Communicate to Connect and Close!

Today I am excited to share a guest post from Victoria Theriault, the founder and owner of DISCover What Works. She’s a certified Team Facilitator, DISC and EQ Analyst and a Keynote Speaker.

Victoria’s background includes real estate sales, as well as coaching Realtors, Brokers and Teams. Her unique perspective merges experience with data.

Victoria helps raise individual and team performance as well as notably improve client service. She’s a co-author of the book Pursuit 365, and the creator and host of the DISCovering You podcast.

Let's get right into it...

Why knowing yourself and understanding others is key to sales success.

Real Estate is a people business; building and nurturing relationships is foundational for
longevity and prosperity.

What’s the best way to develop and foster strong relationships?

Honing your communication skills!

Being an effective communicator requires self-awareness. The more you know yourself,
the easier it is to recognize similarities and differences to others.

And guess what? There’s a great tool to help us do this – DISC.

DISC is an acronym describing 4 different behavioural styles:

o Dominance: Direct, driven, results focused
o Influence: Friendly, spontaneous, emotion focused
o Steadiness: Reflective, tenacious, amiable
o Compliance: Analytical, cautious, detailed

Here’s a fun way to look at it. If DISC was coffee, it would be:

o D - Espresso: Swift, bold
o I - Macchiato: Sweet, frothy
o S - Latte: Smooth, mellow
o C -Americano: Strong, precise

Learning techniques to recognize different personality styles will help avoid disconnects.
Don’t risk losing a prospect, or have a deal fall apart because of misreading someone’s
cues.

For example, someone with a strong, direct personality (High Dominance) doesn’t
necessarily realize that their behaviour appears aggressive to a more reserved,
contemplative individual (High Steadiness).

The potential for misunderstanding is already high; imagine what could happen with the
added pressure of negotiating.

It’s worth remembering that other people cannot read our minds! So, while we know our
intentions, the person sitting across from us does not. Transparency cannot be
assumed.

Having different personality styles doesn’t have to result in an automatic disconnect.
Recognizing the difference enables you to build a bridge to link to that style.

Here’s a brief snapshot of the 4 DISC types. Knowing the focus and motivators of each,
will give you a competitive advantage to connect with them:

High D (Dominance)
o Focus: Achieving goals
o Want: Get to the bottom line
o Do: Be direct and concise
o Don’t: make excuses or take too long

High I (Influence)
o Focus: Recognition
o Want: Engagement with others
o Do: Build a social relationship and share feelings
o Don’t: Give too many details

High S (Steadiness)
o Focus: Security
o Want: Stability and support
o Do: Give them time to reflect and process
o Don’t: Rush them

High C (Compliance)
o Focus: Information
o Want: Knowledge
o Do: Be factual and logical
o Don’t: Skip details or invoke emotions

When you have this insight into each style, you know what they need to make their
decisions.

Provide them with that specific need, and you will get them on board.
This ensures true connection and sets up the relationship for success!

Hope you find some great value in this content,

Victoria