Negotiation

Reader wants to join my Insights & More Book Club, but doesn’t want to read

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This morning, I woke up to find a hot inquiry from a potential buyer:

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Hey john!

I wanna ask you a question about this insights book club thing you’re selling.

I’m interested in it but since I basically have a 10+ “must read” book list that’s pending at all times, realistically, I’m not sure if I’ll be able to read the “insight book” along with you.

Do you think this “mastermind” is still worth a buy?

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How to respond? My natural instinct would be to smile, unpack my sample set of stainless steel pots and pans, and start my pitch, explaining how these pots and pans pay for themselves in just two months’ time, thanks to the energy savings and reduction in food wastage. “As an added bonus, they maximize taste thanks to the Silichromatic Ring™ and Redi-Temp® Valve!”

But I stopped myself from doing what comes naturally. Instead, I responded like this:

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Fair question. I’d like to answer it but how can I? What would a mastermind call be worth to you? What would you want to get out of it in order for it to be worth $15/month to you?

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The only reason I thought and responded like this is because I am now going through Jim Camp’s book Start With No, for maybe the fourth time in five years.

I’m going through Camp’s book for the fourth time because, as I’ve written before, I believe books are the most condensed and most useful sources of ideas and information. They give you the kind of depth you will not find in any other format. They stimulate thinking in a way that no other format can match. What’s more, they offer the best value for your money. You should hate books if you’re selling info, and love them if you’re buying info.

Of course, you have to put in some work to get that value out of a book. Reading it, taking notes, thinking a bit, maybe even rereading, once, twice, or four times, like I’m doing with Camp.

​​Which brings me back to my Insights & More Book Club, and to that inquiry I got this morning.

I’ve opened the doors to the Insights & More Book Club to new members for a few days. I will close the doors again tomorrow. We are starting a new book right now for March and April, and it doesn’t make sense to have people join mid-way.

After my Camp-inspired response above, the potential new member of my book club thought for a bit. He decided it makes sense for him to join even if he has no time to read the actual books. I doubt that’s something I could have sold him on with my pots-and-pans sales shtick. And it’s not something I will try to sell you on either.

But if you are interested in the Insights & More Book Club, whether for the books themselves, for company to help you unlock value out of those books, or for other reasons of your own, you will have to sign up to my email newsletter as a first step. You can do that here. You have until tomorrow, February 27.

The Law of Reflection

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I expected some blowback to my email yesterday.

For one thing, I was writing about loaded topics — corona, Novak Djokovic, government lockdowns, Prince of Persia.

For another, in the hours after I wrote and scheduled yesterday’s email, the story I was writing about blew up. It went from being something only tennis fans and Australians might know about… to the number one international news items, with the predictable outrage and memery and fixed opinions.

So yes — I was expecting people to write in and tell me how stupid, flippant, and just clearly very wrong my email is.

I should have known better. Because what happened was this:

A bunch of people did write in. Some liked the email and the point I was making. Some offered to be my nemesis (the takeaway of yesterday’s email). Some told me personal stories of their own from the ground in Australia. Some disagreed with the email, in reasoned and civil tones.

But not one person was insulting, aggressive, outraged or seeking to outrage me.

In fact, the last time I can remember getting an outraged response to my emails was over six months ago. The same guy who wrote that outraged response had written me a few inflammatory emails before. So I unsubscribed him from my list, and wrote an email about it the next day.

Like I said, no outrage since. Maybe there’s a lesson in there. In any case, there’s definitely a lesson in here:

“The adversary mirrors you”

That’s from master negotiator Jim Camp. The adversary in Camp’s system is the person you are negotiating with, but it could just as well be a prospect you are looking to sell… a reader you are looking to influence… or a girl you are trying to get on a date.

In fact, Camp’s advice is almost the same as the advice of the late and great pickup coach Tom Torero. Tom used to tell guys that “the girl is your mirror.”

If she looks startled or scared when you approach her… if she won’t stick around to talk to you… if she doesn’t trust you with her phone number… then take a step back. And figure out exactly what you’re projecting into the world, and how you should change it.

In other words, this mirroring stuff isn’t my plea for the world to be civil and boring.

I’m just telling you to figure out how you want your adversaries to feel and act. Relaxed and confident? Fun and playful? Scared and outraged? Then you know what to do. Feel and act that same way yourself.

Or vice versa:

Figure out how you want to feel and act in your life and your business. Just be aware that those are the kinds of prospects you will attract.

If there are enough such prospects, then you’re well in the saddle. But if you don’t have enough prospects who want to feel and act the way you do…

Then you might benefit from the following referral advice from Jim Camp. It is a kind of corollary to Camp’s Law of Reflection above. Camp says:

“What’s the key to getting referrals? It’s simple. Give them.”

How to win an argument by not really trying

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About 20 years ago, when I first read Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People, I came across a clever aphorism.

“You cannot win an argument,” wrote Carnegie.

That’s stuck with me ever since, even though it goes against my argumentative nature. The fact is, I like to debate and argue and show people how I’m right and how they aren’t.

Except, like Carnegie says, you cannot really win. You cannot argue people over to your way of thinking. And even if you do get them to admit that you’re right and they’re wrong, you’ve gained nothing except their hatred.

So most of the time, when I find I’m about to let the debating crow out of its cage, I bite my tongue and I stuff the ugly black bird back where it belongs. I smile. I nod. And I think to myself, “Boy, how wrong you are. But you won’t hear it from me.”

This is an improvement over losing friends and alienating people. But it’s hardly a creative and productive way to deal with new ideas.

There’s gotta be something better, right?

Of course. It’s just that I wasn’t clever enough to think of it myself. But I came across this better way to win arguments in an interview with billionaire investor Howard Marks.

Marks was asked what early advice helped him become so successful. He said there wasn’t any investing advice that did it.

Instead, it was just an attitude, and he’s not sure where he picked it up. He illustrated it by describing how he deals with his longtime business partner:

“Each of us is open to the other’s ideas. When we have an intellectual discussion, neither of us puts a great emphasis on winning. We want to get to the right answer. We have enormous respect for each other, which I think is the key. When he says something, a position different from mine, my first reaction is not, ‘How can I diffuse that? How can I beat that? How can I prove he’s wrong?’ My first reaction is to say, ‘Hey, what can I get from that? What can I take away? Is he right? Maybe he’s right and I was wrong.'”

“Yeah, yeah,” I hear you saying. “Enough with the high-sounding billionaire lessons. Why don’t you get off your preachy pony and give me some ideas for how I could money? Like today?”

Well I never… the ingratitude!

Honestly, this intellectual humility thing was my idea for you to make money. But you are right. It might take some time to bear fruit.

If you want to make money today, then I don’t have much advice to give you. Well, none except what I wrote up a few years ago and put inside my Upwork book.

“Upwork!” you now say. “I’ve tried it! It doesn’t work. It’s a cesspool.”

You may be completely right. I certainly won’t argue with you.

But if you want to see what I have to say about success on Upwork, and what you might be able to take away from it and maybe even make money from, today, then here is my Upwork book, still available for some uncertain time on Amazon:

https://bejakovic.com/upwork

What never to say when somebody’s angry, upset, or riled up at you

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In a small town bar, a drunk farmer pushed his way through the crowd and got in the face of a meek and proper-looking man.

“You sent that tornado that leveled my house,” the farmer roared as he grabbed the meek guy by the lapels. “Now you’re gonna pay for that!”

A flash of panic spread across the other guy’s face. He threw a glance to the door. No bouncer to help.

So in another flash, this meek man changed his panicked face into a convincing scowl. And he grabbed the farmer by the lapels in turn.

“Yeah, that’s right about the tornado!” yelled the previously meek man. “And I’ll tell you something else! I’ll send another one if you don’t back off!”

Which the farmer did. “Hey buddy… take it easy! I was just kidding…”

You might know this true-life anecdote because Robert Cialdini used it in his book Influence.

The meek guy at the bar was a local TV station weatherman. Cialdini used the story to illustrate the power of association, which hounds weathermen with threats, insults, and occasional beatings whenever the weather they announce turns bad.

Yeah, that’s right about association. And I’ll tell you something else:

This same anecdote is also a great illustration of another social phenomenon, the power of agree-and-amplify.

In many situations, when somebody’s angry, upset, or riled up, the worst thing you can do is to try to calm him. Instead, it often works much better to agree with what he’s saying, and to push him further into the negative.

It’s like pushing the rug out from under him. Yes, pushing. Because instead of having a firm piece of ground to stand and fight on, your adversary finds he’s moving away from you. And so his natural instinct becomes to give up his spot, and to take a few steps back towards you.

Which might be interesting if you’re meek by nature and you ever find people attacking you, expecting you to buckle.

But what about copywriting?

Would you ever want to use agree-and-amplify in your copy?

I would say no, not as I just described it above. But this agree-and-amplify stuff connects in my mind to a copywriting and marketing topic I wrote about recently. This other tactic allows you to take something negative, and use it in your favor, even in your copy. In case you’re curious:

https://bejakovic.com/a-transparent-but-effective-marketing-ploy-thanks-jay-abraham

Flattery is to listening as sincere compliments are to…?

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Today I have an idea that might help you if you ever talk to friends, clients, or even random strangers like your wife or husband.

I thought of it yesterday when I saw a family of three walking in the park.

Mom was trying to have a serious conversation with dad. Meanwhile, their 8-year-old daughter kept trying to get mom’s attention:

“Mom! Mom! Mom!”

So in between sentences to dad, mom put her hand on the back of the little girl’s head and said, “Tell me, sweetie.”

The girl rattled off a few sentences, a typical 8-year-old’s story that goes nowhere.

“That’s great,” the mom said. And then she picked up the conversation with dad right where she had left off.

Meanwhile the daughter, satisfied at having made an important point, went back to playing and left her parents to talk in peace for a few moments.

A few days ago, I wrote that flattery works great. Well, so does listening, even if you only make a show of it. That’s what I was seeing in that family scene above.

But just as sincere compliments are a step beyond flattery… there’s also a step beyond listening.

Negotiation coach Jim Camp called it blank slating.

That’s when you drop your preconceived assumptions and ideas… give the other party your full attention… and allow them to draw on your mental etch-a-sketch.

Camp thought blank slating is so important that he made it a cornerstone of his negotiation system, which was used in billion-dollar deals as well as in hostage situations (FBI’s Chris Voss was one of Camp’s students).

Blank slating is not easy. But with practice, it becomes possible.

Except… why? Why go to the trouble?

If plain old, in-one-ear-and-out-the-other listening works already… why put in the effort and practice needed to blank slating?

Only this:

Because you’ll uncover information you wouldn’t uncover otherwise.

And this:

Because you’ll build deeper rapport.

And this:

Because your own brain might kick in, and produce new options and alternatives you hadn’t thought of when you entered this situation.

Finally, because you might avoid some real bad situations on occasion. Speaking of which, here’s a bit of barber-shop humor that comedian Norm MacDonald once did on Conan O’Brien:

I looked in the mirror and all I see is a fat old man.
So I says to my wife, I says to her:
Sweetheart I feel old and fat.
I need you to give me a real compliment.
So she says, your eyesight is perfect!
So I says to her, you dirty dog!

Now let me leave you with another analogy:

Listening is to this blog… as blank slating is to…?

If you said my daily email newsletter, you win the prize for most attentive and open-minded. Click here in case you’d like to sign up.

Where to go when a negotiation hits no

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Do you dread having to negotiate?

Is it worse than having to take a cold shower in the middle of January in a bathroom without heating?

If so, maybe the following news item will help:

Women’s tennis world no. 2 Naomi Osaka just shocked the world by withdrawing from the French Open. As you might know, the French Open is one of the four Grand Slams, the biggest tennis tournaments of the year.

It all started a week ago, a few days before the French Open began.

That’s when Osaka wrote a post on Instagram, saying she won’t do press appearances during the tournament. Talking to the press is harmful to her mental health, Osaka said, and it feels like kicking a person when they’re down.

This created a lot of buzz in the tennis world.

A few days later, the French Tennis Federation, along with the other organizing bodies of the Grand Slam tournaments, put out a statement.

They offered support to Osaka, but also said she would be fined each time she failed to talk with the press. The fines would escalate. Eventually, Osaka could be disqualified from the tournament, and even banned from participating in future Grand Slams.

That’s when Naomi Osaka decided to withdraw.

​​She wrote to the tournament organizers for not explaining her position in a better way. And she said she wants to work together in finding a solution. But for now, she is taking time off the court.

To which the French Tennis Federation made its own statement. They said they were sad and sorry at Osaka’s decision, and they want to work with athletes to ensure their well-being. They wish Osaka all the best, and they look forward to seeing her next year.

I don’t know what the outcome of this will be. I just want to point out that everything in life, at least anything that has to do with another person, is a negotiation.

And like negotiation coach Jim Camp used to say, negotiation starts with no.

This is not a matter of hard-line posturing, or telling people to take it or leave it, or walking away.

But real negotiation starts with no. And it doesn’t end with yes.

When I first heard Jim Camp say this, it sounded bizarre or intentionally contrarian. But when you look at negotiations in the real world, like the Naomi Osaka situation above, it becomes obvious Camp is right.

Naomi said no.

Then the tournament organizers came back and said no in their own terms.

Then Naomi came back, and said no in a different way.

And all throughout, the two parties are still engaged, are still talking, and are still working together to reach an agreement.

The question then is how to best manage that process.

What do you do when the other side says no… and you say no… and yet you both have an interest in working together in some way?

The best guide I know for that is Camp’s book, of course titled Start With No.

​​It lays out a system for negotiation, so you can get to an outcome you want, while minimizing that “cold bathroom” feel.

Plus if you write sales copy, this book might have the knock-on effect at making you more persuasive. (A couple of million-dollar marketers say this book is their favorite copywriting book, even though it never mentions the topic.)

Fair warning:

Camp’s book is dense and it might take multiple reads to grasp. But in case you’re curious, here’s the link for more info:

https://bejakovic.com/start-with-no

Eleemosynary enlightenment

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The atmosphere around the large conference table was tense.

At one end sat a team of lawyers, dressed in three-piece suits and aggressively staring down the table.

At the other end sat a bunch of sloppy-looking beatnik types, trying to keep calm but obviously nervous.

The time was the late 1930s. The place was Hollywood. The lawyers were studio lawyers. The beatnik types were studio animators, trying to form a union. Among them was Chuck Jones, the famous director of all those Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck cartoons.

Jones really didn’t want to be there. He certainly didn’t want to start trouble.

And then one of the lawyers stood up. He stalked down to where the animators were huddled together. And he slammed his hand down on the table.

“One thing I want to make eminently clear,” he said. “Mr. Schlesinger is NOT running an eleemosynary institution.”

Leon Schesinger was the head of the studio. That much was clear. But what about that eleemosynary? What the hell did that mean?

“I loved words always,” Jones said later. “And I knew what he was doing.”

Jones felt like he was being played, manipulated, made to feel small and dumb. Like his vocabulary was small. Which it wasn’t!

In a flash, this sense of injustice boiled up and over. And Jones, very unlike himself, stood up, slammed his own hand down on the table, and started to yell.

“What do you mean by that word!”

The lawyer took a step back. “It… it means a charitable organization.”

Jones kept yelling. “Well why in the damn hell didn’t you just say that? How dare you use a word like that? We’re supposed to be working together here to try to solve a problem!”

The other animators suddenly took courage also. A team spirit was forming, thanks to Chuck Jones’s unexpected outburst.

The meeting didn’t go anywhere. After it was over, Jones expected he would be fired for his combativeness and troublemaking. And sure enough, he was called down immediately to Leon Schlesinger’s office.

But it wasn’t what Jones expected. ​​

“I want to apologize,” said Schlesinger. “The lawyer didn’t understand we were trying to work this thing out together.”

The negotiations continued for some time after that. The animators kept together, with Jones at their head, all starting with that fight that Jones decided to pick. And eventually, Schesinger signed the contract allowing his workers to unionize.

My point for tonight is enlightenment. In other words, I don’t want to push a one-sided but misleading conclusion from the story above.

Instead, I want to throw out the idea that in complex situations, like in dealing with people, there is no single best way to proceed in all situations.

So in the interest of enlightenment, since we’ve already heard from Chuck Jones, let me leave you with some words to the other extreme. They come from that great philosopher of human nature, Dale Carnegie:

“You cannot win an argument. You can’t because if you lose it, you lose it; and if you win it, you lose it. […] Distrust your first instinctive impression. Our first natural reaction in a disagreeable situation is to be defensive. Be careful. Keep calm and watch out for your first reaction. It may be you at your worst, not your best.”

And one final thought for tonight:

If you want more complex and multi-sided negotiation and marketing advice, you might like to try out my email newsletter.

3 reasons to 3+ your prospect

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Negotiation expert Jim Camp promoted a technique he called 3+. Camp said to cover each point of your negotiation at least 3 times in slightly different language.

“So you’re saying you want to subscribe to my email newsletter today. Is that right?”

“Are there any reasons you’d rather wait to subscribe?”

“And if you do get to the end of this post where the optin is, would you still be interested in subscribing? Are you sure?”

Camp did 3+ because he wanted to get to a decision that sticks, rather than just a flaky agreement.

But you can do something similar to get a click or a purchase from a prospect, even a flaky one. All you have to do is repeat your basic promise at least three times.

Don’t worry about annoying your reader. You won’t annoy him, as long as you surround your promise with new info. Phrase your promise in a new and surprising way. But keep hammering away at it.

Really? Yes. Because there are at least three reasons why this 3+ stuff works in sales copy.

One is that repetition creates belief. It shouldn’t, but it does. Just look at the stump speeches of politicians, or the headlines of the major news outlets. Repeat an outlandish idea one, two, three or more times, and people will adopt it as their own.

But that’s not all. Because repetition also creates desire. You’re greasing the groove.

Promise me something once, and I only hear your words. Promise me something twice, and I’m starting to imagine your promise being a reality. Make the same promise three or more times, and I’m getting impatient for the outcome.

But there’s a third and possibly most important reason to repeat your message over and over and over. And that’s the fact we’re living in a noisy world. Your reader doesn’t hear your whole message. He is distracted. He skims. He checks his phone. His mind is elsewhere.

You think you have his whole attention. You don’t. But you can still get your message across, if you keep repeating it. How many times? At least three. More is better.

None of this is new. Almost 300 years ago, Samuel Johnson said:

“Promise, large promise, is the soul of an advertisement.”

You might already know that quote. What few people know is that Johnson kept talking after the dictaphone stopped recording.

“Yes,” Johnson said, “promise is the soul of an advertisement. But repetition, constant repetition, is the body of an advertisement. So keep repeating your promise to make it more real. Even if you get tired of it. Over and over. Because eventually, your prospect will hear you. And then he will buy.”

By the way, remember that 3+ from the start of this post? About subscribing to my email newsletter? You do?

Well, I’m not sure if you’re still up for subscribing. In case you are, here’s where to go.

The George Costanza method of client seduction

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There’s an episode of Seinfeld where George Costanza, the fat short bald loser who is always making up exciting careers for himself to impress women, realizes that everything he has done in life has lead to failure.

Desperate, George takes another tack.

He goes bizarro. He does the opposite of whatever he would normally do.

George starts by ordering the opposite lunch from what he normally gets. He then notices an attractive woman looking at him from across the restaurant.

Bizarro George decided to get up and go talk to her — because normal George never would.

“Excuse me,” George says to the woman, “I couldn’t help but notice you were looking in my direction.”

“Oh yes I was,” the woman explains. “You just ordered the exact same lunch as me.”

George takes a deep breath.

“My name is George. I’m unemployed and I live with my parents.”

The woman turns to face him fully, her eyes sparkling and a smile spreading across her face. “I’m Victoria. Hiii…”

Chris Haddad said in a recent interview that if you are a freelance copywriter, then you should be constantly going on Facebook, bragging about how great you are, and sharing all of your successes and testimonials.

That’s one approach. It can definitely work.

But there’s another approach. It’s when you seek to not impress. Instead, you give clients reasons why you are not a good match for them. You refuse to talk about your experience and successes, or at least you put it off as long as possible.

This is nothing more than a page out of Jim Camp’s negotiation system. You’re looking for a no. More importantly, you are eliminating any neediness that’s typical when freelancers talk to clients.

Very likely, this approach is not right for you.

But if you find that the typical advice of confidence and bragging has lead you to failure over and over… then this bizarro George approach is worth a shot. Because it can work, and not on just on TV.

Here’s another thing that is very likely not right for you:

My daily email newsletter. Very few people subscribe to it. Even fewer read it.

Beware “win-win-win”

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The hair stands up on the back of my neck whenever I hear the phrase “win-win-win.” And I’ve hearing it more and more often.

“It’s a real win-win-win situation…”​​

I guess that’s how markets evolve. First we had “win-win,” as in, “win-win negotiation.” Once that became old hat, marketers had to crank it up — hence the rise of “win-win-win.”

The reason I am wary of this phrase is because I’ve read Jim Camp’s negotiation book Start with No. And one of Camp’s big enemies is win-win. That’s just a clever name, Camp says, for fear- and compromise-based negotiation.

According to Camp, win-win negotiation is not principled… it’s not in your best interest… and if somebody is pushing it on you, you’re about to get flayed alive.

But maybe you think this is crazy. Maybe you think that “win-win” is great, and that “win-win-win” is even better. So here’s a quote by one very famous and successful copywriter, John Carlton:

Nearly every biz transaction is an inherently hostile situation.

Behind the smiles and back-slapping and promises of “working for the common good” between, say, a freelancer (or consultant) and a client…

… the freelancer actually wants to do as little work as possible for the maximum possible money…

… while the client wants to bleed every ounce of productivity from the writer for the least outlay of cash.

John uses the terms “veiled teeth-baring” and “primal snarling dance” to describe the reality of business interactions.

That’s certainly one way to do it. But I don’t think it’s the only way.

And if you want to know how to handle business situations in a way that’s neither snarling nor based in fear, then Camp’s book is worth a read. Or two. Or three.

Or you can just subscribe to my daily email newsletter. I’m no Jim Camp. But I’ve read his stuff, and it’s near to my heart. And while my newsletter is mainly about marketing and persuasions, sometimes I also write about the business of copy.

Maybe that doesn’t appeal to you. But in the odd case that it does, you can subscribe to get my emails by clicking here.