Way of the Wolf: Straight Line Selling: Master the Art of Persuasion, Influence, and Success

2Narrowing your eyes and compressing your lips, while nodding your head slowly, when your prospect is disclosing an issue that’s very important to them.

3Narrowing your eyes even more while compressing your lips more intensely, if the above topic deals with one of the prospect’s pain points. In addition, you’ll continue to nod your head slowly while letting out the appropriateoohsandaahsto show that you actually feel your prospect’s pain.

4Leaning forward when you ask an emotionally charged question, and then continuing to lean forward while your prospect answers (while also using the active listening techniques I laid out above in number 3).

5Leaning back when you ask a question that’s grounded in logic, and continue to lean back and nod your head in understanding and scratch your chin thoughtfully while your prospect answers.

While the above list assumes that the sales encounter takes place in person, for many of you that will not always be the case. So when the encounter takes place over the phone, your active listening will be distilled down to the various oohs and aahs and ahas and yups that you let out as your prospect responds to your questions. This will let the prospect know that you’re still on the same page as them, and that you get what they are saying.

Rule #7: Always follow a logical path.

The human brain is extraordinarily adept at analyzing a series of questions and determining whether or not they’re being asked in a logical order. If they’re not, then it will serve as a major red flag that the person who’s asking them is not an expert in their field.

For example, imagine being on the receiving end of the following series of intelligence-gathering questions, asked in exactly this order:

1What part of town do you live in?

2Are you married or single?

3What kind of work do you do?

4How long have you been living here?

5Do you have any children?

6What do you like most about your neighborhood?

7Are you self-employed or do you work for someone else?

Frankly speaking, if you’d been asked these questions in an actual sales setting, by the time you reached question number four, your internal monologue would have been raging away, a mile a minute, saying things like: “What the hell is wrong with this guy? He seemed like an expert at first, but he obviously has no idea what he’s talking about. Let’s get this nonsense over as quickly as possible and find a real expert, not an impostor like this guy.”

By the way, if you think I’m exaggerating, I’m not.

The good news, though, is that this entire issue is easily avoided. All you need to do is take the time to engage in a little strategic preparation—which, in this particular case, means making a complete list of your prospecting questions, and then keep arranging them in different orders until you hit on the one that stands out as the most logical. (Trust me when I say that the right order will be plainly obvious to you. This will be easy pickin’s, now that I’ve raised your level of awareness.)

In fact, let’s do a quick practice run with this right now, using the list of seven questions beginning on the previous page. If you recall, I purposely arranged them so they’d be out of logical sequence. What I want you to do now is take out a pen and paper (or you can use your smartphone or computer) and make a list of all seven questions in their most logical sequence.

Once you’ve done that, you can find the correct order below.

1What part of town do you live in?

2How long have you been living there?

3What do you like most about your neighborhood?

4Are you married or single?

5Do you have any children?

6What kind of work do you do?