and who actually means it?
Last week I shared Chris Voss’s brilliant but simple method to understand if someone is lying to you.
The skill in being able to spot the lie comes from your ability to read people but in my view the way buyers and others give away how they are feeling is through their tone.
Excited or Scared? Angry or Condescending?
The tonality in which we speak makes up 38% of the success of a communication and I thought this week rather than just sharing words, I would share some tone.
1 simple sentence, 6 key emotions, all delivered in a slightly different tone.
The Same Sentence Spoken in 6 Different Tones - Watch it if only to laugh at me
To achieve success in sales, we have to learn to become experts in adjusting our tone.
To use different inflections (as I tried to show above) at different points in the buyer conversation.
Don’t be OVEREXCITED on a first call but do show EXCITEMENT and ENTHUSIASM. Sound natural and genuine.
Don’t respond in a NEUTRAL tone when someone tells you about the problems they’re experiencing. Ensure you respond with EMPATHY and lower the tone of voice but do save those neutral tones for when you’re responding to buyer objections.
Don’t sound DISAPPOINTED if a buyer does say no to you. That might close the door for the future. Share your disappointment in an upwardly POSITIVE tone and wish them well for the future.
Use an INQUISITIVE tone to show that you’re interested to know what is going on in the world of a buyer but don’t speak in an ACCUSATORY way if a problem arises and your customer decided to blame you. This will break any trust you do have and create bigger problems down the line.
Do show CERTAINTY to convey your confidence, but don’t come across as ARROGANCE in a negotiation phase within the sales conversation. Its more likely to harm than help.
Achieving success within our conversations comes down to delivery.
It’s not what we say but the way that we say it.
Keep practicing those tonal changes and inflections. Master them and you are a long way down the path to mastering sales and selling!
