Sales presentations should be structured from the point of view of the potential client. All of the classic “solution” type sales methodologies boil down to being able to identify what the prospects’ “pain” issues are. This is to say that bragging about your product or services is not the best way to get the attention of your would-be customer. Your job is to figure out what they need and then fulfill that need.

With that as a given, you absolutely must get to the point quickly and efficiently with all sales presentations. Time is precious, so don’t waste your audience’s time. This means the fewer PowerPoint slides the better. Everyone who has experienced the dreaded “death via PowerPoint” syndrome will agree that with slides less is more.

The same holds true to the number of words or images on a slide – the fewer the better. Keep it very simple and get to the point. Don’t put your entire presentation on the slide deck. Most of it should be spoken directly to the folks you are selling to, with eye contact, and as much interaction as possible. Get the people you are presenting involved throughout the session, encourage them to ask questions, and get a good dialogue going. The more involved they are, the more attention they are paying to you, which is all to the good.

You should have one main presenter and no more than one or two others. You may want other experts to be in the room with you, in case specialized discussions ensue. Use humour sparingly and deftly, if at all. Some people are good at injecting a bit of levity into a presentation, but most of us are not. Never make fun of your competition, of course. Unless absolutely necessary, don’t even mention your competition at all, referring to them only as Brand X. Everyone will know who you are talking about.

Hand out colour copies of all your slides after your presentation has been completed, never before. You want their attention to be focused on you as much as possible and you don’t want people reading ahead. Be very careful as to when (if at all) you discuss price. And before you get to the pricing part, be sure that you have communicated clearly the value you will provide. Make sure that you ask for the sale at the conclusion of the event. If you get agreement, you are done, as far as presenting is concerned. Once you get to “yes”, you’re done.

To live in the present means to become aware and conscious of your actions, feelings and thoughts. It means bringing your attention to the present moment and dealing with it effectively, instead of focusing on the past or future. The past has gone away and cannot be changed, and the future will be the result of the present, of the way you think, feel and act now.

True living occurs in the present moment, the only moment that exists.

Below you will find a conversation between a teacher and a pupil about living in the present. This is an excerpt from the book ‘Peace of Mind in Daily Life’.

Teacher: Living in the present moment helps you to avoid worries, fears and anxieties, and wasting your time on futile and negative thoughts.

If you keep thinking about the past, you allow all kinds of emotions and thoughts to rise into your consciousness, affecting the way you feel and think. Most often, such reminiscing disturbs the mind and agitates it, which is the opposite of peace of mind.

It is the same with thinking about the future. It is okay if you devote some time to thinking about it and planning it, but if you just keep dwelling on it and worrying about it, you are keeping peace of mind away.

The best approach would be to direct your attention to the present moment, to what you are doing and what is happening around you at each moment. By occupying your mind with the present moment you keep your mind busy, and don’t make room for worries, anxieties, fears or unpleasant memories.

Pupil: Do you mean to say that I should not think about the past and the future?

Teacher: Learn from the past and plan for the future, but don’t dwell too much on them. You cannot change the past and you cannot yet live in the future. The only place where you can live and act is in the present. Actually, what you do in the present affects your future.

Reliving past events in your mind and daydreaming about the past or the future, keep the mind busy with endless thoughts, but if you focus your mind on the present moment, you don’t make room in your mind for unnecessary and disturbing thoughts or emotions.

Living in the present means that you direct your attention to what is happening now, enjoying it and making the most of it. By focusing your mind on the present, you don’t have time or opportunity to wallow in useless and negative thoughts and emotions relating to the past or the future.

Wake up to the present moment and live in it. The past happened and is over, so what is the use of reliving it?

You lose peace of mind if you constantly live in the past and think and visualize events that have already happened. You also gain nothing by worrying about the future. On the other hand, concentrating on the present moment, on what is happening or what you are doing right now, frees you of unnecessary, burdensome and unpleasant thoughts and emotions, and brings peace into your mind.

Want to get more listings? One of the best ways to increase your listings is to increase your closing ratio. Of course you could just go on more listing appointments and leave your closing ratio where it’s at but that’s a lot harder than just closing more of the appointments you go on.

Here are 5 ways to increase your closing ratio when conducting a listing presentation.

1. Don’t “Wing” It But Rather Use A Proven Real Estate Listing Presentation

Most Realtors use a CMA as their listing presentation. They compete over price to get a listing. It’s not unusual for a Realtor to name a higher price than they feel the home will sell for just to get the listing. That’s why I hate competing over price and basing my listing presentation around a CMA.

What has always worked best for me is to evaluate the seller’s motivation before going on a listing appointment and then using a proven listing presentation to get the listing.

The listing presentation that I like the best is one that presents a big problem like the housing market is still going down (at least it is where I am at in Florida); then solve that problem by showing how you sell homes in a rough housing market, make an offer and ask for the listing.

2. Be Passionate And Confident

Most people have a very short attention span. People get bored easily. If you are not excited or passionate about what you’re saying then your prospect won’t be either. Even if you are not passionate about your listing presentation, act as if you are and you will eventually become passionate about it.

People want to do business with someone whom they feel can get the job done. You must act confident and speak with authority to put confidence into your prospect. You can sell their home just as well as anyone else if not better, right? So act like it and your prospects will feel it and want to do business with you.

3. Watch For The Buying Signals

Every good salesperson should look for the signals that tell you the other person has been “sold” and that the time has come to ask for the signature. When you see the buying signal don’t fail to ask for the listing. Otherwise if you keep selling you could sell yourself right out of the listing.

Here are some buying signals to watch for during your listing presentation:

When the prospects ask you about…

- what commission you charge.

- how long your listing contract is.

- questions about how you promote your listings.

Or when the prospect says something like…

- “How quickly will agents start calling to show the home?”

- “How soon do I need to have my home in showing condition?”

- “Another agent said they would list my home for 5%.”

- “Another agent said they would take a 90 day listing.”

- “I’ll list with you if ________”

- “When will you put my home on the MLS?”

- “Will you do open houses?”

When the buying signal comes, get out your pen and listing contract and go for the close. Don’t continue talking about the sale or what you will do to sell the home. Talk about the listing terms, such as the listing price, length of the listing agreement, and commission.

4. Ask For The Listing

If you stumble around when the time comes to close you can easily lose the listing. You shouldn’t wait for the prospect to decide they want to list before you decide to close.

Here are some statements you can use to lead into the close or ask for the listing outright:

“When can I start?”

“When can I start promoting your home to my buyer list?”

“When can I tell my buyers and the other agents in my office about your home?”

“Can I take pictures of your home today?”

“Would it be okay if I start advertising your home today or should I wait until Monday?”

“Don’t you agree that my marketing plan will get your home sold fast for the best price?”

“Don’t you agree that with everything I’ve showed you about the housing market, the sooner I sell your home the more money you’ll get for it?”

5. Don’t Give Up When The Prospect Says “I have to think about it”

In most cases objections are a good thing. It means your prospect is interested in listing with you. One of the most common objections agents get hung up on during a listing presentation is “I want to think about it”.

If you have already answered most of your prospects’ questions and they just seem to be stalling then get them to commit. Find out what their main objection or concern is by saying something like “Is there anything else holding you back from making this important decision?”

If they tell you there’s nothing else holding them back, then ask them “why?” they have to think about it? You could say something like “Joe, most of the time when a home seller tells me they have to think about it there’s something I have failed to explain well enough in order for them to make a decision. So what did I miss and what is it that you have to think more about?” Once you have said this wait for their answer. Do NOT talk until they have come up with a reason why they have to think about it…even if there is a silence for thirty seconds or more.

Do your best to overcome all of their objections for waiting and thinking more about the decision. If they come up with a lame excuse to stall like “I never make big decisions like this until I have slept on it” then tell them that you respect that and say something like “I respect that. Don’t you feel that I can sell your home?” when they answer yes then go for the close again and say something like“then put me to work today and let me start marketing your home immediately”.

While you say this put the listing contract in front of your prospect and put your pen in their hand while you look them confidently in the eyes. I know this may sound like high pressure sales or even a bit cheesy but you don’t get paid just to visit their home, right? You get paid to close.

We used to call them visual aids – those things a presenter or speaker or instructor used to help an audience better understand what he or she was saying. Sometimes they were pictures. Sometimes they were props. But whatever they were, we used to expect the presenter or speaker or instructor to do the heavy work of engaging the audience and conveying the information they wanted to impart. And then along came PowerPoint and we all forgot the essential meaning of visual aids.

Aids are intended to help speakers – not to replace them. They are meant to enhance, support, or add an element of entertainment to the presentation – not to provide a script we can all read together. They are intended to use vivid pictures to simplify difficult concepts, visuals to eliminate complicated text. They add power graphically.

To Microsoft’s credit, PowerPoint has become idiot-proof, which means we can all use it easily. Sadly, that also means we can all misuse it badly. We can type away and put every word we plan to say right on our screens. Plus, we can add all those animations or transition tricks the kids love to use and drive our audience insane as words fly in from unexpected directions.

Then too, you can print those screens and use them as handouts, thinking you’ve killed two birds with one stone – when what you have actually done is killed your opportunity to engage the audience. If there is enough text on the slide to use it as a handout, you have given your audience a reading exercise, not a presentation. A few keywords in bullet points? Sure. Complete sentences? Absolutely not.

The reality is, you can either engage your audience and be the focus of their attention, or you can be the lead reader. You cannot do both. And do be aware that as you read, your audience is ahead of you – and getting more annoyed by the minute. One might certainly ask, if your goal is to give your audience something to read, why drag them in to your presentation?

Imagine if you attended a play and instead of receiving a program, you were handed the script. If you are anything like me you would be thinking something like, “How can I watch a play when I am reading a script?” The fact is, you can’t. Our brains are not made for that kind of multi-tasking – reading and listening and watching all at the same time. And if we all read along together, we miss the action – the human dimension the presenter brings into our midst.

Still, that’s not the only problem. Even though Microsoft suggests it, using slides as handouts is a big mistake because printed slides are the exact opposite of reader-friendly reading material. Slides are horizontal; documents are vertical. Slides should be on dark backgrounds; documents should be on white paper. Slides use huge font; documents use nothing bigger than 10 to 12 points – or they are harder to read, not easier. And so on and so on.

The issues I describe are not problems with Powerpoint. They are problems with bad presentations. So, let’s understand the real point of PowerPoint.

Good presentation slides:

• help the presenter engage the audience
• keep audience’s eyes focused on the presenter
• simplify, enhance, highlight or visually delight
• uncomplicate difficult concepts
• convey big ideas in simple, pictoral form
• avoid text as much as possible
• use big, vivid pictures – not cheesy clipart
• add a touch of humor or entertainment
• make the presenter look good.

Used well, PowerPoint is an invaluable visual aid. It creates a powerful opportunity to be warm, enthusiastic and engaging. It provides a background visual that gives the presenter room to be real and talk conversationally. It allows the presenter to be flexible and human and likable. It makes the presenter look good. And that’s the point.

Do you also get nervous or fear presenting in public?

Whether you are a CEO, consultant or a soccer mom you not alone!

My friend Andy Lopata even wrote a book called, “And Death Came Third”; based upon an old NY Times survey. It revealed that those who were asked felt speaking in front of colleagues, followed by speaking in front of strangers, were both feared more than death itself!

Now a few decades later, most basic presentation courses still focus on word choice, structure and rhetoric. But when it comes to your pounding heart, lack of breath, sweaty palms and shaky knees, the best solution still offered for your nervousness is, “Practice makes perfect“. Understanding and practicing presentation structure and rhetoric definitely helps to minimize your fear of speaking, but will that do it for you?

It didn’t for me; especially after my classmates forced me from the stage when my mouth froze shut from the terror I felt from presenting our report. Since that nightmarish experience, I have been studying the mechanics of body language, especially focusing on presentation technique. For over 20 years now, I have held successful workshops in effective presentation technique and efficient body language. For me, the positive comments and presents I have received from happy, empowered participants seems proof that if we can now enjoy presenting, so can you!

So, if you wish to empower yourself to better express your message at a parent/teacher meeting, want to feel even more at home presenting to prospective, yet skeptical buyers or calm down angry shareholders, below are four simple, almost boring tools. Each tool can drastically and effectively help you calm you down and empower you to deliver a clearer, more powerful and actionable message.

These four simple but effective tools to handle your presentation fears are:

· Inspired breathing

· Serve more and perform less

· Remain present

· Unite rather than separate from your listeners

These tools may first appear to be too simple and boring to consider. If so, consider this, how good have all those complicated and expensive tools worked in relieving your presentation nervousness? Even worse, how many times have you bit your tongue and remained silent on something important because you were too scared to speak out?

If you are serious about enhancing your self-expression and getting more stuff done, then simply try the following:

Inspired Breathing:

You can either inspire yourself and others by breathing more, or you can stop breathing and hope to survive your presentation. Beware that if you stop breathing long enough, you will expire. The more and deeper you breathe, the more you relax. The more you relax, the more each cell in your body will resonate with your message.

Just like a flute, saxophone or tuba, the more air that flows through a wind instrument, the richer its tone becomes. By using our lungs, vocal chords and mouth, aren’t we also wind instruments? Yet we sometimes get nervous or scared and when we do, we breathe less or stop breathing altogether. The more air used also allows for better sound control.

Practice breathing more deeply and consciously to inspire both yourself and those listening. The more relaxed you become, the more easily your message will resonate. The more of you that resonates, the more each of your cells vibrate with your message.

Isn’t it true for you too that the deeper and richer the speaker’s voice is, the more easily you believe the speaker’s message? Consciously take in more air and see if you too resonate more inspiration and believeability.

Serve More and Perform Less:

Standing for and presenting from a platform of service, rather than trying to perform for your ego is a surefire way to calm your fears while increasing your presentation efficiency. Performing, in this case, means trying to please your ego. Ego shows up as that little voice in your head. The one that constantly tells you what you should do and what you could have done better. In reality, this is your internal thought process and only exists deep inside your head. It has nothing to do with the reality of those people listening to you here and now. That voice is an abstraction buried in your mind. Reality is where measurable change can occur.

The more you train to focus upon serving those listening in front of you with a healthy dose of curiosity and intention, the more you can consciously connect with them and create measurable results. Just like a waiter who “disappears” into the background of a tasty dinner conversation, serving your listeners allows you to “disappear” into their richer and more actionable experience. With practice, increasing your level of service also lowers the volume of your little, internal voice and lessens the fear of the scary thoughts it imparts. Thus, serving more and performing less is a win/win for you and your listener.

Remaining Present:

Staying present with your audience rather than retreating up into your thoughts and fears is the most effective way to reduce or eliminate your fear of presenting. Presence allows you to communicate better. What scares us most is not presenting, but our fear about all those thoughts of what can go wrong when we do. Again, if you can eliminate that little voice in your head representing ego and increase your level of service, you will automatically dampen or eliminate the source of your fears.

Simple, right? Not if you are sure that little voice is you!

Yet, is this true?

What if that voice is just a program containing a bunch of scary thoughts?

Keep in mind that if that little voice is you, then who do you suppose is listening?

When you really begin to distinguish that little voice and all those scary thoughts as a program, or just another subset of you, you can then begin to adjust or pay less attention to them. You become the programmer rather than the program.

Then you can also change the channel and tune into empowering thoughts instead.

Finally, just as if you happen to lose your arm, you would still be you, right?

The same goes when you remain present by training to pay less attention to what’s going on between your ears and focus more on serving who is in front of you. Remaining present eliminates distance between you and your listeners and allows you to effectively tackle their concerns, here and now.

Uniting with rather than separating from your listeners:

Connecting more with your listeners by using the above tools is an effective way to unite with your audience. Now, physically walk towards them and you will also sense an increase in connection. Practice asking them more thoughtful questions, listen attentively to their answers and watch your engagement with each other develop further. All of these simple service tools and tips will bring you closer together. They will help create stronger feelings and deepen the relationship between you and your listeners. After all, who do you trust and believe in more, someone you feel you have a relationship with, or someone trying to separate themselves from you?

Still not convinced?

Stand in front of a full-length mirror. Cross your arms and move away from your image. Get a sense how more distance increases your feeling of separation.

Now, walk towards your image, take a few inspiring breaths of air and open up your arms and unite with that person you see. Sense any difference now?

Be more present, inspire, serve, and unite more and enjoy speaking

How many times have you heard others talk about all of these simple tools?

Yet how often have you consciously applied them when standing up and speaking?

Each one alone is powerful, so you can begin by practicing your favorite. Notice how much more connected you feel. Begin combining them and marvel at your increasing level of self-confidence. Take on mastering them and enjoy how much richer your life gets.

Initiating the debt negotiation transaction can be a very complicated affair. This is the reason why you should make use of online services to find out more information on consumer debt negotiations services.

If you employ an expert to take over the task, you need not worry about the right way to begin or the right way to end. You just have to stick to your plan and repay your debt amount as quickly as possible. The experts shall take care of the task of settlement of debt and negotiations.

Of course, this does not mean you should completely waive your responsibility of analyzing the performance and the legitimacy of the service provider. There are many persons who are of the opinion that the services that debt settlement experts offer is no different than any other service which the individual can do on his or her own.

Well, consumer debt negotiation services are not as simple as you think. There are many technical and financial aspects that must be considered. Each and every proposal received from the credit card company must be analyzed and you should conclude whether it is the right way to proceed or not. If you have no idea how the credit card companies work, you will obviously find it very difficult to negotiate unsettled debt.

Remember that there is absolutely no point in coming back with a thirty percent settlement amount on a debt worth fifty thousand dollars. That is only going to make things worst. If you want a consumer debt negotiation services to work for you, you will need a clear goal in your mind.

You will have to analyze your finances and determine whether you need settlement or not. If you do, you will have to find out the exact percentage of settlement you need to overcome your finances. You will have to add another five percent to make sure you are safe from any contingency. Once you have all this information in your hand, you just have to proceed and negotiate.

You will have to leave certainly way for the process of negotiation. You are not going to walk out of your negotiation just because you were offered a forty five percent discount instead of fifty percent discount, right?

All this must be sufficient for you to realize that consumer debt negotiation services can quickly assume very complicated tenor. The right way to overcome this problem is to employ professionals to take care of the task.

Negotiations, even the word can cause stress in the minds of some people. With business owners, especially small business owners, the fear of negotiating can be the death knoll of the business. Even worse, when negotiating against larger organizations, small business owners, at times, are in such great fear of losing business opportunities they forgo the attempt to negotiate.

This writing is the first in a series of articles, written for small business owners. In the forth coming articles, we will explore the psychology behind the fear of negotiating. We will also discuss strategies that can be employed to overcome that fear and explore how to position the organizations of small businesses in a better position to negotiate.

In the American society of which we live, more so than any place in the world, we are taught to accept a price, or offer, when we are presented with it. We are taught not to question a price. When a price, or offer, is legitimized in writing, we tend to believe that price is etched in stone. It becomes unmovable to the degree that we mentally believe that to be the truth.

One simple question that can always be asked, when making a purchase is, can you do better on your price? When posed in the right environment, you will be surprised at the results (In a later issue, we will discuss how to get the seller into the right environment.) At worse, the response is, no. If thats the case, you have not lost anything. You are no worse off than before you asked the question. On the other hand, the seller just might lower her price. Thus, you save money.

Some people feel cheap or have their status lowered in their own minds, when they ask for a price reduction. We are all aware of some of the names that have been associated with people who employ these tactics. Unfortunately, two words that we don’t associate, and maybe we should, are better off. As you go throughout your day tomorrow, just for fun, ask people that you are making purchases from if they can do better on their price. If it makes you feel better, tell them you are seeking lower prices as part of a negotiation session you are involved in. Ask them to help you with this endeavor. Ask them to help by lowering their price by any small amount. Once you get good at negotiating, you can set a target amount that you would like to have taken off the cost of a service or merchandise. By the way, asking people to help you is a tactic you can use when negotiating. Most people love to help their fellow man. We will talk more about tactics in our next edition.

When it comes to negotiating, as the folks at Nike say, just do it! You might be pleasantly surprised with the outcome.

Negotiations is not a science, rather it is an art, and the degree of success most often depends on the negotiator’s knowledge and application of various tips, strategies, and tactics. No matter how good you are, you will not always be able to produce a successful negotiation. Some negotiations inevitably fail to achieve agreement. But the purpose of this article is to assist you in having the necessary skill sets to put you in the best position for success when negotiating in real estate by providing you with the 7 steps to a successful negotiation.

In real estate, the real estate professional will have the most success negotiating with a motivated seller. Sellers can be motivated to sell for several reasons: moving and don’t want to be a landlord, job loss and looking to avoid foreclosure, divorce, house is an unwanted inheritance, mortgage increased and can’t afford, etc… Therefore, the most important step in negotiations is to find their ‘why’ or pain point. Why are they looking to sell? And what are their consequences if they are not able to sell?

Let’s take a probate example from a property in San Antonio, TX. The seller inherited a house that needs quite a bit in repair. The property has an After Repair Value of about $100,000. However, this is an ugly house that hasn’t been painted or had new carpeting installed in a couple decades, and requires updates. The foundation needs repair and the A/C is about 20 years old. The seller is asking $60,000 but you feel the price is too high given the amount of repairs needed. How can understanding the seller’s motivation assist you in creating a more profitable transaction for you?

The property, as mentioned, is in San Antonio, but the seller lives in Austin, TX, about 90 minutes away. After talking with the seller for a little while, the skilled negotiator finds that the seller doesn’t want to fix up, maintain, nor be a landlord for the property. He is doing well financially and the money from selling the house isn’t as important to him as just being rid of the burden. The seller is tired of having to go there every weekend to landscape the property and clean the house for perspective buyers. What you end up finding is that his biggest need is not making a huge profit on the property; rather it is getting rid of the house so he can go back to his normal life routine of spending his weekends with his family, and will gladly trade equity for time. Would this information benefit you in your negotiations? Absolutely.

Therefore, the most important aspect of negotiations is having an understanding of the consequences of not achieving agreement for the seller and being able to provide a solution to those consequences.

This part of the negotiating process is absolutely important. Once you, as the professional, understand the sellers’ consequences of not achieving the agreement, then you are able to add value to your offer without adding money to your offer. If money is not the issue but time and managing the property is the issue, could you create an offer to discount the price in return for speeding up the buying process? If you could propose an offer where the banks were not involved, and you could purchase the property in 7 days but for a discounted rate, would the seller be happy with that offer? Would you be happy picking up a property for $.40 on the dollar? Finding out the needs of the seller will lead to a win-win scenario.

The following are the seven steps to a successful negotiation:

1- Be prepared. When you are going to visit and begin negotiations with a seller or a buyer, you will want to be informed about the property and the area. Do your homework. The more information you have about the property and the area, the more tools you will have for negotiating. How many foreclosures are in the area? Is there any new construction in the area? What are the school districts like? The crime rate? Know any item necessary to discount value from a seller or add value to a buyer.

2- Have open dialogue. You will want to make your case and you will want to listen to theirs as well. Active listening is the most important part of this step. Listen for consistency in their story to find out if your have the real pain point or motivation. As in the example above, if price appears to be the issue but the seller mentions the inconvenience of managing the property from 90 minutes away, then addressing his pain point will probably lead to a discount in price.

3- Watch for non verbal clues when negotiating. The following are some clues as to whether or not the seller or the buyer is losing interest in what you are discussing:

a. Watch the direction of their feet. If the feet is pointing towards the door, you are losing them. If the feet is pointed towards you, you have their interest.
b. Closed palms, crossed legs, or folded arms can indicate a closed person, or someone who is suspicious or not buying what you are saying.
c. A hand to the back of the neck or a finger in the collar could also signal that the person is losing interest in what you are saying.
d. An object in someone’s mouth, such as a pen or paperclip, means that the person isn’t being ‘nourished’ by what you are saying and requires more information.
e. Lack of eye contact or lint picking or flicking of the fingers can be a sign of boredom or lack of interest as well.

The following are non verbal cues that the person has interest in what you are saying

a. Nodding their head indicates agreement and understanding
b. Leaning forward while you are speaking shows a good connection is being made and there is interest in what you are saying
c. Open gestures can indicate that the other person is interested and you should proceed, such as open palms, leaning back in a chair with arms open (not crossed), and nodding
d. Touching can be a sign of acceptance
e. Head tilts can mean interest as well.

4- Argue- state your case and expose the other party’s case. Many times this argument will be over the value of the property, the amount of repairs, or the length of time needed for the transaction to occur. When ‘arguing’ it is important to stay objective. Do not take business personal, and do not allow emotions to get in the way.

5- Signal- indicate your readiness to work together. Find whatever common ground you have with the other person and build on it. In the probate example, the common ground is that both parties would like the property acquisition to happen quickly. If there is agreement on this principle, what sacrifices will each party be willing to make in order to make this transaction occur? Remember, whether buying or selling, if you are not able to get the price you want, then get the terms that you want. The seller dropping the price 20% is a sacrifice. The cost of me acquiring cash at a higher rate within 7 days plus taking the property in ‘as-is’ condition is a sacrifice. But if both parties are willing to make sacrifices then a successful transaction can occur.

6- Package the deal. Put all the elements of the deal together. Make sure that both parties understand the deal and are in agreement. The more thorough you are in this step, the less chance of a last minute back-out by the other party.

7- Finalize the deal. Document all of the agreements.

Again, not every negotiation will end up with a successful transaction, but if you take the time to follow these simple steps, you will put yourself in the best position to use your knowledge base and skills in order to offer the best possible strategy to create a win-win scenario for you and your customer.

In your negotiations, what’s your value perspective and how do you assess the other negotiator’s value perspective? The better you determine what’s of true value to the opposing negotiator, the better positioned you’ll be to win more negotiations.

An item is only worth what someone is willing to pay. Thus, value is based on someone’s perspective and the value-add an item contributes to one’s environment.

When it comes to assessing value, perspective is based on current needs, wants, and desires of the negotiator making the assessment. Thus, when negotiating you should observe the value proposition that one holds per how he can be influenced to obtain the outcome sought from the negotiation.

To understand someone’s perspective of value, understand it from an emotional and physical perspective (i.e. what it does for them, why he wants it, what he’ll do with it, how others will view him once he has it based on how he wishes to be perceived).

Value Perspective Based on Positioning:

To maximize the perspective of an item, in the planning stage of the negotiation consider how you might make the item more appealing to the opposing negotiator. In some cases, you can increase the perspective of an item’s value by making it harder to obtain. In other situations, it may behoove you to make an item easier to attain based on concessions you may seek.

Value Perspective Based on Current Needs:

When considering a negotiator’s perspective of value, consider how long an item may be perceived as being valuable to him, based on why he needs that item. If the item is not truly a need, but instead something he wants, the value of obtaining the item may subside quicker than if it was a real need, something he has to have. Wants tend to dissipate faster than needs.

Value Perspective Based on Increments: (give a little now with the promise of more later)

Another way to increase the perspective of value is to deliver concessions in incremental phases. It’s akin to allowing the opposing negotiator to experience what it might be like to possess all of what he’s seeking while keeping him engaged in the negotiation to obtain more of what he needs. By allowing him to experience the sensation of what it would be like to have it all, the degree of what he doesn’t have takes on a heightened desire for him to possess the totality of your offering.

Personality Type Value Perspective:

Always consider the personality type of the other negotiator when assessing how she might respond to the strategies above. Since some negotiators are more disciplined than others, some may be better at delaying the gratitude they’ll experience from obtaining an item, which will make it more difficult for you to give the item a heightened sense of value.

As you can see, the way one views value is totally dependent upon one’s perspective. Therefore, you should never assume because an item has value to you that it has the same degree of value to your negotiation counterpart. Since needs shift with the passage of time, in order to maximize a negotiation opportunity, assess the ‘shelf life’ of offers/counteroffers. To the degree you position your offer from a perceived value perspective at the optimum time, you’ll be more successful in your negotiation efforts… and everything will be right with the world.

Remember, you’re always negotiating!

It may sound strange but there are times when you can win more negotiations by appearing to be odd and scary than meek and mild.

Depending on the person with whom you’re negotiating, this tactic can have a debilitating effect on them. The reason for that is, some folks don’t know how to deal with an odd and/or scary force. During such hesitation when they’re in deliberation mood as to how they should respond, you have the opportunity to alter their thought process per how they deal and interact with you. Doing so can alter the way they interact with you for life.

The following is a situation in which you might consider employing the ‘odd and scary’ negotiation strategy or in a situation that’s similar.

You’re up against a rough and tough negotiator. His actions might be interpreted as those of a bully. He’s a ‘Hard/Closed’ type negotiator and possesses an, ‘I win, you lose’ mentality.

With this type of negotiator, you must be mentally prepared to display the strength and insights that will impress him; if he were to holler at you, it would behoove you to holler back. You might be thinking, won’t that cause things to escalate, which in turn can feed the potential for an impasse? If such a thought captured your attention, you’re right. You can possibly be placing the negotiation in jeopardy, but think about the alternatives. The more you allow yourself to be pushed, the greater the probability that a negotiator of this type will push you. Thus, the timing of your response has to be precise. It should be delivered when least expected to have the greatest impact.

A friend of mine, David Dadian that owns an IT solution business, related a story that solicited such a response with one of his company’s clients. In one situation, a client attempted to bully David and a member of his staff by citing remarks that were unflattering. David being a very gentlemanly type of person initially didn’t offer a rebuttal; he was poker-faced. After the client’s tirades begun to subside, David launched into tirades of his own. He gave the client every bit of what he’d received. The client became melancholy and did not attempt to taunt or deride David after that.

In assessing what possibly occurred in the client’s mind, one can consider that the client was not prepared for David’s retort, especially offered in the manner that it was delivered. Thus, the client may have perceived David to be scary (i.e. David’s personality had changed to becoming somewhat unrecognizable from that which the client had known David to possess). From that, the client may have deduced that David’s behavior and mannerisms had become odd, one in which the client was unaccustomed to being spoken to. The one thing that’s certain, based on the client’s reaction and following actions, David gained control of the negotiation with his actions.

In negotiations, you will be tested. Since negotiations are likened to chess, the types of moves you make during a negotiation session influence what will occur later in the negotiation. As such, by employing the odd and scary tactic into your negotiation, you can alter the possibility of negative maneuverings by the opposing negotiator, simply because he perceives you as being weak. Even if you never have to employ this tactic, having it in your tool of negotiation weapons should embolden you during your negotiations… and everything will be right with the world.

Remember, you’re always negotiating.