Damaging Admissions Ep 283

In a discussion about persuasive sales techniques, the host and guests, including a proponent of the "damaging admission" strategy, explore the power of trust in B2B sales and the impact of structuring statements with a negative followed by a positive. By owning one's deficiencies and framing them before a positive assertion, as illustrated by Eminem's approach in "8 Mile," the tactic increases the believability of the claim. This method stands out in a market saturated with exaggerated promises and can make sales arguments more compelling. The host emphasizes the importance of using this technique with integrity, suggesting that acknowledging potential drawbacks upfront can actually enhance the persuasiveness and perceived honesty of the sales pitch.

• Being truthful about negative aspects can enhance the credibility of subsequent positive statements.
• The more truthful and damaging a negative statement is, the more impactful the following positive statement appears.

"Be truthful in the things that you're saying that are negative."

This quote emphasizes the importance of honesty when discussing negative aspects. It suggests that such truthfulness can set the stage for a stronger, more believable positive message.

"And the more true they are and."

This continuation implies that the truthfulness of negative statements is directly proportional to their effectiveness.

"The more damaging they are, the more believable the thing that comes after the sentence."

This quote clarifies that the degree of damage caused by a truthful negative statement can significantly increase the believability of what follows.

• Introduction to the podcast's focus on customer acquisition, value maximization, customer retention, and learning from failures.

"Welcome to the game where we talk about how to get more customers, how to make more per customer, and to keep them longer, and the many failures and lessons we have learned along the way. I hope you enjoy and subscribe."

This quote serves as an introduction, outlining the podcast's themes of business growth strategies, customer relationship management, and learning from past mistakes.

• Speaker A shares a persuasion tactic that leverages integrity to build trust with prospects.
• Owning deficiencies with a single statement can be a powerful tool in persuasion.

"Really pumped to tell you one of my, my strongest and most powerful tactics in persuasion that allows you to use integrity to increase the trust in your prospects by owning all of your deficiencies with a single statement."

Speaker A expresses enthusiasm about sharing a persuasive technique that involves admitting shortcomings to build trust.

• Trust is crucial in sales, especially in B2B scenarios.
• The extent of trust influences the likelihood of a sale.
• Belief in the salesperson, the system, and the world are underlying factors.

"So many times, if you're thinking about how you're selling someone, the degree to which they will buy is directly correlated with how much they trust you."

This quote highlights the direct relationship between a customer's trust in the salesperson and their willingness to make a purchase.

"Especially in a B two B scenario where if I said, hey, for every dollar you give me, you'll make ten back. If someone truly believed that, then every single person would buy from me, right? Because there's no logical reason not to."

Speaker A uses a hypothetical B2B example to illustrate the importance of trust in the decision-making process of a buyer.

"So underpinning that is whether they believe me or not. And that could be within the context, whether they believe in themselves versus the system versus the world, there's other sub beliefs there. But fundamentally, if those three things are aligned and they truly believe in their core, then they're going to buy."

This quote delves deeper into the various layers of belief that influence a customer's trust and their subsequent purchasing decision.

• Referrals come with pre-established trust, making sales easier.
• The person referring has already endorsed the salesperson, simplifying the sales process.

"You have a referral that gets on the phone with you, it's so easy to close them, because the person who referred them has already imbued you with trust."

Speaker A explains how referrals benefit from pre-existing trust, which facilitates easier sales conversions.

"They've already vouched for you. And so the person comes in with sky high trust, and really you just need to get out of their way so they can make the purchase."

This quote further describes the dynamic of trust in referral-based sales, emphasizing the reduced need for persuasion.

• Speaker A introduces the concept of a damaging admission as a favorite persuasive technique.
• This method involves acknowledging negatives, which can paradoxically enhance credibility and trust.

"And this is the concept of a damaging admission, which is probably my single favorite technique to use in persuasion, because it allows me to be."

The incomplete quote suggests the introduction of a concept that Speaker A favors for its effectiveness in persuasion.

• Authenticity makes individuals stand out in a world full of exaggerated claims.
• Being truthful and honest can enhance persuasiveness.
• Acknowledging the negatives can make the positives seem more believable.

"And in a world of Charliton's, where people are always making huge promises and making huge claims and never kind of being real and authentic with people, you stick out like a sore thumb in a good way."

This quote emphasizes the value of authenticity in an environment where exaggeration is common. It suggests that being genuine makes a person more noticeable and positively distinguished.

• The order of positive and negative statements can influence the impact on the listener.
• Placing a positive statement after a negative one can amplify the positive message.
• The 'but' in the sentence acts as a turning point, enhancing the statement that follows.

"What happens is in that statement, I directed your attention to all of the things that you're going to have to do right now. If you noticed, it was positive statement but negative statement."

This quote illustrates how the sequencing of information—positive followed by negative—directs the listener's attention to the less desirable aspects of the proposition.

"Go negative statement, but positive statement, the butt acts as an amplifier for the second half."

This quote explains the strategy of starting with a negative statement and following it with a positive one, using 'but' as a pivot to emphasize the positive.

• Starting with negatives can make the subsequent positive claims more credible.
• Owning up to negatives demonstrates honesty and can make the speaker more trustworthy.
• The contrast between negatives and a positive can make the positive seem more impactful.

"The thing is, the more negatives I can say in the beginning, the more believable the thing that I say right afterwards is."

This quote conveys the idea that acknowledging multiple negatives before making a positive claim can make the positive appear more credible to the listener.

"And so if I own all of my negatives, which is why I love this, because be truthful in the things that you're saying that"

This quote highlights the speaker's appreciation for owning negatives as it aligns with being truthful, which is a key component of their persuasive approach.

• Negative statements have an inherent impact on believability.
• The more negative and true a statement is, the more it influences the perception of subsequent information.

"are negative." "And the more true they are, and." "The more damaging they are, the more believable the thing that comes after the sentence."

These quotes indicate that the speakers are discussing the psychological effect of negative information on the credibility of following statements. The negativity of a statement enhances the believability of what comes next.

• The host emphasizes the ad-free nature of the podcast and the lack of product sales.
• The host requests listener support in spreading the word to help more entrepreneurs.
• The specific call to action is for listeners to rate, review, and share the podcast to potentially impact others.

"Real quick, guys, you guys already know that I don't run any ads on this and I don't sell anything. And so the only ask that I can ever have of you guys is that you help me spread the word so we can help more entrepreneurs make more money, feed their families, make better products, and have better experiences for their employees and customers." "Is if you can rate and review and share this podcast. So the single thing that I ask you to do is you can just leave a review. It'll take you 10 seconds or one type of the thumb. It would mean the absolute world to me. And more importantly, it may change the world for someone else."

The host is explaining that the podcast operates without ads or sales, and the only support they seek from listeners is to share and promote the podcast. This support could have a significant impact on other entrepreneurs.

• The use of "but" in communication is strategic, with the information following it being amplified.
• The placement of "but" can direct attention and influence belief in the subsequent message.
• Similarly, "because" can be used to persuade, which will be discussed in a future video.
• The speaker provides an example of how to use "but" effectively in copywriting, especially near a call to action.

"And so the way to use but because everything that happens here after the word but is amplified, right? And everything that is before the word but is diminished." "So the good thing is you can actually control where your prospect's attention is going. So this is where we're directing them. It's after the word but." "And so I do this sometimes the word because is actually really similar too, to this in a different way. I'll use it in another video, but if I say something really horrible, I'm trying to think of something else. Let's see here. I'm really hard to live with. I absolutely do no house chores whatsoever. But whatever I say right now is something that you're going to believe, right?" "And so when you use this to your advantage and you weave this into your copy, especially as you get closer to your call to actions, people will believe you. And fundamentally, this is what will make your copy so much more persuasive, right?"

These quotes explain how the word "but" functions in communication to emphasize the information that follows it while diminishing the preceding message. The speaker suggests that this can be a powerful tool in copywriting to guide the audience's focus and enhance the persuasiveness of a message.

• Negative admissions in advertising can enhance the perceived effectiveness of a product.
• Citing a famous Viagra commercial, the speaker illustrates how a warning about a potential risk (prolonged erection) paradoxically underscored the drug's potency.
• The example shows that mentioning a negative side effect can amplify the positive aspects of a product and increase consumer interest.

buy on Amazon, right? Because the damaging admissions, the reviews that are negative give credence to the things that are positive.

This quote suggests that negative reviews or admissions can make positive statements more credible to consumers, enhancing overall trust in the product or service.

So let me give you a really famous example that Viagra had. And some of you guys may know this commercial, but it's literally it crushed for them, right? Some of you guys may remember that they had a warning label at the end of their advertisements that said if an erection lasts longer than 4 hours, must contact a medical professional, right? And so the beauty is there was a genuine risk, right? But in making the risk, they amplified the power of the product. Every single guy heard that warning and was like, I could have an erection for 4 hours. Sign me up, right?

This quote explains how Viagra's advertising strategy turned a serious warning about a health risk into an appealing feature, demonstrating the product's effectiveness and thereby enticing potential customers.

• Warnings about extreme outcomes suggest the underlying promise of the product is a given.
• This technique increases the believability of the sales message and makes the entire argument more persuasive.
• It is considered a favorite persuasion tactic by the speaker because it is rooted in honesty.

If we're warning people that the extreme.

Adverse effects of the result that we're promising in an extreme fashion, then it makes the underlying believability of whether or not they're going to achieve it seem assumed.

These two quotes from different speakers connect to highlight that emphasizing extreme adverse effects presupposes the effectiveness of the product, thus making the overall promise more believable.

And then it makes the entire set of sentences or the preceding argument more persuasive and believable. And so ultimately, this is one of my favorite persuasion tactics, and I love it because it's so based in integrity.

This quote emphasizes that the speaker values this persuasive technique not only for its effectiveness but also because it aligns with ethical practices by being upfront about potential downsides.

• Transparency about potential negative outcomes can be used to bolster the persuasiveness of an argument.
• This approach is seen as integral because it involves disclosing information that consumers will likely discover on their own.
• The speaker encourages using this tactic in sales presentations and copywriting for more effective persuasion and increased likelihood of purchase.

You're just saying all of the things that someone is going to find out eventually. You might as well use those things to increase the persuasiveness of your argument, right?

This quote underlines the principle of integrity in persuasion, where being honest about all aspects of a product or service, including potential negatives, can be strategically advantageous.

And so I wanted to leave this with you. I hope you found it valuable. Keeping awesome. Try it in your copy. Try it when you're presenting something in a sales Presentation, and I guarantee you you will have a prospect who believes you much more and is more likely to buy.

This concluding quote serves as a call to action, encouraging the audience to apply this tactic of integrating negative admissions to enhance the persuasiveness and effectiveness of their sales strategies.