You are judgmental of other people.

I know there are many who might take offense at that. It’s not my opinion. It is a fact of brain science.

You have already made hundreds, if not thousands of judgments, many of them subconsciously, about someone before they even open their mouth.

Communication expert Paul Watzlawick famously said,

"You cannot NOT communicate."

Think about that one.

Anything you do, say, write, or anything about you that someone else observes, is communication. So it creates a feeling, whether you meant it to or not.

And as long as I'm on a mini quote roll, here's Maya Angelou's:

"I've learned that people will forget what you said,
people will forget what you did,
but people will never forget how you made them feel."

Your email creates feelings. Your voicemail creates feelings. Your call opening creates feelings.

Which is another reason I've ranted several times about the ridiculous gimmicks some prospectors are using where they apologize for calling and say things like, "This is a cold call," "Don't hate me," and "You can hang up if you want."

Forget for a moment whether those are clever, funny, pattern interrupts, or whatever else they're being called this week.

How do they make the other person FEEL?

And more importantly, how do we make sure the feelings we create actually lead to someone buying from us?

I break that down in today's Big Lesson, and share some contrasting examples from a research trip.

OK, a vacation.

You are not in the sales business. You are in the business of creating feelings in people.

Success happens when we create positive feelings. Problem is, a lot of people are stirring up negative ones and don't even realize it.

Let me explain how to create the positive ones, so you can do it more often.

If you've followed me a while, you know I look at most human interactions through a sales lens. Because just about every interaction someone is selling and someone is buying. If not a monetary exchange, it’s ideas or actions. On a trip to Cabo San Lucas I picked up a lot of sales lessons, good and bad.

As I said earlier, you cannot NOT communicate.

It should be obvious why this matters to us as salespeople. Yet too often salespeople, and sales training, are focused on overcoming objections, getting past the screener, memorizing 100 questions, and other techniques that are mostly about what WE want.

How about starting with a different mindset: How can I make this person feel like I'm actually interested in them, and that I might be able to help?

Here are a couple of examples from that trip.

We spent most of our time at one property where we have a fractional ownership (their fancy word for a timeshare.) We played several golf rounds there at the Tiger Woods-designed El Cardonal golf course on the Pacific Ocean, where they play a PGA event in November.

A couple of the mornings when we checked in, the young lady working the counter did NOT give off positive feelings.

She acted as if we had interrupted her. She didn't look us in the eye. Her body language and facial expression looked like she had just rolled out of bed. All of that happened before she even spoke a word.

Then when she did speak, she mumbled and I had to ask her to repeat herself several times. She processed our transactions robotically. At the end, she gave an expressionless "Enjoy your round," which seemed like it pained her to say.

She did her job. And actually, I feel better served when going through the self-checkout at Albertson’s. 

And that's the problem.

Technically, everything got done. She processed the transaction. We got what we needed. She even told us to enjoy our round.

But how did we FEEL after dealing with her?

I'd like to give her the benefit of the doubt, but she did the exact same thing two days in a row, and I watched her do it with other golfers checking in.

And just hearing that, you probably felt something yourself. You probably have your own, “Let me tell you what happened to me…” similar story. 

I'm sure there are those who would come to her defense and say we don't know what's going on in her life. Fair point. But if you chose a paying job that requires you to create positive feelings in other people, you need to figure out how to do it, even on the days you don't feel like it.

That's being a professional.

Salespeople make the same mistake. You can do everything technically right…ask the questions, deliver the presentation, send the follow-up, log the notes in the CRM, and still leave the person feeling absolutely nothing good about dealing with you. You processed a call and a contact. You probably didn’t connect with a human.

Now here's the positive flip side. Not just one person doing it right, but an entire organization.

Toward the tail end of our trip we arranged to stay at the Chileno Bay resort, a five-star property, primarily so we could get access to the very exclusive Chileno Bay golf course.

The positive vibes started right after I made the online reservation, months earlier.

I got a personal email from the concierge thanking me for the reservation and letting me know she could help with dinner reservations, golf, or anything else we needed.

I told her we'd need a golf tee time. She had it handled the same day.

Important point here. Speed creates an impression.

Before we arrived, more communication, all aimed at making check-in fast with minimal paperwork. Another positive impression.

Fast forward to pulling the car up to the reception area.

Two attendants opened our car doors, smiled, and greeted us by name. They'd been tipped off by the gate attendant, where we'd stopped and given my name.

Tiny detail. Major impact.

They told us they'd take our bags to the room and park the car.

Another young lady came over, welcomed us with a warm smile, introduced herself, and said she'd walk us to the check-in desk. She asked if we wanted a beverage. Hot, steamy day, so I took her up on a cold Pacifico.

More positive feelings at every turn.

At the check-in desk, yet another woman greeted us just as warmly. One piece of paper for me to sign, handed us our keys, then introduced us to Eduardo, who seemed to appear out of nowhere.

He told us he was our personal assistant for the visit, anything we needed, and gave me his personal cell number. Couldn't have been nicer as he drove us to the room in a golf cart, asking where we were from, how the trip had been so far, all of it. And get this: he listened and asked follow up questions like someone who was actually interested.

He gave us a brief tour of the room. I noticed the TV screen:

Welcome back, Art Sobczak and Pamela.

We had been there five years ago.

They knew. Impressive.

And here's what REALLY got me.

Every single employee we ran into on the property made eye contact and greeted us. Good morning. Buenos días. Hi. Hola. Whatever.

I'm talking landscapers. Housekeeping. Maintenance guys. Everyone.

It's a policy of mine to do this myself with people everywhere, regardless of their job or status, so I can maybe brighten their day a bit. Often people aren't looking at you, so you don't get the chance.

With this staff, they always beat me to it.

And that's when it really hit me. This was a culture built around how they wanted guests to feel.

It wasn't an accident. Someone had decided this is the experience they wanted people to have, and the entire organization delivered it. 

It didn't feel scripted or phony either. These were real people who clearly cared about us.

You might be thinking, this is not high-tech, revolutionary, AI-inspired advice.

Exactly.

It's probably one of the easiest things you can do to make an impact on another person.

And it made such a big impact on me that I'm writing an entire newsletter about a resort where I paid about three times more per night than we could have, at another still very exclusive resort..

Think about that.

They charged me three times more, I felt great about it, and now I'm advertising them to tens of thousands of people for free. (And if someone from Chileno Bay happens to read this and wants to incentivize us to come back, well, that would create even more great feelings. 😉 Anyway…)

That's a pretty good ROI on making someone feel good. And it raises a question for us in sales.

Think about the early parts of your communication with a prospect. What feeling does your email create? What does your LinkedIn message say about you? How does your voicemail make them feel?

And maybe most importantly, for what I teach, how do they feel during the first 20 seconds of your call?

This is one reason I've always taught that the first objective of a prospecting call is to create no resistance.

Resistance is a feeling. Curiosity is too. So is trust. Feeling understood, feeling like someone actually cares what you have to say, that's a feeling.

Pressure works the same way. So does annoyance. And so does feeling like you're just another name on somebody's call list they need to get through today.

We're creating one or the other with everything we do.

So instead of only asking, "What should I say here?", add another question:

"How do I want this person to feel after interacting with me?"

Ask it before your first email. Before your call. During questioning. When you're following up. After they buy.

And this goes way beyond sales.

Negative feelings kill customer retention. How often have you said, "I can't wait to go back there," after dealing with someone who acted like they couldn't care less?

On the positive side, the benefits are pretty obvious. Greater customer satisfaction. Word-of-mouth referrals. Deeper relationships.

And yes, you feel better too when you make someone else's experience better.

So what do you do?

Start by asking yourself,

"How can I make this person's experience better?"

That means being less me-focused and more others-focused.

Do it in planned interactions like sales calls. Do it in spontaneous ones too, with everyone you come in contact with.

It is ridiculously easy to look someone in the eye, smile, and say hi. Or thank someone like the person cleaning the public restroom, or anyone doing a routine job where people usually walk right past the like they are invisible.

I read something the other day that suggested parents stop asking their kids how their day at school went. Instead ask,

"Whose life did you make better today, and how?"

That's actually a great question for us to ask ourselves every day.

And here's another:

How did people feel after interacting with me today?

James Keller said, "A candle loses nothing by lighting another candle."

A lot of people are probably going to feel something because they interacted with you today.

Make it something good.

Now go light some candles.

If today's message hit home, this is a big part of what we work on in my Smart Calling Ultimate Sales Pro coaching program.

There are several pillars to true sales professionalism, and being others-focused is one of them. The others are being fearless and rejection-proof, having a proven sales process and tried-and-true messaging, and being disciplined enough to actually do the work.

This is the only public offering I have where I give personal one-on-one and group access.

If you're ready to take the next step in your sales career, and your life, check out the details here:

https://smartcallingtraining.com/aes-application

Last week I announced I’m liquidating my inventory of a couple of books that we’ve sold over 40,000 copies of.

These two books contain 800+ pages of sales and prospecting ideas, examples, questions, word-for-word language, and techniques that are as relevant today as the day they were written.

But my business model has evolved, plus I’m done with paying to print, store, and ship books. (My flagship, Smart Calling, is published by Wiley, not me.)

Once those are gone, they're gone.

And, by the way, some people wrote in last week saying that their security software was giving them a warning about the link. That typically is a result of the software being extra sensitive. I can assure you, nothing malicious with the link or site. If you’re still a bit iffy, just call my office at (480)699-0958.

Go make it your best week ever!