Way of the Wolf: Straight Line Selling: Master the Art of Persuasion, Influence, and Success

by Jordan Belfort

Now, in this particular case, the additional words Mr. Smith heard after “Hi, is John there?” were: “I really want to know! I’m not like the rest of the salesmen who ask you that, just to get it out of the way. I genuinely want to speak to him!”

Now, to be clear, there is a sweet spot here, insofar as just how much peppiness and upbeatness you can layer onto your words until you start to sound disingenuous. In other words, you don’t want to say it like Tony the Tiger says, “It’s grrrrrreat!” I mean, you’d sound like a complete idiot if you did that. You want to be upbeat enough to get your point across, but not so over the top that you sound ridiculous.

At the same time he’s hearing the additional words from Bill Peterson’s amped-up greeting and trying to process their meaning, he says, “Yeah, this is John,” to which Bill Peterson immediately breaks out his second core influencing tonality, which is called phrasing a declarative as a question, and he applies it in the following words: “Hi, my name is Bill Peterson, calling from Acme Travel Company in Beverly Hills, California. How are you today?” Now, notice how each one of those three thoughts is a declaration: 1 Hi, my name is Bill Peterson, 2 calling from Acme Travel Company 3 in Beverly Hills, California Now, clearly each of those three thoughts is a declarative statement, not a question. However, by phrasing them as questions, you’ve tapped into the power of three separate human desires simultaneously: 1 To not be perceived as being out of the loop 2 To remember people we’ve met before 3 To appear generally agreeable

Now watch what happens to the punctuation when Bill Peterson phrases those declaratives as questions: “Hi, my name is Bill Peterson? Calling from Acme Travel Company? In Beverly Hills, California? How are you today?” By phrasing each of these three statements as questions, back to back, you infer what’s called a microagreement, and the additional words Mr. Smith hears are: “Right? Right? You’ve heard of us, right?”

This is a tonality you want to use sparingly, but it’s incredibly powerful in gaining agreement with your prospect. You can either phrase your statement as a question or, in some contexts, just use the exact words as you raise your voice again, again, and again, to which your prospect will hear: “Right? Right? Right?”

When Bill phrases his name as a question, Mr. Smith’s inner monologue starts saying, “Wait a second! Am I supposed to know who this person is? I better hedge my bets and sound like I do!”

What happens in that very instant, when you phrase a regular statement as a question, is that it sends your prospect’s brain into search mode, as the prospect tries to figure out whether or not they should know the person who’s calling. And again, due to the conscious mind’s limited processing power, as long as your prospect r...

the next group of words you’re going to say—aka, your next language pattern, in Straight Line parlance—is going to explain the precise reason why you called the prospect today.

In other words, you didn’t just call the prospect out of the blue. You didn’t call yesterday, you didn’t call tomorrow, and you didn’t call next week; you called right now, and there’s a very specific reason for it. We call this reason a justifier, inasmuch as it creates a justification for your reaching out to the prospect.

when you use a justifier correctly, it will dramatically increase the compliance rate for whatever request you’re making. In this case, the request that Bill Peterson is going to make will be for permission to ask Mr. Smith a series questions, so he can begin the intelligence-gathering process.

However, for now, let’s just focus on the justifier itself and the tonality that Bill is going to apply to it—namely, the tonality of mystery and intrigue.

Bill says, “Now, John, the reason for the call today is that we’ve been reaching out to a select group of homeowners in your area to offer them . . . ,” and then he’ll go on to explain whatever that offer happens to be. It could be a marketing special, where Mr. Smith is going to get free airfare or a free night in a hotel; or it could be the chance to join ...

The way you create mystery and intrigue with this tonality is by lowering your voice to just above a whisper and then hanging on the R in the word “r...

In addition, because you lower your voice to just above a whisper, the reason takes on the properties of a secret, creating a sense of urgency and scarcity, which takes us now to our f...

In consequence, you should always try to create at least some degree of urgency right before you ask for the order, as it will dramatically increase the likelihood of your prospect saying yes.

Now, if the salesperson wanted to increase that likelihood even further, then they could layer the tonality for scarcity on top of the words said. We call this second type of scarcity tonal scarcity. Specifically, tonal scarcity is when you lower your voice to just above a whisper and then put a little oomph into it! Applying that tone of voice to a word or phrase triggers a sense of scarcity in the listener’s unconscious mind, which then sends a signal to its conscious counterpart, in the form of a gut feeling. In other words, tonal scarcity stacks on top of verbal scarcity, so that the sound of your words intensifies the feelings of scarcity in the prospect’s gut to a level far beyond what they would have felt from words alone.

And that takes us to the third type of scarcity, which is called informational scarcity—meaning, the information itself is in short supply. In other words, not only is the black 750iL in shor...

Here’s how you put it all together: First, verbal scarcity is used to convey the logic: “We only have one black-on-black 750iL left, and once it’s gone, it’s going to be three months until our next shipment comes in.” Second, you add on tonal scarcity by using a power whisper, which greatly intensifies the prospect’s sense of scarcity. And third, you add on informational scarcity by explaining that even the information itself is in short supply.

For the next three tonalities, let’s jump ahead to the end of the main body of your sales presentation, right to the point where you’re going to ask for the order for the first time. In this case, we’re going to apply a series of three tonal shifts as we ask for the order—starting with a tonality of absolute certainty, then transitioning into a tonality of utter sincerity, and then transitioning again to the reasonable man tone.II

1 Absolute certainty: I’ve already explained this to you in detail in Chapter 4, so let me just quickly refresh your memory. In essence, with the tonality of absolute certainty, your voice takes a firmer, more definitive tone, with a power that seems to come right from your solar plexus, in order to convey your absolute conviction about whatever you happen to currently be saying.

2 Utter sincerity: This is a calm, smooth, confident, low-pressure tone that implies that what you’re currently saying to the prospect is coming directly from your heart, and that you’re being absolutely sincere with them at the highest possible level. It’s a velvety smooth tone that’s so humble, and so nonthreatening, that it sounds almost apologetic in nature, but, of course, there’s no apology being given. Rather, you’re telling someone something that is clearly in their best interest,

3 The reasonable man:

In this particular case, we’re focusing on how it’s used at the close; however, what I want you to understand is that we are also going to be using it at the beginning of the sale, when you ask your prospect for permission to explain the benefits of whatever product or idea you’re offering them. In other words, you don’t just start pitching your prospect an idea, without first saying something along the lines of “If you have sixty seconds, I’d like to share an idea with you. You got a minute?” Those last three words—“got a minute?”—are when you apply the reasonable man tone, which entails you raising your voice up at the end of the sentence,III to imply the reasonableness of your statement.

In essence, when you use the reasonable man tone, the extra words your prospect hears are “I’m reasonable, you’re reasonable, and this is a very reasonable request!” And since it’s basic human nature to want to obey the golden rule—do unto others as you’d have them do unto you—your prospect feels an unconscious obligation to return your reasonableness in kind, causing them to say yes to your request.

First, the typical language pattern for a close would be something along the lines of “If you give me one shot, Bill, believe me, you’re going to be very, very impressed. Sound fair enough?”

First, we start with the tone of absolute certainty, which is applied to the words “You give me just one shot, Bill, and believe me . . .” Next, we smoothly transition from the tonality of absolute certainty to the tonality of utter sincerity, which is applied to the words “. . . you’re going to be very, very impressed . . .” And then lastly, we transition from the tonality of utter sincerity to the tonality of the reasonable man, which is applied to the words “. . . sound fair enough?” And this implies that you’re a reasonable man making a reasonable statement.

Remember, you don’t want to say “SOUND FAIR ENOUGH?” in an angry, aggressive tone, or “Sound fair enough?” in a nasally Poindexter tone, or “Sound fair enough?” in a high-pitched Mary Poppins tone. Rather, what you need to get across is that you’re reasonable, and hence the whole thing is reasonable and it’s no big deal to buy.

The first question you’re going to ask them, no matter what objection they hit you with, is: “Does the idea make sense to you? Do you like the idea?”

So let’s say in response to you asking for the order, your prospect says, “It sounds good. Let me think about it.” Your reply would be: “I hear what you’re saying, but let me ask you a question. Does the idea make sense to you? Do you like the idea?”V Now, the key here is that the tone you use—starting with “I hear what you’re saying . . .” and going all the way to the end, when you say, “. . . do you like the idea?”—is going to be your hypothetical, money-aside tone.V The additional words that your prospect hears in this case are “Hypothetically speaking, putting money aside, does the idea make sense to you? Do you like the idea?”

In essence, you’ve made the whole thing an academic exercise, which totally disarms them—allowing you to continue the process of increasing their level of certainty for the Three Tens, through the process of looping. Next, we have the tonality of implied obviousness.V