Phone Magic

Phone: Friend or Foe? How to tell:
We all use them each day. Sometimes our business and our success is driven by our phone presence, but how do we know what is going on the other end? Are they getting our message? What kind of an impression am I making?
Here are some phone guidelines I find effective:
1-Client Fishing. You put out the bait, an ad, a business card, a one to one meeting, and they called. Oh, Happy Day. Have a standardize greeting, “XYZ business. This is Gary. How can I help you? LISTEN then use the Five Magic Words. “Tell me about your ____.” Script the blank to your service or business. “Tell me about your hair, yourself, your loan, your child, your roof, your challenge.” Or with your sincerity ask, “How I can help you?” The KEY is to have an active attitude of curiosity and gratitude for the call and respond by putting all your attention on the caller. If you make a lot of calls having a mirror in front of you can be very helpful at maintaining attention, smiling and reinforcing your side of the call as positive. Without being able to show your happy face, you must intend them to know your interest in them. You must let them know you care. “

2-Taking Notes. Show you care by asking if you can take notes. Your showing you care, are paying attention and want to get it straight. You can add to this at the end of the conversation by saying, “Let me read back my notes so I can be sure I got our conversation right.”

3-Breathing. Belly breathing is the best way to stay connected on the phone. It slows the need to rush, and it keeps you more in tuned to the magic of feeling. I don’t think judging from feeling is useful, but being in your feeling is usually more effective than being in your agenda.

4-Digital Remembering. This is my reminder on how to get an appointment right. Make sure all the information is correct by index finger pointing at the info and reading it back. “Sam our meeting is on January 29, Thursday, at your office, 123 Main street at 2:00.” Remember to pause and listen for the response.

5-Humor and Honesty. Tell them your glad for the call, even say “I want you to know that put a smile on my face.” Become a teammate and show you’re also concerned about the issue.

6-Brag, just a little, about your connection and appreciation of them. “I just want you to know that we are sending, referring, linking to your business. A business to business connection. We want you to know we appreciate you.”

7-Thank them. Feel the thanks. You can never say thanks too much, or for creating a special feeling. Phone service is not about being right, always winning or even getting the truth told. It is an impression, a limited sensory experience, so make the best use of your guidelines, and project your appreciation for taking them a bite.

Connecting over the Phone is a program available from Gary C Smith Public Speaking & Trainings 510-722-3212

The Art of Persuasion

Audio communication doesn’t get any better than The Art of Persuasion by Dr. Rick Kirschner. Dr Rick has a voice that intones interest. His use of characters, stories, and humor give him abilities to make large valuable pieces of information palatable and memorable. This audio is a must for everyone from sales people; counselors, teachers, parents, children and anyone who has an idea and wishes to create change and break free from the inSAMEity of the habitual sleep walk society has fallen into.

There are brilliant individuals in our society with life changing ideas who need this audio. Our ‘information-tech’ society will not flourish without the insights and the keen sense of ‘useful assumptions’, a reduction of individual differences by ‘blending’, understanding ‘access languaging’, and the move from limits to ‘possibilities gates’ that Dr Rick clearly states for all personality styles. It is both a beginners course in the art of persuasion and a doctoral dissertation on persuasion and how to protect yourself from persuasive manipulation.

Dr. Rick has made the valuable transition from helping us deal with difficult people, to dealing with the most difficult person of all, our self.

This is not an audio of scripting, manipulation techniques or psycho babble, but here are the basic patterns of effective persuasive communication, not just with others, but to better understand who I am, and the ethical qualities that honest, authentic, real people need to know

Our educational system needs to be revamped around Dr. Rick’s’ The Art of Persuasion.

As a trainer of speakers I use Dr Rick information as guidelines for my marketing group, Toastmasters, and public speaking.

He sums it all up with two quotes:
“If you have to be right, your doing it wrong.”
“You make a difference in your world and in our world.”
I can say the same and more about the works of Dr. Rick Kirschner, he makes a difference in my life.
Thank you
Gary C. Smith Public Speaking & Trainings

The Greatest Speech

Get ready it is coming.

The greatest speech of our lifetime, prehaps of the history of the USA.

How do you know?

What else could Mr. Obama do?

He is going to amaze us, make us cry, give us hope, speak complete sentences and really, really, really mean it!

Oh yea,

I know cause I've had the flu and tapped into some amazing auditory hallucination.

I can't remember the speech word for word.

I am a little confused about the ideas,

I am sick, but by golly, by gum I feel it!

The road he's travelled, the colleages he's gathered, the family he loves and his ability to put his attention in the moment!

"Here & Now boys & girls."

"Here & now boys & girls."

Get ready to listen.

Practice with your chuildren, your co-workers, at the unemployment line, applying for a job, working the soup kitchen, listen.

Listening is not about the sounds hitting the ear drum, the hammer and anvill doing some type of synphonic cacophony, but, like in my auditory hallucinations, hearing what's important. Grasping meaning and being able to share the meaning.

Listening is looking right in the eyes, and not switching channels, or adding a new down beat or changing the tempo.

Listening is about letting the speaker speak, without your agenda, the Democrats or Republicans agenda, not your mothers or Gods agenda.

Things will be said that sway us into hearing each other better.

And that's what I want, to hear the message that everyone has to say.

A message came in my dreams
Where Mr. Morpheus planted seeds
Of magic beans & missing friends
who speak words bearing love
hidden beyond sights, sounds & smells
wonders of life
& dark days being celebrated.
Seeds holding gifts of fruits
Faces inspiring poets
& play of children holding hands
& whispering
“I’ve got a secret.
Let me tell you how it goes.
If your real quiet
You can see
& feel
how we’re all the same.

Let us Sleepers Awake.