40: How to effectively negotiate by changing your voice

38% of what you communicate is down to your tone of voice, but how do you use that in negotiations? Chris FOSS gives us an idea in never split the difference.

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welcome to the bite size sales podcast where we believe that sales is the most important team and a B2B company, that the sales team deserves great sales skills training, but usually doesn't get it. And that taking bite-size steps each day to get better at your craft is the best way to improve results. I am your host, Andrew Monahan , and I'm using my experiences in B2B sales to bring you simple, actionable ideas every day to help you get better.

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welcome to episode 40 and this one is the fourth in a series of five run negotiation, which I thought was appropriate given us an a month and a quarter end of year for many of us right now. Always good to sharpen up negotiation skills when you got more deals. Hopefully you're going to close at this period. Um, so I'm sure you've all seen the studies or herb or the studies that say that in a given communication, only 7% of what you communicate is down to the words that you say 55% is body language and 38% is your tone of voice and how it all comes across. And you know, these studies are go back a long time. So this is nothing new. Um, but it does have a profound implication for salespeople. When you think about, there's some of us that spend all our time on the phone, maybe a few web meetings along the way. There's some people that are out in the field doing more face to face stuff. But one of the interesting things is there's a trend that more and more meetings are being done online versus face to face. Now there's always going to be a role for face to face. Don't get me wrong, but it seems like the debt , the trend is to do more. Um, there are non face to face, let's say, and this has an effect, right? Because if 55% of what we communicate is our body language, if people can't see plenty of language, then it causes a problem. Right? And look , I'm no stet it's statistician, but it says to me that if you take away 55% and you're left with your tone and the words, something like 84% of your communication is down to your tone of voice. And there may be stats, people that tell me I've got that all wrong, but it seems suddenly very, very heavily weighted towards how you say things when you take away the ability to use body language or read body language, which is crazy, right? And, and I imagine also when negotiations are taking place and you're commonly on the phone actually doing negotiations , um, everyone is concentrating on what's being said, how it's being said. It probably reading more into your tone of then in perhaps your early stage or top of funnel type type meetings that take place. So anyway, point of all this as to say that your tone of voice is super important and Chris Voss in his book never split the difference. Talks about this and he gives three styles that he recognize are , he's recognized that there, let me just read from the book to explain these to you. There are three voice tones available to negotiators. Number one, the late night FM DJ voice. Use this one selectively to make a point, inflect your voice downward, keeping it calm and slow. When done properly, you create an aura of authority and trustworthiness without triggering defensiveness. Second one is the positive playful voice. This should be your default voice is the voice of an easygoing good natured person. Your attitude is light and encouraging, and the key here is to relax and smile while you're talking. Third one is the direct or assertive voice. This should be used rarely. It will cause problems and create pushback . So that's read straight from the book. Never split the difference by by Chris boss, who's the ex FBI hostage negotiator. Um, so you know from this, what do you take? I would suggest that assess your own natural style, how you usually interact with people in a business setting and see if you do need to adapt a little bit. I know for example, myself, I can default to be a little bit serious and a little bit monotone and I need to kinda , you know, put more energy into how I talk sometimes and sometimes slow things down and, and people were careful about how I say things. Now you don't need to adapt or I certainly don't need to adapt into sound like some sort of giddy school good all the time. Way overly enthusiastic. But I think what this a chapter that this section from the book does do is to say, just take an assessment of where you're at and how you do things and see how you could adopt one of these two favorite , uh , tones, the FM DJ voice or the playful voice that he taught about. Maybe you have to lighten up, maybe you have to slow down, maybe you have to use softer tones, but whatever , whatever it is, start practicing those in a personalized but also run the office maybe. And then when you use them in negotiations that it becomes very natural for you to do so.

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The episode is sponsored by unstoppable dot du . Most sales teams are not trained effectively in the skills and mindset they deserve and these are the most important people in the company. It's no wonder that only about 50% of reps make quarter every year . Unstoppable is a service that helps sellers and leaders get great at the skills and mindset they need without taking time out of the field. It exists because if the sales team has the right skills and mindset, they thrive, they are confident and they perform much better. Find out more and even get a free sales book@bitesizesales.com and no to wrap up as Pat Ryan, director, North America sales that didn't quarter may or may not have one said training without implementation is just entertainment and prefer entertainment when Monaghan does it. So make sure you take action on what you learned and keep getting better every day. This world does not need more sales BS, so don't create anymore. Be great at the fundamentals. Be honest. Be real. Be yourself. Just do not be us . And finally I'm setting off as the great Joe Sexton would by saying, gone to sell.