There is a great debate surrounding over the validity of NLP, or Neuro-Linguistic Programming, but the major question for your sales team in Dubai is: can NLP benefit us in a sales situation?
You may not have heard of NLP, but only if you are new to the sales arena, because whether you are a saleswoman in Dubai or a super sales guy in New York, NLP is part of the sales toolkit.
Can't decide ? Let Yoda persuade you....
Some people believe that is a form of the Jedi Mind Tricks and find it laughable, however, it does well to remember that NLP started life as a therapeutic system to help people overcome problems in their life. The methods used to help people can be used positively to help sales people listen to their customers in a much more productive way. Good practice NLP techniques are also an excellent way to learn how to better communicate how your products will really benefit your customers.
One of the major demands on sales people is to try and persuade the prospective customer that their product is better than the competition’s product. In fact, they have to go one step further and convince the prospect that not only is the product better, it is so good that the customer willingly takes out their wallet and buys it from them.
To do this you have to be persuasive. Some people are naturally good at it and have probably been wrapping the world around their fingers since toddlerhood. Since not everyone has this innate skill, it is fortunate that one aspect of NLP does address this. It is called language patterns and helps you learn how to create a sentence that will direct people’s attention in the direction you want to go: your product!
According to bestselling author, Rintu Basu, there are tried and tested ways to use this technique. An example Basu uses during an interview on Your Charisma Coach, is the sentence: “The issue isn’t x, it is y”. It’s simple way of moving the conversation in the direction you want it to be going in.
Some people feel this conversation management technique intriguing, and at the other extreme there are some who think it is down-right immoral. Now, as a Dubai advertising executive or marketing junior, you are of course trying to get a person to buy your product or service over your competition’s product or service. This is not quite the same as trying to make that person do something they aren’t already thinking of doing.
Because there is a lot of misinformation on the internet about NLP, it is one area where a training course is really beneficial. For a professionally organised, systematic approach that will really give your sales team a boost next time they go to see a potential new client or customer, visit the Institute of Sales and Marketing website for details of their latest courses in Dubai on Professional Selling Skills. You can learn about how NLP can turn you into a more professional questioner, listener and communicator. A soon to be launched course is an NLP sales two day workshop which gives sales professionals a chance to really practice their NLP sales skills in a safe environment before using them to create rewarding customer relationships.
Many of us work in a challenging environment and it seems that challenge begins when we walk into the office space. If we have reached the upper echelons it may be that we have our own clearly defined workspace but the vast majority are fixed in a cubicular world which mimics early psychological experiments. It’s a wonder we don’t implode, it’s amazing we are actually productive.
Edward Hall regarded by some as the great grandfather of Neurolinguistic Programming (NLP) coined the term “proxemics”. This describes the space in which we feel comfortable in different contexts. With a large part of our lives spent at the office having space invaders encroaching on our spatial limits can impact on our performance. With cubicle space rapidly decreasing by as much as 50% in urban areas to increase cost efficacy environmental stress can have long reaching impacts on employee health, productivity and inter-cultural relations. Overcrowding in the animal kingdom leads to aggression and territorial tension but in the office do the polychrones inadvertently wind up the monochrones by borrowing ‘personal’ items and multitasking?
Space to think concentrate or think creatively is lacking in most office environments and whilst some are able to zone out and accept differences others can obsess on them seeking quieter spaces to perform. Personalisation of spaces, creation of physical barriers or feng shui may provide some cognitive solace against the shrinkage of personal space but ultimately we may be slaves to primal evolutionary forces. Research from Caltech shows that the amygdaloid region of the brain may hold the key as to why we maintain spatial distance from people, it indicates that this region is active during romantic approaches but also influences our fear response and holds emotional memory. One subject with damage to this region had no concept of personal space.
Creation of our own ‘personal bubble’ may not translate however across inter-cultural divides. Dubai is an extremely multi-cultural work environment, in the workplace you will hear different languages and experience different smells, tastes, dress, intonations, work ethics and cultural space boundaries. The question is whether you recognise them for what they are or react with your own defences seeing intrusion as a threat.
Edward Hall wisely said : We should never denigrate any other culture but rather help people to understand the relationship between their own culture and the dominant culture. When you understand another culture or language, it does not mean that you have to lose your own culture.