5-minute sales lesson: How to make a good first impression

And the thing about liking is that it serves as a very powerful bias in selling. If you like a person, you are more likely to believe in what that person is saying. Instant trust is given.

So…how do we make people like us? We’ve established the argument that getting people to like us is important in selling especially in the context of high-ticket selling since high-ticket selling anchors on the relationship between the seller and the buyer.

Contrast that if you don’t like that person. That person might make the most logical argument yet somehow part of us don’t want to believe.

And so how do we make people like us? Simple. We have to be likeable.

And being likeable has two aspects: one is being instantly liked and the other is being loved. Both are important and both are keys.

You won’t even listen or trust the person you don’t instantly like. And though this sounds bad but well, that’s the reality of us being humans.

The other thing is you might instantly like someone but it does not mean anything unless you fall for the other person or that you begin to love them. Instant liking is just that, instant. Kung baga happy crush lang!

But love? Having a deeper likening to the other person? It’s different. It means you want to be friends with the other person and you are getting attached to them.

And to be able to build a relationship with the other person, instant liking is not enough. Having a happy crush on someone does not make a relationship.

To put it on a business sense, you might instantly like me as your salesperson but then during the conversation you feel something is “off” with me, chances are you will still not be comfortable with me. Or that somewhere down the road, the liking is not backed up.

In other words, there is still no relationship built.

And so in essence, as salespeople (or businesspeople in general), we need to be instantly liked and deeply liked. In dating terms, it means they need to first like us to date us AND eventually fall in love with us or at least get attached with us to want us to become friends with them.

So wait, with all these said, how can we do that?

Let’s start with instant liking. Instant liking starts in the first meeting with the other person. According to sales guru Jordan Belfort, we only have four seconds to get the interest of the prospect. If in that four second, we failed to build rapport, then all might be lost.

In Jordan Belfort’s words, we only have four seconds to establish ourselves. In that four seconds, we need to prove that we are sharp as a tack, enthusiastic as heck, and an expert in our field. First impressions do last!

And true enough, we as humans make that instant judgement. Just think of the last time you inquired from a store. Let’s say it’s a phone repair shop. Your phone just got drowned in the swimming pool. So you go to this repair shop and have it fixed. As you approach the repair man, you tell him your problem. “Ahhh bale ganito yan Maam/sir, kung yung tubig kasi pumasok sa phone niyo, ganito ganyan mangyayare……bale ang kailangan naten gawin dito is ganito ganyan.”

And let’s be honest, many times these people who repair things speak in a very technical manner in a way that we cannot follow. Yet based on how they speak, they exuberate confidence. It feels as if they really know what they are doing thus we instantly trust them.

How do they do that? In how they speak and present themselves. That is what we mean by being sharp as a tack, enthusiastic as heck, and being perceived as an expert in our field. It is all about how we appear and how we present ourselves. Appearance and presentation matters…a lot!

And what do we mean by appearance and presentation? We need to appear like a professional and present ourselves as an expert. All in the first four seconds of the first meeting/touchpoint.

How do we do that? The most obvious of course is how we look and how we dress. Now, we are not talking about being handsome or beautiful. What we mean here is looking neat and professional. Aanhin mo na maganda ka if madungis naman suot mo at hindi maayos pananamit mo?

In fact, we can look at Ms. Universe or any pageants. Many of the contestants there are not really beautiful or handsome. Yet why are they in the pageants?

Marunong sila mag-ayos! It’s not about how you look but how you appear. We cannot emphasize enough how important this is.

The other thing is how we speak. It’s not about languages. Tagalog man yan or English, we know who has the knowledge and who doesn’t. Is there conviction in your tone and may kwenta ba yung sinasabi mo? How you speak is as important as what you say.

Other non-verbal languages also matter. Are you standing up straight or kuba-kuba? The thing here is standing up straight exuberates confidence. It tells the other party that we are confident. What about the eyes? Saan ka nakatingin? Eye to eye contact is as important.

All these things we mention will make you look sharp and an expert. But there is one more piece in the puzzle: enthusiasm. You might look sharp and an expert but without enthusiasm, people won’t feel comfortable for one simple reason…it is as if you don’t feel like helping them.

And how do we express enthusiasm? Simple. Smile and be polite. Legit yun na yun!

Smiling and being polite expresses it self as if we are willing to help them.

So yeah here is a summary…to be instantly liked, we need to appear and present ourselves as sharp as a tack, enthusiastic as heck, and an expert in our field…all in four seconds (or at least in the first meeting/touchpoint).

Practical implications?

1. Be neat in your appearance.
2. Dress appropriately and professionally.
3. Speak confidently and truthfully.
4. Stand up straight.
5. Maintain good eye to eye contact.
6. Smile. Be polite.

Once you master them, you would have mastered instant liking.

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