The older I get, the less stock I put in ideas, knowledge, skills, success and the more I focus on communicating them effectively. One of the most effective books I've read on this subject has been Way of the Wolf: Straight Line Selling.

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It's written by Jordan Belfort - subject of the biopic, The Wolf of Wall Street - and, if you've ever seen the movie, this is the content he developed in his post-prison life teaching people to sell pens.

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Is it the final word on sales? I highly doubt it but he compresses a great deal of knowledge into an easy read and there are a few call backs to the movie that stop it from being too dry. Finally the whole thing is described in a visual style I felt useful and lends itself well to coaching others.

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The following is a brief synopsis of the overall concept and a cut out of one of the techniques which I've been conscious of using recently as part of my MAP.

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Summary: the Straight Line

The book opens and pivots around how Jordan, a natural salesman, was able to summarize his entire philosophy and method of sales by sketching and talking through a simple diagram on a flipchart.

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Basically he gets frustrated that his team can't close sales, that they can't prospect leads, that they're sloppy and unprofessional, that they lack confidence, that they go off topic and a million other things and eventually says:

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"look guys: every single interaction should be built around a straight line from A to B".

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OPEN ----------------------> CLOSE

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"and your job is nothing more than pushing things along:"

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OPEN >>>>>>>>>>>>>> CLOSE

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And when the guys protest that they’re building rapport, Jordan says "fuck that. Of course there is a grey area. A small grey area. Your job is to keep the boundaries in mind and when the conversation starts drifting there, you fucking bring it back to the straight line":

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OPEN >>>>>>>>>>>>>> CLOSE

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He goes on to talk through this process in more detail touching on DHV, shit tests, fogging, negative inquiry, DARE'ing and many of the other concepts we talk about here. He also clarifies how multi-phase interactions can be joined up i.e. when you're not selling a pen to a passerby, when you're continually re-engaging to develop a relationship with a company/client/person.

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In fact really this book is about creating and controlling the frame of an interaction and expanding that sphere of competence.

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It's all very light on theory and heavy on action. Worth a read.

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Example: Pacing and Leading

One thing Jordan explains especially well is the correct use of “Pacing and Leading”. He is drawing from various sources and many might recognize this as what I believe is originally an NLP term. If you don't, it was a concept from the '90's that led salesmen all over the world to obsess over mirroring their counterparts body language. Such as crossing or uncrossing their legs anytime the prospect did.

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Cue autistic results.

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However Jordan drops a simple nugget of wisdom that the focus shouldn't be on forcing rapport, but falling into it naturally by matching the prospect’s level of enthusiasm/engagement and making your own EVER SO SLIGHTLY higher than it. Then, as they warm to the subject, you lead by increasing your own enthusiasm and so on and so on until you both reach the shuddering climax of a successful close.

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If you've ever been really in the zone and pushed through a lot of resistance to close a huge deal, you'll know exactly what he means, alternatively you'll recognize times when some charmer has made you his own slut.

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Anyhoo.

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IRL

My wife once said she loved that when she asked me if I wanted her to make me a cup of tea, I always replied “I’d love that”. Cue relaxing together and being taken care of.

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Conversely if she asks what movie I want to watch and I shout “Predator!”. Likely I’ll be watching it on my own (another win, ha!).

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The same effect happens in catch-and-release type cold approaches:

Quite often a casual “hello there” from me results in a bright eyed “Hey!” from the girl in question and the challenge is to re-calibrate and lead her UP in enthusiasm and not down towards me. Bizarrely it seems easier for me when the response is neutral, maybe because in many ways it's easier to start low and go up?

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But wherever you are, people tend to seek to match you as long as you are not too far off and from there you have a choice to influence it by controlling yourself.

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When the gap is too large, it will be obvious as you will both likely want the encounter to end.

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Anyway, a simple way to establish and lead a dynamic is to think of your engagement level as a dial and dial it up and down to one notch above your counterpart.

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Use this knowledge to boil that fucker like a frog and check out the book for more ideas on communicating.

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As Jordan Belfort might say:

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"Sell me your penis".