Shari Alexander | The System for Influence & Persuasion

System Overview

Ask yourself “what do I need to know?” instead of “what should I say?”

• One common mishap that an aspiring influential person makes when he/she’s about to engage in a very important conversation, is to ask him/herself the question “what should I say?”.
  • This question only puts you on the back foot and sets you up for potential failure.
  • With this question, you’re only figuring out the things to say based on your knowledge, perspective, values, and background.

• Instead, a good influencer should ask himself/herself the question “what do i need to know?”.
  • It will give you a glimpse of the receiver’s knowledge, perspective, values, background, and context.
    • What is important to them?
    • What motivates them?
    • What puts them in a positive/negative mood?

• Start focusing on the people you’ll talk to and know more about them.
  • Before you communicate, get to know who’s going to be your audience.

The core three-step process of influence:

Step 1: Observe.

• Find the smoothest possible path to make your audience emotionally and logically agree to your statements or ideas.

• There are a few different ways to do this step based on your situation.
  • Sit at your desk and write out things you know about the person.
  • For campaigns, write out your knowledge about your ideal target market.
  • If you’re speaking to a group, know the culture of that group.

• Figure out what’s important to your audience.

• These are the things to look for during this phase: Influential V. I. B. E. S.
  • V (Values)
    • What do they value? What’s important to them? Values are a human’s core operating system that tells a person which is right, and which is wrong. Your values may be different from your audience’s values.
    • One of the quickest ways to discover someone’s values is to know how they’re spending their time and money.
  • I (Identifiers)
    • How does your audience talk about themselves? What labels do they gladly wear?
    • Framing your influential argument based on the concepts your audience identifies with, they will more likely approve your concept.
  • B (Beliefs)
    • Beliefs are the meanings that we give to different situations.
    • You may discover some of your audience’s values if you observe their beliefs closely.
    • Pay attention to these 4 types of beliefs:
      1. What do they believe about the problem you’re solving?
      2. What do they believe (positive/negative connotations) about the solution you are presenting?
      3. What do they believe about themselves in relation to the situation? Do they think this is important for them? Do they think they shouldn’t be bothered with it?
      4. What do they believe about you?
    • Focusing on these 4 will help you identify which beliefs you can validate and which you can take head-on.
  • E (Emotional triggers)
    • This is the stimulant that puts your audience into either a positive or a negative state.
    • What triggers them to be in a good mood and bad mood?
    • We might want to focus on positive emotional triggers but be aware of certain negative emotional triggers.
  • S (Secrets, goals, and desires)
    • One influential step you could take is to attach your ideas to your audience’s goals.
  • You don’t need to know all five of them and there are no set quotas or rules on this.

• During this phase, focus on being curious about your audience’s VIBES and avoid judging them to be able to see all the influential opportunities.

Step 2: Connect.

• Look for the connections between your goal and your audience’s positive association with things.

• Another thing you need to make sure of is that you’re connected to your audience by building rapport.
  • If you haven’t built a rapport with your audience, you won’t have the right to influence them.
  • Don’t take those rapports for granted.
  • Make sure you’re in rapport with your audience before chiming in your influential pitch.

• From the things you observed from your audience’s VIBES, pick a topic that puts your target market into a positive mood.

• If a conversation is negative to start with, feed your audience’s VIBES to make them be open-minded as the conversation goes.

• Be honest at what you say. A positive influencer is truthful and ethical to what he/she says.

• One of the easiest ways to connect with somebody is to be with them.
  • Be present.
  • Listen to them.

Step 3: Influence.

• This step becomes more specific to the individual rather than the situation.

• Here are a few influential techniques and points to keep in mind once you get on this stage:
  • Utilize the word “because”.
    • Communicate your reasons behind requests. Team members can easily get demotivated if they lose sight of their significance on your business.
    • You don’t need to use it every single time you make requests, but you need to be aware if you’re no longer using this word at all.
  • Use the bucket technique.
    • This one’s helpful when you’re looking for a number, ranges, budgets, and the likes.
    • It’s also helpful when you’re trying to qualify a prospect.
    • This influential technique gives your prospects the safety to self-select and give you helpful information without them divulging what feels like too much information.
  • Linguistic social proof technique.
    • This one’s applicable to almost all situations.
    • You may convey social proof on conversations by using specific words depicting that most people have been choosing something consistently (example: typically).

• This step is what people mainly see, but it’s just the tip of the iceberg.

• To be able to reach this step and influence people around you, you should already have understood and connected with your audience.

• Part of the process is to understand the outcome that you’re looking to achieve. Start with the end in mind.

• Influence is communication with a goal. You can be a great communicator, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re influential.

• If you’re not creating the change you seek, you’re not an influential person.

• Most people struggle on this step since they are only clear on what they don’t want but vague on what they DO want.