Tony Brazier

www.braziers.co.nz

Tony Brazier

The Press - Wednesday 10 February 2010

Psychology in Selling

There is an awful lot of psychology in selling real estate. It is the reason why it is so difficult for a Principal or Sales Manager to confidently list the attributes of a successful salesperson. This leads to not being able to make a judgment about the likely success of new recruit until long after they have ‘had a go’ at selling. Sometimes at great cost.

To me a handy pre-requisite would be if all had successfully completed Psychology 101, and even then it is not assured that the required skills and knowledge would have been retained as relevant. You see, a salesperson has to be many things to many people. They must attain the ability to change personality depending on whom they are dealing with and what situational background is at hand. Some will remember the song by Billy Joel called The Stranger and the words about “… the faces of the stranger and we love to try them on”. This can be a typical day in real estate.

Prior to entering a vendor or purchaser’s home at the time of presentation of an appraisal or an offer, a salesperson will sit in their car and gather their thoughts and relevant scripts together. More experienced ones will have calculated every eventuality on paper and know what the desired outcome is before they enter. However the very best of them will also select the personality within themselves which is best suited to this particular situation. Does the situation require an empathic ear or do these clients require a forceful personality who will push them to the outcome which is known to be best for them.

All negotiation is simply a series of inter-personal transactions between people. In the best selling book of the 1970’s “I’m OK, You’re OK (by Thomas A Harris) the author describes this process as Transactional Analysis (TA) the categorised transactions between people as coming from either the Parent (authoritative), Adult (mature) or Child (playful, silly) in any given situation. Most negotiation due to its importance will be done Adult to Adult but if one party or another comes from a different angle and replies from the Child (e.g. via sarcasm or flirtatiousness) or the Parent (e.g. via pushiness or put down) then this cross-transaction can cause havoc and resentment for either party or both.

A salesperson’s job is not to judge the personality of the person on the other side but more correctly it is to determine which sub-personality of their own would be best to deal with this situation. This is where most fall down and use the only personality they believe they possess to attempt to resolve all negotiation with. We have all heard about the ‘pushy’ salesperson or the one that wasn’t forceful enough. These negotiators chose the wrong ‘stranger’ as Billy Joel’s song puts it, to be in control that day.

In fact most people possess 72 different sub personalities within themselves to deal with the variety of situations they find themselves in. For example, have you every been in your “Domineering parent”, pose, hands on hips, arguing with a teenager when the phone rings whereupon your “Bubbly receptionist” sub personality is much more appropriate and can be brought out in the flick of an eye. That is of course until the phone call ends, then back comes the ‘Domineering Parent’.

Dr Fred Grosse, who coaches top salespeople in the USA, Australia and New Zealand, teaches that there are more sub personalities being found as time goes by and trains his students in being able to choose the appropriate sub personality to suit the situation. This is by no means a form of manipulation, it is simply the best mechanism by which to cater for the huge variety of personality types, and mixture of relationships in couples. Often we are dealing with them when they are their most stressed, i.e. selling their prized asset.

It is a pleasure to watch such a salesperson in action who has mastered this skill as, more often than not, all parties will go away from the transaction adequately satisfied albeit having given ground on one item or another. In contrast the salesperson that expects the huge variety of personalities he/she may encounter to change to suit their own modus operandi, will have many less satisfied clients/customers. There is still a place for all types of personality in selling real estate.

After all, the client ‘procrastinator’ often needs the ‘decisive’ negotiator to help do what’s best for them. As does the, ‘fearful’ widow who appreciates the ‘dutiful’ son approach to taking things slowly and carefully now that she’s on her own. However, the best salespeople are empathetic and intuitive enough to judge the best person within to approach each situation. The frustrating thing for those in charge of recruitment is that these people come in a huge variety of outwardly visible packages.