Oh my, how pretty you look today!

How did you feel as you read that? Did you blush? Did it bring a smile to your face? Did you agree with me or were sitting there thinking to yourself how does she even know? Have you figured out the *SECRET* yet? Today I am going to indulge and veer a little off course, but stay with me it will be worth your while!

Have you ever been crabbing?

Apparently it’s fairly difficult to catch the speedy crabs but remarkably easy to keep track of them once they are caught because of their instinct to “pull each other down.” Once you have at least two crabs, you just put them in a shallow pan or bucket. A single crab could easily climb out, but if there is another crab there, he will reach up with his claw and pull the first crab back down before he can get up over the edge.

They don’t boost each other up or assist each other in their frantic quest to escape and regain their freedom. They do just the opposite. They pull each other back as though they can’t tolerate any of their number rising above their level or escaping without them.

Recently I found myself on a blog that had some content relative to the home party companies. So you can imagine I was very thrilled to find someone else as passionate about home party business. I went ahead and posted a comment, that made no reference whatsoever to what I was doing. Now you see when you post a comment, it can be traced back to its origin. The owner of said blog related to home party plans tracked me back and then proceeded to edit my comments such that anyone who read it would not be able to track it back to me (for obvious reason I was viewed as a competing entity). I only found out because I visit the blog, located a piece that was very insightful and wanted to post only to discover that I had been blocked. It said after I tried to publish my comment; DISCARDED! ha ha ha. I took it as a great complement!

This instinct, of course, is not limited to crabs. It is an unfortunate part of human nature to envy those who climb above us and to pull them down literally or verbally or at least within our own critical and judgmental minds.

You know people are more likely to be persuaded to say “yes” when you make them feel good about themselves, their work, and their accomplishments. People will do almost anything for you when you treat them with respect and dignity and show them that their feelings are important.

I have a MacBook for a computer. Great gadget I might add! 2 days ago, I had to go to the mall to get it fixed. Outside of the apple store, there was a relatively handsome young man selling those ornaments the move when the wind blows creating these mesmerizing illusions. No doubt he picked up in my fascination. He stopped me cold in my tracks as I was trying to avoid him, clever chap! Then he proceeded to stroke my ego! What he said to me is this, I really need your opinion. Then he bore his wares asking which I liked best and why. He made several comparisions, each time never failing to ask what my thoughts were. He even asked me how I felt about the price point! Ok he was good. I knew what he was doing and I choose to play along, I wanted to learn. You see once a student always a student. I must learn something new each day and I was well taught!

Not only was he soliciting my opinion, but he hang on to every word I uttered and used all the information that I shared to make a sale. It wasn’t about him, it was all about me. In this blog you hear over and over again me saying that people love to buy. People love to buy even more from people they like it is just that simple.

Needless to say, with my ego sufficiently stroked, I walked away with two lovely trinkets, a purchase I was happy to make because it was well earned. As as I am concerned I paid a small amount for a priceless lesson in what it means to sell without being an annoying pushy home party plan sales representative!

I studied psychology and spent a lot of time writing research papers, conducting social experiments and working with teens. I borrow heavily from that background today.

An experiment testing the effects of praise on a group of men in North Carolina was very insightful. The men received different types of comments from someone who needed a favor from them. The comments were either positive, negative, or a mixture of both. As you might expect, the person giving the positive comments was liked the best. Secondly, this conclusion held true even when the men knew their “complimenter” was seeking a favor. Finally, unlike the other types of comments, pure praise did not have to be accurate to work. Positive comments produced just as much liking toward the flatterer when they were untrue as when they were true. Strive to be sincere in your praise, although flattery works even when it is not sincere.

Ok the following is another Psych. 101 or 201 classic that shows the immense strength of praise. At a small college in Virginia, twenty-four students in a psychology course decided to see whether they could use compliments to change the way the women on campus dressed. For a while, they complimented all the female students who wore blue. The percentage of the female student population wearing blue rose from 25 percent to 38 percent. The researchers then switched to complimenting any woman who wore red. This caused the appearance of red on campus to double, from 11 percent to 22 percent. These results indicate that when you favorably comment on behavior, that behavior will increase. In psych. terms we call this positive reinforcement. Want a behavior to persist, speak on it. Want it to stop, don’t mention it. Now you see where most parents of teenagers get it wrong. You hate your daughters boyfriend…don’t say a thing! It will fizzle very quickly!

John Gottman, popular marriage counselor, through his many studies became so good at predicting which coouple would stay together and which ones would end up in divorce. His research indicated that one negative comment has more power than ten positive comments.

You are right. How do I know how you look like, I don’t. But I do believe that you are beautiful just the way you are, because our Creator does not make mistakes!

The home party plan success tips I share here are designed to do just that. Help you connect with your home party attendees, your party recruits and home party plan business sales customers on a personal and genuine level.

To your success!