How likeable are you? Bestselling author Tim Sanders says “Unlikeable
characteristics are a primary reason for failure, whereas improvements
in likeability offer excellent explanations for breakthrough success.”
Sanders is so passionate about the importance of being likeable that he
has devoted a whole book to the topic. And, he backs it up with a boat
load of documented research. Quite frankly, I couldn’t agree more with
Sanders. After all, it’s long been said that people do business with
people they like. So, just how likeable are you? You might want to
take some time to think about it because there is no doubt that it will
effect your success this year.
Sanders lists four elements of likeability: Friendliness, relevance,
empathy and realness.
Friendliness.
Being friendly may seem like a pretty easy thing to do, yet stop and
think about it. How many friendly people have you encountered since
you started your day today? Unfortunately, most of the people you have
dealt with today have most likely been lukewarm on the friendly scale,
if that. As a result, you probably haven’t wanted to go out of your
way to do anything extra for those people.
When I think of friendliness, I always think of Virginia, a woman I had
the good fortune of getting to know many years ago. Virginia was
always genuinely friendly. When I would go shopping with her it always
amazed me how sales clerks fell over with assistance for her while the
same salesclerk became rather detached when dealing with someone else.
The difference was truly Virginia’s friendly manner. She always
communicated in a warm and friendly style and definitely lived with a
friendly mind-set. So for starters, figure out what it will take to
totally remove unfriendliness from your behavior and develop a
“friendly mind-set.” Next, check out your face. Greet others with a
smile and make eye contact. It’s amazing how your smile becomes
catching—even to the grumpiest face.
Relevance.
To become relevant you must connect with other individual’s interests,
wants or needs. If your client has young children and he’s the coach
for his son’s soccer team, get interested. In effective communications
it’s the small talk that helps to build rapport. Finding out about the
unique interests of your clients enables you to have more personal,
small talk conversations that over time, truly build rapport and ease
the way for the more serious business conversations.
Empathy.
This is perhaps the toughest of all to develop. Some experts believe
you either inherently have empathy, or you don’t. Empathy is not the
same as sympathy. When there is illness in one’s family you may
express sympathy. Empathy, on the other hand is listening deeply for
the emotions behind one’s words and actually connecting to that
emotion. In many ways, it’s the truest form of walking in someone
else’s shoes. When you sincerely let others know you understand what
they are feeling, it provides a much deeper connection, thus
strengthens rapport.
Realness.
Be true to yourself and others. Share honestly with others while
balancing the sharing with humility and little exaggeration. Recognize
that it’s o.k. to say, “I don’t know.” It keeps you human. And be
honest when you make promises by following through on what you said you
would do. Be fully present with the one you are with. Nothing smacks
more of phoniness than pretending to be communicating with someone
while looking around for who might be more interesting to talk to.
When that rare occasion of a problem comes along, take quick action and
handle it personally—preferably face-to-face. Be there for your
customer and they will be there for you.
Perhaps the greatest testament to your likeability is when your
customers like you so much that they are loyal to you alone and even
refer you to others on their own. Now that’s likeability and that’s
going to boost your chances for success in a big way.
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