What is it that each and every customer wants, actually needs, from us? And no...it's not $500 below invoice!

Since the dominant buying motives differ from customer to customer, what could the common need be? It's this:

Two of the most basic of all human needs are to be valued and understood.

It's what our spouses want when they have to tell us about the book they're reading, it's what our kids want when they show us their latest "boo-boo", and it's what each and every one of our customers want every time they reach out to us or walk through that door. We've heard it before; our customers don't care how much we know until they know how much we care.

I have found that one of the most effective ways to help our customer feel valued and understood is through a commonly known but often under used skill called Active Listening. Unfortunately, however, most sales people listen to respond rather than listen to understand and that’s where many of our rapport issues begin.

There are four elements to Active Listening. They are: 
1) attentive body language, 2) verbal attends, 3) leading questions, 4) restating.

Let's take a look at each of these elements.

Attentive Body Language. By this I mean open posture, good eye contact, lean slightly forward, smile, nod our head occasionally, raise our eyebrows sometimes, etc. We need to avoid finger tapping, folded arms, looking away, looking at our watch, shifting our weight too often, yawning, touching our phone, and nodding off. Cues like our facial expressions, breathing pattern, the dilation of the pupils of our eyes, the amount of blood in the capillaries of our skin, all speak to our customer “in between the lines”.

It's important we remember the formula 55-38-7.

In 1967, a study was conducted at UCLA by professor Albert Mehrabian, and later published in his book Silent Messages. His findings have been proven over and over again these last several decades. One point in particular that Professor Mehrabian discovered is that in face to face communication, 55% of what our customer reacts to or makes judgements on are things that they can see (body language, facial expressions, proximity, eye contact, breathing patterns, etc.), 38% of what our customer reacts to or make judgements on are things that they can hear (tone, tempo, volume, enthusiasm, empathy or confidence in our voice, etc.), and only 7% of what influences our customer are the wiz-bang word tracks we all memorize! Although our message is conveyed through the words we use, a full 93% of what influences how our customers FEEL about what we’re saying has nothing to do with the words we choose to use.

Verbal Attends. These are little verbal clues that let our customer know we're interested. Things like "I see" or "uh-huh" or "really?" or "go on" or "sure, sure" etc. Just verbally letting them know "Okay buddy, I'm with you". Remember: to be interesting, be interested.

Another reason to use verbal attends is when someone is on a roll, talking up a storm, and their’s is the only voice they hear, they will sometimes check up and stop talking. By simply hearing our voice occasionally, they usually relax and keep opening up.

Leading Questions. These are open ended questions that are designed to do two things. First it lets the other person know we're interested and second it helps them to completely express their idea, complaint or concern. Questions like "then what happened?" or "how did it make you feel?" or "anything else?", etc.

Restate. I hope we all are already doing this. That is paraphrasing back to the other person what we thought they said to us. Doing this will help us to eliminate any misunderstandings, it allows us to exclude from any further discussion irrelevant or undesired points, and it confirms to the other person that we actually were listening! Most importantly, it gives them the opportunity to feel valued and understood. Once we've paced their most basic of all human needs, then and only then can we hope to be able to lead them in any meaningful way.

Most of us only listen passively, simply waiting for our turn to talk, and Active Listening requires a little more effort. So, just like anything else we want to do well, it too will take a good amount of practice. I assure you, however, it will be time well spent.

The skill of Active Listening has made me more money than any closing technique or any killer sales strategy I know! It's also a skill I encourage you to take home with you. The ability to listen to gain understanding will help us become better partners, parents, children, siblings, friends, as well as better salespeople.

My hope for you is that, like it has for me, the skill of Active Listening will help to improve every relationship in your life.

 © 2016 by Michael D. Hargrove and Bottom Line Underwriters, Inc. All rights reserved.

Michael D. Hargrove is the founder and president of Bottom Line Underwriters Inc. and and My Success Company, which are success coaching firms serving the automotive industry for over two decades. You can find more of his work here: http://bluinc.com/free-stuff/articles/selling-skills/. He can be reached at Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Amazon, or e-mailed at mhargrove@bluinc.com.