Chapter 5
Finding Your Selling Style
Learning Objectives:
 Recognize the different behavioral styles.
 Identify your own dominant social style.
 Learn how to deal with people who operate from each
of the various styles.
 Understand the concept of versatility and how it affects
your ability to relate to all social styles.
 Become familiar with gender issues in selling.
 Discover how neurolinguistic programming can be useful
to salespeople.
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A Difference in Social Style
 Failure to understand social styles can cause lost
sales, frustration, resentment, or firing
 Understanding styles leads to better communication
 Style analysis was started by Carl Jung and modified by
others
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The Social Styles Model
 Basic Concepts
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Primary style: a person’s favorite style
Back up style: used sometimes (especially under stress)
Clues to style: manner of speech, use of time, gestures used
We respond to a style similar to our own
 Behavioral Styles in Selling
 Know your style well
 Style reflects surface behavior. It is not an in-depth
personality analysis
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The Social Styles Profile
Wants facts and figures; precise about time; task-oriented;
objective and reserved
(Controlled)
Nonresponsive
)
1
Nonassertive
(Asking)
Inquisitive; slow-acting;
low risk taker; nonverbal; cooperative
Analytical
“How”
D
Driver
“What”
2
C
B
3
Amiable
“Why”
Expressive
“Who”
Assertive
(Telling)
A
Fast; active; high risk
taker; verbal; directive;
competitive
4
Responsive
(Emotional)
Expressive about feelings; wants feelings and emotions;
imprecise about time; people oriented; subjective
4
Recognizing Social Styles
 Understand the preceding grid which plots assertiveness and
responsiveness
 Each quartile in the grid represents levels of intensity
Identifying the Four Behavioral Styles:
Drivers
• High assertiveness and low responsiveness. Control specialists
Expressives
• High assertiveness and high responsiveness. Social specialists
Amiables
• Low assertiveness and high responsiveness. Support specialists
Analyticals
• Low assertiveness and low responsiveness. Technical specialists
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Versatility as a Communication Tool
 Conflict can happen if we use or stay in our own style
 Flexibility or Versatility: the willingness to control personal
behavior and adapt
 Psychological Reciprocity: when we move toward their
style, then they feel compelled to move toward our style
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Identifying Pace and Priority
 Three questions to ask yourself to determine a
prospect’s pace and priority:
 How fast are decisions made?
 How competitive is the person?
 Not just in sports!
 How much feeling is displayed?
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Gender Style Differences
 Contribution of Gender Issues in the Business World
 Proxemics (the distance individuals prefer to keep between
themselves)
 Plays a major role in cross-gender communication
 Important to emphasize and encourage the differences
between men and women’s communication styles in order
to benefit from those differences
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Relating to the Opposite Sex
 Ask Yourself: Do gender differences create diverse
ways of thinking or different reactions in a sales
situation?
 Determine what you need to be aware of when selling to
someone of the opposite sex
 Adjust your style to use the strengths unique to the gender
of your prospect
Remember…
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Reading the Prospect’s Environment
 Notice the Prospect’s Surroundings
 Office decorations and how things are arranged
 Furniture
 Pictures, diplomas, awards
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Social Style Profile: Driver
 Decisive in action and decision making
 Likes control; dislikes inaction
 Prefers maximum freedom to manage
self and others
 Cool, independent, and competitive
with others
 Low tolerance for feelings, attitudes,
and advice of others
 Works quickly and impressively alone
 Has good administrative skills
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Social Style Profile: Expressive
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Spontaneous actions and decisions
Likes involvement
Exaggerates and generalizes
Tends to dream and get others
caught up in those dreams
Jumps from one activity to another
Works quickly and excitedly with
others
Seeks esteem and group
identification
Has good persuasive skills
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Social Style Profile: Amiable
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Slow in making decisions or taking actions
Likes close, personal relationships
Dislikes interpersonal conflict
Supports and actively listens to others
Weak in goal setting and self-direction
Seeks security and identification with a
group
 Has good counseling and listening skills
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Social Style Profile: Analytical
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Cautious in decisions and action
Likes organization and structure
Dislikes involvement
Asks specific questions
Prefers objective, task-oriented,
intellectual work
 Wants to be right, so collects much data
 Works slowly, precisely, and alone
 Has good problem-solving skills
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Neurolinguistic Programming (NLP)
 Perceptual fields are ways in which people view the
world
 Use these as another way to observe and understand
people
 Separate from social style analysis
 The science of how the brain learns
 Modes of Perception - Most of us
favor one mode
 Auditory - Sound
 Visual - Sight
 Kinesthetic - Touch
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Identifying a Prospect’s Behavior
 Tapping into the prospect’s system of perception
 NLP can help you develop the ability to identify a prospect’s
mode of perception
 Adapt your mode of selling to their mode of learning
 Ethics of employing social style analysis or NLP
concepts:
 Good if they are used as tools to obtain information that
will aid in serving the client
 If they are used to satisfy personal greed, then you have an
ethical problem
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Identifying Modes of Perception
Visual Perception
Looking up and left
Visualizing (remembering) from
the past; picturing past mentally
Looking up and right
Visually constructing an image
to see what it would look like
Kinesthetic Perception
Looking down and right
Remembering past feelings
Auditory Perception
Looking sideways to left
Hearing sounds or voices from the
past (remembering)
Looking sideways to right
Constructing a future conversation;
thinking of the right word to use
Looking down to left
Holding an internal dialogue with
oneself; how something sound
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Interpreting Predicate Words
 Listen for word cues
 I am watching developments in that particular stock; before
I buy, I want to see the progress it makes this quarter and
get a picture of what to expect in the future
 There is so much noise in here that I can’t hear myself think
 The atmosphere was heavy and damp; there was an
oppressive stillness, thick with apprehension
 Match word cues with eye cues for better precision
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