How do you read your customer?

Grant Leboff:Simon, in the book you talk about how to read a customer. You talk about observing them and classifying and then adapting your behaviour, and I think is a really useful model for sales person to understand. So, perhaps you could explain that for people?

Simon Hazeldine: I think it's a two stage process here. One is you may interact with the person online first, either via email or maybe connect with them on Linked-In and then you meet them in person. So let me just cover those in sort of in sequence. Let's say I am going to have a meeting with you. What I can do is go to your Linked-In profile and you describe yourself, what people will do is use language that reflects their personality, that they're comfortable with. So what I did when I wrote the book is, I went to peoples whose profiles I had, I have their full PRISM brain mapping profiles, so I knew what their personality was. Went to a representative sample of Linked-In profiles and lifted out the language of those personality traits - so the expressive buyer would describe themselves in this way.... So it gives you a really good idea.

First of all get a clue from Linked-In. If you are in email communication, you know if it's a very short sharp e-mail, it's likely to be from, probably, the driver personality. If its got a couple of exclamation marks, it's likely to be the expressive. If they're making sure you know where the visitors car park is and have a nice weekend you're probably in with this you know the steadiness personality. And if it's quite a detailed email about what they'd like to cover in the meeting, it's possibly a pretty good chance of that's the gold kind of analytical. So you're prepared. But also even if you just go in absolutely cold, you've never met the person before, you haven't researched them on the Internet - which you should do - but if you haven't, they come to greet you in the foyer. First thing, you observe them, you classify them, then you adapt your behaviour. So it's the speed and the energy the person possesses. They come toward you quite quickly. They are moving at speed, there's energy in their body. That's either the expressive personality or It's the driver.

If their body language is open, it's going to be more expressive, if it's closed it's driver. So energy first... High energy will be the more demonstrable energy, will be the green or the red. Lower levels of more contained energy will be the blue steadiness or the gold analytical. Then when you've classified them that way then look for the body language. The more closed it is, it's going to be the driver or the analytical The more open it is, it's the steadiness or the expressive. That gives you a very good early indication. And as the meeting progresses you are gathering more information about them and you are adapting your style. So if I have a driver personality I get straight down to business pretty quickly. I'm not going to do a lot of small talk. I'm not going to ask them too many questions about their weekends because they just want to get straight down to business. Whereas with other styles that would be the wrong approach, you will create a feeling of discomfort. Pretty easy thing to do, once you know how to do it.

Grant Leboff: And it's interesting isn't it, because people often think of sales as thinking on feet and having the gift of gab. But actually, what you're saying, and I subscribe to this view aswell, is you can really be prepared. Just looking at looking at them online, looking at their profiles, you can understand a lot about someone before you actually meet them.
Simon Hazeldine: And I think that that is what modern sales professionals must do. I sometimes talk about the worst question that a salesperson can ask, and it used to be the best question you could ask them. It used to be the best question; 'So Grant please tell me about your business'? Now it's the worst question - I should know about your business. I should do my research before I come to see you. Doing it that way is respectful to the customer, it shows you're interested, you have gained some useful knowledge and it's a really good starting place for the conversation.
Grant Leboff: And for those people in global sales, I'm just interested because you paint this picture, but there are cultures where you don't get straight away. So how do you adapt the PRISM model, depending on where you are, culturally?

Simon Hazeldine: PRISM is around human behaviour and human personality and then another thing that's going to impact, obviously, is your international culture. And I think if you are selling to different countries... For example, in the UK, we're a very multicultural society and I have a lot of customers who are based in the UK, but have come from countries outside of the UK, and using online resources like the research of Hofstetter and things like that. I do my homework on that country, how they like to behave, for example; what's the power distance? What's their approach to uncertainty? Those sort of things that allow me to be respectful of those different cultures and alter my behaviour, necessarily accordingly. But if you are going to be working with a country a lot, or a culture a lot, I think you need to do your homework. Read up on the history of the country as well. I think it is just a good thing to do.

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