All great communicators share one trait. They instinctively communicate in the preferred style(s) of the audience, be they visual, auditory, and kinaesthetic.
Over the last couple of articles we’ve written how people process information. Starting with Visual, Auditory and Kinaesthetic preferences.
We’ve related how visually oriented people tend to be fast thinkers, fast talkers and want information presented in a visual form. Listening to them you’d get a sense their voice is coming from their heads.
Individuals with an auditory preference tend to exhibit more variation in their voice modulation, speak with a lower pitch and use colourful descriptive language. Their voice appears to come from the upper region of their chests.
Kinaesthetic types experience the world through their bodies and tend to give more weight (almost literally) to their feelings. Listening to them you might think their voices are coming from their stomachs.
Let’s move on to the Auditory/Digital or Logical Thinkers.
Meet Bill. Neatly dressed, with a jacket with elbow patches on the sleeves and a row of different coloured pens in his shirt pocket.
He walks into the room, shakes hands, sits down and precisely lays out his pad and pens ready for action.
When he speaks it’s in a reasonably monotone, flat, often quiet voice.
Auditory-Digital individuals live in a “logical” world. Their “inner voice in their heads” thrives on logic and rationality.
They want factual data with validating numbers and statistics. They consider the theoretical implications through logical analysis and structured arguments. They make inferences and project trends based on extrapolating the data under consideration.
Often colourless personalities, they don’t show much emotion, preferring to persuade through the logical weight of their arguments.
Because of their flat, monotone delivery, auditory-digital types don’t make good public speakers or trainers. Their delivery style simply bores the audience to tears. And their logical arguments simply don’t stir up an audience’s emotions – vital to bringing them along with you.
A lot of stereo typical computer programmers, accountants and lawyers fit this mould. They bury themselves in their books and mutter phrases like “It doesn’t compute”.
You’ll also hear phrases like:
- Get an account of
- Factor it in
- The bottom line
- Hash it out
- Explore this idea
- Consider the implications
- Increase my understanding
- Provide me with a report
So when dealing with this type, you’ll need to go to extreme lengths with your logical arguments.
And woe betide you if there’s a flaw in your argument. They’ll pick it up immediately.
And if you’re dealing with someone at the extreme end of this preference, any show of emotion on your part will turn them off.
I vividly remember asking a high auditory-digital prospect why he’d insisted on buying a particular car for his wife regardless of her preference for another make.
His response? He’d done significant research into reliability of each model, asked his mechanic and made a rational decision which way to go. And his wife’s choice wasn’t it!
All of which goes to show, there’s always an exception to the rule that people buy on emotion and justify with logic.
Selling to a high auditory-digital prospect can be easy – if you’re prepared.
You must have detailed product knowledge and be willing to lay all the facts on the table. No amount of data will be too much. No level of detail too great.
These are the people who will read every word of your marketing and sales material. They will conduct extensive research and to a large extent base their buying decisions on rational, logical arguments.
At the extreme, like my friend above, they’ll supress their emotional side and let logic win. It’s not that they don’t have emotions. Far from it. It’s just that they don’t let emotions rule them.
Now remember, these are just primary preferences. We all think in visual, auditory, kinaesthetic and the voice in our heads (auditory-digital) terms and switch from one to the other.
And as an effective communicator you must be able to switch through every style depending on who you’re dealing with. Your flexibility is the key to your success.
This series has just scratched the surface with respect to communication and persuasion. We go into significantly more depth in rapport building language skills, thinking styles and eliciting core values and motivations in our sales coaching programs.
And we use every one of these techniques in marketing collateral we create for our clients. Material which is designed to bring prospects to your door, enabling you to begin the selling process.
Our programs suit both business to business and business to consumer marketing and sales scenarios and are guaranteed to improve your qualification and closing rates, making you more money.
Call Rashid on 0414-913-334 to get started.
Rashid & Barbara.
