Tag: power of influence

From the time we are helpless newborns to the moment of our deaths, we need – and seek – help from other people.

In fact, one of the very first things we learn is how to determine if a person can help us or not, and, subconsciously, we never stop looking for that person who can help us advance.

If you understand that truth and position yourself as a person of influence who can help others, without even knowing why, prospects will be drawn to you.

So if you’re ready to become a magnet to your ideal clients, here are the two remaining keys to positioning.

1. Dress the Part

“When people walk into a room, without even thinking about it, they start judging the other people based upon what they observe.

If you’re dressed to impress at business or networking events, that first impression is likely to be that you are “different,” which, as I explained last time, is the first step to being seen as a person of influence.

Dressing the part affects you as well. You feel more confident and carry yourself more powerfully when your hair is done and, if you’re a woman and wear makeup, your makeup is professionally applied, and you have on great shoes. It’s the same for men.

Now, dressing the part doesn’t necessarily mean conforming to a corporate ideal. You have to be you.

Wear clothing that is appropriate to your niche or style, but that makes you stand out and brings out your best. Draw others’ eyes to you and be proud as they wonder, Who is that man or woman?

At Home Too.

You also want to dress the part while making sales calls from home. You may think that no one is going to see you, but you will feel the way that you’re dressed. As I’ve said, if you hope to influence others, you have to first influence yourself.

If you take the time and make the effort to dress well and then have that 10-minute conversation with yourself before you get on the line, you’ll likely be astounded by the difference in your results.

2. Bring an Assistant with You

Let’s say that you’re at a networking event and you look great. You’ve also taken my advice from the last article and polarized the conversation, and you have determined that the person you’re speaking to would be an ideal client.

After the prospect agrees to a follow-up phone conversation with you, the final key to positioning yourself is to have an assistant with you. Pass the prospect on to your assistant to put you in their calendar and vice versa, and free you to move on to the next person.

As your assistant handles the logistics and builds excitement about you and your work, the prospect will rightfully sense that everything is about to change.

Meanwhile, you are exactly where you want to be: perfectly positioned to influence that prospect to choose the life of his or her dreams.

When you have the desire to do or have something, but your personal or financial situation indicates to you that you can’t, you’re in prison.

You want something. You can’t have it. You’re stuck.

As your ideal prospects contemplate buying your service or product, many of them are in a prison of their situation too. They want or need what you’re got, but they think that they don’t have the money or their spouse won’t let them do it or the funds are earmarked for something else.

Whatever their prison is, they believe it. Those bars are very real for them.

If you haven’t integrated the Five Pillars of Influence, their prison may be real for you too. In fact, you’re probably in there with them, agreeing with their assessment or trying to convince them that they’re wrong. Either way, you’re losing the sale while they miss out on the solution that would change their life.

Fortunately, there’s an alternative.

Become Your Own Power of Influence

As I said last time, you need to bring them to clarity to bridge the gap between their prison and your solution, so that they naturally influence themselves. They buy from you and they feel really good about it.

The first step to doing that is Pillar 1: Become Your Own Power of Influence. That means, you learn how to influence yourself.

Think about it, how can you coax someone out of their prison, unless you have coaxed yourself out of yours?

You can’t. To help them, you must first help yourself.

How I Became My Own Power of Influence

Listen, I have been there. When I first started as an entrepreneur, nobody knew who I was. I didn’t have a cultivated market. I didn’t have a website.

I literally started off making cold calls, and, because I was completely broke, I needed to make sales right out of the gate.

The other thing you have to understand is that I was not a born salesperson. I had dabbled in sales, and I was okay at it, but I hated it with a passion. That’s right. I could not stand sales.

Then one day, early in our work together, my mentor asked me why I didn’t like to sell. I told him that I had no idea. “I just don’t like to do it,” I said.

He shook his head and said, “I know why you don’t like it. It’s because you think sales is something that you do to somebody, but it’s not. Sales is not something that you do to someone. It’s something that you do for them.”

In that moment the dots connected for me and my thinking shifted so dramatically that it allowed me to come at sales from a completely different perspective.

I finally understood what had been holding me back. As long as I felt that I was doing something to prospects, sales felt bad. It felt bad to sell to somebody.

But once I realized that I was offering my ideal prospects a solution that they actually need and want ~ I was offering them a way out of their own prisons ~ I came not only to love sales, but became very good at it, and my income skyrocketed.

I didn’t know it at the time, but I had also just taken the first step toward becoming my own power of influence. I’ll show you how you can start doing that for yourself next time.