Appealing Emotionally In Business

This might, on the surface, sound a little out there, but here's something I find overrated: Rationality. Sure, sure, it's important to have a solid foundation, a base from which to work, feet planted firmly on the ground, and all that, but in business the idea of rationality has won out exclusively over all else. In my opinion, we've lost something in the transition from 'mom and pop' businesses to faceless corporations. An integral part of selling our products or services, especially when dealing with an affluent clientèle, is our ability to reach them on an emotional level.

In order to be seen as vital and viable to our affluent prospects and clients, we must link to their emotions and their other-than-conscious minds. In previous articles, I've gotten detailed about how we can access these powerful conduits, so here I'd like to discuss why we should do this.

Emotions drive us. They, along with our DNA, make us take action. We are ruled by the same dives our primitive ancestors were ruled by--food, shelter, sex, fight or flight. . . they didn't have to think about traffic, they weren't worried about receding hairlines or expanding waists, they had no concept of choice, luxury or affluence.

This is what we need to hold foremost in our thoughts when we interact with a prospect. It's all about appealing to their core. Our gut instincts and impressions are far more powerful than the rational thought processes. The balance, and what we should seek to attain, is the balance between the rational and the core emotions.

Our gut reactions happen instantaneously. Malcolm Gladwell, in his book 'Blink', discusses rapid cognition, faster than the blink of an eye. Our emotions take one fifth of the time to assimilate as does our rational brain.

Think of this through the frame of how sales used to be and how they are now. At our core we are like cavemen, and on the surface we are incredibly sophisticated. In the last thirty to sixty years, we've seen the 'features and benefits' style of sales and the Dale Carnegie method of sales, both of which were passable for their time. As competition has increased and the marketplace has grown, so has our ability to detect B.S.

The ability to elicit the emotions that feel best--being understood, feeling at ease. . . these are responses we want to duplicate in our clients over and over. By accessing their values, eliciting their criteria, infusing everything we do with honesty, integrity and sincerity, and having a product or service we believe in to combine that with, this creates an emotional alchemy that is easy to sell.

In our advanced state of civilization (depending on your perspective) we are given amazing choices and opportunities. There are products and services available to us that even a generation ago, wouldn't have been dreamed up. In this ever expanding atmosphere it seems likely that those of us who know how to access the core and our prospect's emotions are going to be the ones capable of rising to the top in our given fields. By elevating emotions and partially bypassing rationality, we find ourselves with incredible persuasion power.