How to really negotiate

Here are a few tips on how to really negotiate, gleaned from a lifetime of sales…

Some
of them are somewhat contradictory.

Do not worry about that. Entrepreneurs
constantly deal in an environment where they have incomplete information and
ambiguity is abundant.

1.       Develop your BATNA (Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement) before
negotiations commence—if you can live
without a deal, you are in a better position to negotiate successfully.

2.       Sit with your back to the window—light up the other party’s face so you can
clearly see their emotional state.

3.      
Get on the same side of the table as they are on (not
literally). If for example, you are trying to sell computer equipment, talk
about different solutions and different vendors as if they were on the other
side of the table and you are in effect providing them with consulting
services… Tell them if they do not like any of the alternatives, you will work with them to find one that works for
them.

4.       Calibrate the other party.

5.       Read lateral eye movements.

6.       Read body language—measure their enthusiasm or lack thereof. More than half
of all human communication is via body language.

7.       Listen to tonality.

8.       Synchronize breathing.

9.       Mirror body movements—leaning forward, leaning back, arms folded in front…

10.    Empathize with
other party’s feelings.

11.    Ask questions without first making assumptions.

12.    Don’t bet against yourself—don’t improve your offer until they counter.

13.    Don’t be afraid to make first move—aim higher and show confidence that you know what you are talking about.

14.    Remember that pricing is an art not a
science. Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Minister of Finance to Louis XIV once
said, The art of taxation (a tax
is a price, Ed) consists in so plucking the
goose as to obtain the largest possible amount of feathers with the smallest
possible amount of hissing, The quote may also have
involved obtaining the maximum number of
quills (a valuable writing tool at the time, Ed) with the minimum amount of hissing.

15.    Try to agree on simple things first—build momentum.

16.    Provide evidence supporting your positions.

17.    KISS—keep
it simple.

18.    If negotiations halt, leave two or three talking points behind—not ten, no one can focus on
more than a handful of reasons…

19.    Don’t fill in the gaps, sometimes silence is best—make sure you do not talk all the time; listen carefully and pay attention
to body language and tonality.

20.    Remember to smile from time to time—what you
think and do counts. If you think positively, you are far more likely to
achieve your goals. Think only about what you want, not what you do not want.
The latter invites a negative result.

21.    When you hear yes, stop talking, thank them and leave—only thing that can happen
after getting to ‘yes’ is talking yourself or them out of a deal you just
agreed to.

22.    Always volunteer to write up the deal—s/he who wields the pen, has the
initiative.

23.    Resist strong emotions—s/he who loses her/his temper first, loses.

24.   
Be patient.

Negotiate hard on every point—someone once negotiated a long term office lease; he asked, “Give me a
nickel!” We thought nothing of it but a nickel was worth more than $50,000 over
the term of the lease so pay attention to details. Protect
your margins, every dime counts.

25.    Do not agree too quickly or
they will think they did not get a good deal.

26.    Really know your
product or service.

27.    Use negative cost selling—tell
them how they will make money by buying your product or service. Do a
spreadsheet from their POV not yours.

28.    Make sure you can demonstrate your value
proposition in a compelling way in simple language in less than
two minutes.

29.    Remember, you are selling them a
solution to their problems—this is called, naturally enough, solution
selling.

30.    Never take No for an answer—on the other hand, a No is better than a Maybe. If someone says Maybe
tell them you will take that as a No
and move on. Perhaps they will say, ‘I didn’t mean to say No.’ OK then, say Yes. The
best answer is ‘yes’; the second best answer is ‘no’; last best answer is
‘maybe’. Don’t get into ‘hoop’ treatment—where clients treat you like trained
poodles. They make you jump through hoops by telling you, ‘If only your product
had such and such a feature, I might buy it.’ You go back and redesign it. Then
they ask you to add or change something else, constantly raising the bar until
you can’t jump through the hoop.

31.    Set weekly or monthly goals—do not
think you can reach your sales goals for the year in the last month or quarter
of the year.

32.    Face your fear—do the
tough stuff and don’t take a No
personally.

33.    Before you say something, ask
a) Is it true? b) Is it an improvement on silence?
c)     Are you going to hurt someone by saying it?

35.    Never tear down a competitor, let
you’re the other party do that if they want to.

36.    If you are less successful than
you would like to be and want to know who is preventing you from being a
success: first look in the mirror.

37.    People like to buy from people they like and trust.

38.    Everyone in your organization is in sales—nothing is worse than when a
potential client contacts your organization and your own people don’t know much
about your products and services, especially your new products and services.

39.    Take every opportunity to sell.

40.    Don’t leave without making a
sale. If a salesperson for the Ottawa Senators can’t sell a suite, they’ll sell
four season tickets and a sign or maybe just a couple of season tickets…

41.    A sale is about providing timely information to the right client; not about
selling to people who don’t need or want your service or product.

42.    A sale is not marketing.

43.    Often clients will answer their own questions; so just listen.

44.    Use very opportunity to reverse sell—your Accounts Payable is a good
source of potential clients-even your accountants are in sales for you.
Example: if a plumber isn’t a Sens season ticker holder why is he or she your
plumber?

45.    Sales is all about action—don’t push on a string.

46.    Use the six degrees of separation to make contact with those you need to get in
touch with but don’t be afraid of just calling or showing up.

47.    Use a bottom up not a top down sales method. Nothing is worse than asking your
President/Coach/Mentor to call the other President to make a sale-then the line
employee/manager will do everything he or she can to torpedo it. Instead,
contact the line manager and when the time is right, your
President/Coach/Mentor to make a call or send an email to the other President
raising the profile of the opportunity and confirming the line manager’s wise
choice.

48.    Remember that you are not in the selling business at all—you are in the
helping-to-buy business. You are providing a solution to a client’s problem.

49.    Creativity counts.

‘I
hate selling but
I love helping people buy,’ Serence CEO Allan Wille.

Bad things happen to good
people and it is easy to blame others. No doubt others contributed to the
situation in some way. But mostly, if you are really honest with yourself, you
almost certainly had a hand in it.

“I claim my own power
and accept responsibility for my own life,” a quote from the book Chakra
Meditation by Swami Saradananda, Duncan Baird Publishers, London, 2008.

Stop feeling sorry for
yourself and get out there and make things happen. There is a better person
inside you and, when you listen to him or her, good things tend to happen. It
is when you substitute the judgment of others for your own, bad things may
happen. Not selling enough? Do not blame the market or lousy clients, find new,
better clients, change your niche, improve your selling skills, get more
education, add more differentiated value, change industries, whatever it takes.

Bad things happen to good
people and it is easy to blame others. No doubt others contributed to the
situation in some way. But mostly, if you are really honest with yourself, you
almost certainly had a hand in it. Stop feeling sorry for yourself and get out
there and make things happen. There is a better person inside you and, when you
listen to him or her, good things tend to happen. It is when you substitute the
judgment of others for your own, bad things may happen. Not selling enough? Do
not blame the market or lousy clients, find new, better clients, change your
niche, improve your selling skills, get more education, add more differentiated
value, change industries, whatever it takes.

Bruce M Firestone, PhD
ROYAL LePAGE Performance Realty broker
Ottawa Senators founder
Real Estate Investment and Business coach
613-762-8884
bruce.firestone@century21.ca
@profbruce
profbruce.tumblr.com
brucemfirestone.com
making impossible possible

copyright, Bruce M Firestone, Ottawa Canada 2017

Postscript 1: I prefer to do business with people I like and
trust but occasionally I find myself doing business with people I don’t like
but still trust. I ALMOST NEVER DO BUSINESS WITH PEOPLE I DON’T TRUST.

So you don’t have to like everyone.

A few things will help—

1.         justify what
you do carefully and fully on the cost side—explain what your costs actually
are in detail

2.         take your
time

3.         break it
down for them

4.         check out
what I do on the scheduling side of things, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hA5G4KvVmnk&index=55&list=PLd3QdcBlEm9-b9B3sAnGd86s79M8ib_P3&t=14s  

5.         I would show
every client a detailed schedule and breakdown of team resources and costs so
they know exactly what they are paying for

6.         again, I
would also justify my fees based on the value I create for my clients—which you
can certainly do too.

Prof Bruce

Postscript 2: See also: How to really
sell, https://profbruce.tumblr.com/post/160736700769/how-to-really-sell