By: Christopher Morin and Patrick Renvoise

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What weighs 6 kilograms, contains over 100 billion living cells and one million kilometres of inter-connecting fiber?

Your brain.

It’s the most fascinating and the most evolved object known to mankind. And every single decision to purchase your products and services is made by one.

Luckily for us, Christophe and Patrick - the authors of Neuromarketing - have found that each and every one of them has a huge buy button.

In ten minutes or less, we’re going to figure out how to find it.

As it turns out you have three brains. Well, not really three brains, but three distinct parts that operate separate organs with different instructions. Each of them has a separate purpose and understanding which one does which is the key to finding the buy button.

The new brain thinks, the middle brain feels, and the old brain decides. The old brain is our fight or flight brain, and according to leading Neuroscientist Robert Ornstein it is concerned solely with our survival and has bee doing so for millions of years.

If you’ve ever been in a sales situation where you were certain that you had the best solution for your prospect and then they went somewhere else, here’s the formula for making sure that never happens again.

Selling probability equals pain, times claim, times gain, times old brain cubed.

Step #1 - Pain

Step number one is to diagnose the pain. Is there a doctor in the house? Diagnosing a prospect’s pain isn’t a new technique. However, what other courses might have not taught you is that there are some very necessary conditions - four of them to be exact - to assessing whether or not a pain will lead to a sale.

First, you need to identify the pain. It’s either going to be financial pain, strategic pain, or personal pain. Any of those three will do. This is where, however, mere mortals stop. You, on the other hand are an amazing sales machine and you’re going to go all the way.

Second, you’re going to figure out the intensity of the pain. The more intense the pain, the greater the chance of the sale.

Third, you need to know how urgent the need to alleviate the pain is. If there are other fires your prospect has to put out before she even considers your product or service, there isn’t going to be much urgency there.

Lastly, you need to know that your prospect acknowledges the pain. It isn’t enough for you to see that he should be in pain, they have to acknowledge it. If you don’t have all four of these conditions, you don’t have real pain.

Step #2 - Differentiate your claims.

Coco Chanel once said that in order to be irreplaceable one must always be different. If there is ever a recipe for success, it is this.

The authors tell us we should find one or several unique attributes about our solutions, so we can strongly assert our claims. However, here’s how you move to the front of the class.

Make claims that eliminates the strongest principle pain that your prospect has. That’s what will motivate them to buy from you.

Step #3 - Demonstrate the gain.

Simply put, highlighting your value proposition isn’t enough. You have to prove it. Why? The old brain, as researchers found, is especially resistant to adopting new ideas or behaviours.

Especially buying from you. So how do you get over this resistance? Through tangible hard evidence. Here the four ways you can do that.

First, you could provide a vision. Steve Jobs was a master of this. People line up around the block to watch him unveil the latest and greatest from Apple computers. This could be very persuasive if done right. But it certainly sits at the bottom of the gain totem pole.

Second, you can provide data to back up your claims. Consider this demonstration of gain - our product will save you an average of five cents per transaction. Since you average ten thousand transactions a day, you will save five hundred dollars a day. Or a hundred and seventy five thousand dollars a year. That’s getting better.

Third you can provide a demo of your product or service. You don’t necessarily have to go through all of the features or functionality, but providing your prospect with an inside look of how you actually get rid of their pain is very reassuring.

Lastly, you can go with the ultimate proof - a customer story. Nobody wants to be the first to try something. Seeing that you have other customers who have had their pains removed is a huge deal. There are no assumptions or visions necessary because, as they say, the proof is in the pudding.

Step #4 - Delivering to the old brain.

This is by far the most important factor in the equation. So, if you’re going to remember anything from these ten minutes, make it this step.

There are six message building blocks and seven impact boosters. I’m going to focus on the ones that I think will help you the most just by reading them - you’re going to have to go buy the book to find the rest.

Building block number one is the grabber. If you’ve ever started a presentation with who you are and what your background is or an overview of your company, do not pass go and do not collect two hundred dollars. As David Ogilvy once said, if you’re selling fire extinguishers, start with the fire.

Building block number two is the big picture. The visual nerve carries information forty times faster than the auditory nerve. So, use big picture to tap into the old brain. But let’s get something very clear here, a PowerPoint slide with bullet points and text is not a visual aid.

Impact booster number one is wording with “you”. Human beings listen better when people talk to us rather than at us. Why?Because nobody gives a crap about you, they care about themselves. In fact, a study done at Yale University has shown the most powerful combinations of the words in the English language to be, thank you, would you please, what do you think and I am proud of you. Enough said.

Impact booster number five is learning styles. There are three different ways in which people learn, auditory, kinaesthetic, and visual.

Most people strongly lean toward one of these styles. So, especially in situations where you can determine the learning style of the people you’re talking to, talk to them in the way in which they learn. For instance, as the author states “do you see what I mean” works great for a visual person. “I hear you” works better for an auditory person. And “it feels good doesn’t it?” is effective for kinaesthetic learners.

Impact booster number seven is “less is more.” As George Washington once said, let your discourse with men of business be short and comprehensive. Notice that he said short and comprehensive. Average men, are either short, or comprehensive. You on the other hand, a neuromarketing superstar, will be both at the same time.

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