For Salespeople, a Sense of Humor’s Usefulness for Rapport and Likability is Unmatched for Reward.

If you are salesperson, your first job is to connect on a human, authentic and relatable level with your prospect, whether in an email, on the phone, or in person.

By connect I mean being able to establish a relaxed, friendly, competent and worthwhile conversation about a problem you think you can solve for your prospect in a way they find useful, credible, and well-timed.

So how does having a sense of humor help towards this end? According to Albert Einstein in three very important ways:

Create your own Einstein Quote Here.

In his online course, "The Science of Sales" Sales expert, Jeff Bloomfield, connects all three of Einstein's ideas in his 'Connect - Like - Trust' recipe for success. Here's an excerpt:

"People prefer to work with people they trust, and as human beings, we tend to trust people we like. How do you determine if you like someone? People like people they connect with."

When they like you that makes your prospect feel you're alike making you likable and your prospect more likely to do business with you.

So if we're in sales how do we increase our personal likabiility and connectability?

There are lots of articles and books on the subject but at the top of everyone's list of favorite likable & connectable qualities is humor.

21 Tips to Be More Likable

Nothing positions people for persuasion

as well as a sense of humor.

Roger Dawson, Negotiation Expert

Laughter creates a bond where strangers in

the room feel like friends.

Rachelle Parham

Roger and Rachelle make a striking case for humor's usefulness.

But the unvarnished truth is that

people have a lot of fears around humor.

The #1 fear being, "I'm not funny."

I can hear you now; "I'm not! I don't get half the jokes people tell me. I forget punchlines. People look at me and they forget punchlines. I am the Terminator of Humor."

MEME TO THE RESCUE

Create your own Skeleton Meme Here

As it turns out whether you think you have a sense of humor or not is irrelevant. Simply being able to demonstrate a sense of humor is all that is required. And with the suite of new Humor Tools available today its easy. How easy?

Well you tell me.

Let's say you wanted to open your next sales presentation on a light, rapport establishing note with an impressive, warm touch of smart, likable humor. How would you do that? Maybe with a cartoon?

But where would you find a perfect crowd pleasing opening cartoon?

Well now that's an idea. A cartoon search engine. This new humor tool makes finding and delivering rapport building, reputation enhancing cartoon humor easier than ever. Below is a link to an 8-pack of cartoons to whet your appetite for exceptional cartoons. Click on the image below to be taken to the live site to see them:

When you get to the live site on your computer hover your mouse over the thumbnails to enlarge the cartoon images. If you see a cartoon you like just click on the thumbnail to be taken to the cartoon's original site for a larger and higher resolution version.

To see some of the funniest and smartest business cartoons you've ever seen all in one place click on any of the category titles below.

Accounting ~ Advertising ~ Business ~ Career ~ Coffee Committees ~ Communication ~ Computers ~ Consultants Customer Service ~ Ethics ~ Entrepreneur ~ Human Resources Innovation ~ Leadership ~ Legal ~ Management ~ Manufacturing Marketing ~ Meetings ~ Mergers ~ Motivation ~ Negotiation Presentation ~ Procrastination ~ Sales ~ Social Media ~ Statistics Strategy ~ Real Estate ~ Regulations ~ Taxes ~ Teaching Technology ~ Wall Street ~ Workaholic ~ Working from Home

Did you find at least one cartoon you like? Why not add it to your next presentation? It is the easiest way to demonstrate your sense of humor which increases your LPM Likability Per Minute (a new measurement I just made up). And it can support people's trust in you based on what Jeff Bloomfield says about human connection:

"People prefer to work with people they trust. And people trust people they like."

And for a salesperson, the opportunity of humor gets even better.

"Humor Increases Persuasion's Effectiveness"

Marshal Chiles explains this in this short video.

Marshal suggests adding funny images to your presentation slides. Click the link below to begin your successful funny image search.

According to an article in the Harvard Business Review entitled, What It Takes to Give a Great Presentation "Unexpected moments grab an audience’s attention because the human brain gets bored easily. Our brains are trained to look for something brilliant and new, something that stands out, something that looks delicious.” Visual novelty provides the brain what it's scanning for to keep it engaged.

Science says our brains love novelty.

To keep your audience's attention, why not give it to them?

Funny quotes also provide stimulating visual novelty so if you'd like to add a funny quote to your next presentation click on the image below to see it enlarged. A quote may be perfect for your next talk.

Are you starting to see that having a sense of humor is irrelevant.

All that matters is your ability to demonstrate that you have one.

By adding some great visual humor to your next presentation deck you will let your audience know that not only are you competent in your expertise to solve their problems, but you'll also be fun to work with. A skilled sales presenter knows the first order of business is always the same - demonstrate that you're likable. How do you know when you've succeeded? When you see your audience smiling.

Studies show no matter what people say they prefer likeable people over competent people.

Eric Barker

The ROI of well delivered humor always pays off for a presenter.

Humor helps you come across as competent and likable. It also helps your audience lean in to your talk instead of check out. But as sales people learn over time - in a competitive sales situation - all things being equal - likability is going to be the tiebreaker.

Demonstrating a nice sense of humor can make all the difference...and the sale. That's your humor ROI.

If you're in Sales it's time to benefit from Humor's likability qualities to improve your product presentation results. With the humor tools at HumorPoint it's easier than ever to find and deliver exceptional humor. You now have at your fingertips a state of the art suite of high-performance humor tools and content that guarantees you can enjoy all of humor's benefits for greater sales and business success. Yes, even if you're the Terminator of Humor.

If you would like to add a short, pitch-perfect comedy clip to your next sales presentation check out The Perfect Comedy Clip on HumorPoint. Sometimes it's just more fun and easier to let a professional comedian deliver the perfect punchline for you.

If you're a salesperson who loves golf then this cartoon is for you.

For More Golf Cartoons Click Here

PS. If you'd like to develop your Self-Deprecating Humor click here.