Notes on Selling - Three

by Greg Woodley

This is the third in a series of articles regarding the sales process. The ideas for this article come from "Influence - The psychology of Persuasion" - Robert Caldini.

Today I would like to look at the "Law of Contrast" often referred to as "the Contrast Frame ", "Pre-framing" is similar.

"Men, as well as women, are much oftener led by their hearts than by their understandings." - Lord Chesterfield

The Contrast Frame

The contrast principle affects the way we see the difference between two things that are presented one after another. Simply put, if the second item is fairly different from the first, we will tend to see it as more different than it actually is. So if we lift a light object first and then lift a heavy object, we will estimate the second to be heavier than it actually is.

If we talking to a beautiful woman at a cocktail party and are then joined by an unattractive one, the second woman will strike us as less attractive than she actually is. . In a study done on the contrast principle at Arizona and Montana State universities college students rated a picture of an average-looking member of the opposite sex as less attractive if they had first looked through the ads in some popular magazines.

This concept is more than in our head, it is actually in our nervous system. Want proof -Take three buckets of water :one cold, one at room temperature, and one hot. Get your friends to place one hand in the cold water and the other hand in the hot water. Then get them to place both in the lukewarm water simultaneously. The look of amused bewilderment that immediately registers tells the story: Even though both hands are in the same bucket, the hand that has been in the cold water feels as if it is now in hot water, while the one that was in the hot water feels as if it in cold water.

The point is that the same thing can be made to seem very different, depending on the nature of the event that precedes it. The great advantage of this principle is not only that it works but also that it is virtually undetectable.

Retail clothiers are a good example. Suppose a man enters a men's store and says that he wants to buy a suit and a jumper. If you were the salesperson, which would you sell him first to make him likely to spend the most money? Stores instruct their sales personnel to sell the costly item first. Common sense might suggest the reverse.

Sell the suit first, because when it comes to look at jumpers, even expensive ones, their prices will not as high in comparison. A man might balk at the idea of ding $95 for a jumper, but if he has just bought a $495 suit, a jumper does not seem excessive. The same principle applies to the accessories (shirt, shoes, belt) to go with his new suit.

Real estate agents have been known to use "setup" properties. They keep a house or two on their lists at inflated prices. These houses are not intended to be sold to but to be shown to prospects , so that the genuine properties in the company's inventory would benefit from the comparison. To quote an estate agent, "The house I got them spotted for looks really great after they've first looked at a couple of dumps.

Automobile dealers use the contrast principle by waiting until the price for a new car has been negotiated before suggesting one option after another. In the wake of a fifty thousand-dollar deal, the hundred or so dollars required for a state-of-the-art sound system seems almost trivial in comparison. The same will be true of the added expense of any accessory. The trick is to add the extras independently of one another, so that each seems petty when compared to the already determined price of the car… many a budget price figure has ballooned from the addition of little options. While the customer stands, signed contract in hand wondering what happened and finding no one to blame but himself... A victim of not only the Contrast Frame but the Law of Commitment.

Below is a brilliant letter, and funny too:

Dear Mother and Dad:

Since I left for college I have been remiss in writing and I am sorry for my thoughtlessness in not having written before. I will bring you up to date now, but before you read on, please sit down.

You are not to read any further unless you are sitting down. Well, then I am getting along pretty well now. The skull fracture and the concussion I got when I jumped out the window of my dormitory when it caught on fire shortly after my arrival here is pretty well healed now. I only spent two weeks in the hospital and now I can see almost normally and only get those sick headaches once a day.

Fortunately, the fire in the dormitory and my jump, was witnessed by an attendant at the gas station near the dorm and he was the one who called the Fire Department and the ambulance. He also visited me in the hospital and since I had nowhere to live because of the burnt out dormitory, he was kind enough to invite me to share his apartment with him. It's really a basement room, but it's kind of cute.

He is a very fine boy and we have fallen deeply in love and are planning to get married. We haven't got the exact date yet, but it will be before my pregnancy begins to show. Yes, Mother and Dad, I am pregnant.

I know how much you are looking forward to being grandparents and I know you will welcome the baby and give it the same love and devotion and ender care you gave me when I was a child.

The reason for the delay in our marriage is that my boyfriend has a minor infection which prevents us from passing our premarital blood tests and I carelessly caught it from him. I know that you will welcome him into our family with open arms. He is kind, and although not well educated, he is ambitious.

Although he is of a different race and religion than ours, I know your often-expressed tolerance will not permit you to be bothered by that.

Now that I have brought you up to date, I want to tell you that there was no dormitory fire, I did not have a concussion or skull fracture. I was not in the hospital, I am not pregnant, I am not engaged, I am not infected, and there is no boyfriend.

However, I am getting a "D" in American History, and an "F" in Chemistry, and I want you to see those marks in their proper perspective.

Your loving daughter,

Sharon

This would have to be one of the best examples of the Contrast Frame that you are ever likely to see.

How do you use the contrast frame in your business ?
How could you use it more often ?

Greg Woodley is an NLP Master Practitioner who has spent over 20 years in Sales. Greg is also a successful life coach and corporate leadership trainer. He can be contacted via phone on +61-4627-6582 or
gregwoodley@aol.com