How to convince people: get a person’s criteria

If you want to know how to convince people to do something, then a very effective tool is to get criteria. Criteria are basically a person’s hot buttons – if you push them, the answer is almost guaranteed. There are positive and negative hot buttons.

The easiest way to get a person’s judgment is to simply ask them questions.

For example, if you want someone to join your company, you can ask, “What do you want in a job?” Then they tell you their criteria.

If you want someone to go on vacation with you, you can simply ask, “What do you want on a vacation? What has to be there? What is important to you?”

The answer will be for a person to list their criteria. For example, in the case of a vacation, a person might say, “I want to relax and recharge, but I don’t just want to be lazing on the beach. I want to have an adventure and have fun, I want to be active and meet nice people and have some fun. emotion “.

Now that is obviously more than just one criterion. So now the best thing you can do is figure out which ones are more important and which ones less.

For example, you might say, “Well, let’s imagine I have a vacation here that is about relaxing and recharging my batteries, and others that are full of excitement, what would it be?”

If you are standing in front of the person, spread both hands and make it clear that one option is in your right hand and one option is in your left hand, and keep your hands wide apart. This will show you in many cases which one they prefer even before they say it. And that’s a great skill you must possess to refine your body language reading skills.

So you just compare the different criteria to each other and then identify which is the most important, which is the second most, the third most, and so on.

And then when you’re trying to get them to go on vacation with you, make sure your vacation description matches your criteria.

Sometimes you will come across a person who has too many criteria, and this is the type of person who never goes on vacation because he just can’t make up his mind, or the type of person who is never happy with a vacation because not everything. he or she wanted to be present.

And the best thing to do in such a case is to simply help them create the hierarchy and then decide which criteria are required and which are optional.

Now when it comes to sales, this is an extremely important technique. Because what most inexperienced marketers do is simply reap the benefits of a product or service. They just talk about how good this product is and what it will do for them.

But usually the seller in this case uses only his own criteria. Instead, what the salesperson should do is use the judgment of the potential customer. But to do so, they would have to obtain the criteria first by asking questions and then listening to the answers very carefully.

When large corporations start advertising campaigns that cost them millions of dollars, the first thing they usually do is market research, and one of the most important points in market research is to find out what the criteria of a large group of people are for who want to sell their products.

However, one thing that is very important: when you use other people’s criteria to get them to do something, then you really must deliver what you promised. For example, you can get someone to accompany you on vacation by rephrasing your vacation according to your criteria.

But if the holidays are not really what you promised, you will not have much fun with your travel companion, because they will be on a completely different vacation than they were looking for and they will blame you. for it.

It’s actually quite easy to use other people’s criteria, because you can, and indeed should, use your own exact words. Because they attach all their emotions and desires to these words, and therefore every time you use them, you also trigger these emotions.