Overcoming objections: A short process to help you address emotional need

1965 Rambler Marlin by American Motors Corporation (AMC). A sporty “personal-luxury” two-door hardtop fastback. (Chrostopher Ziemnowicz/Wikimedia)

People who work in sales have known for a long time that buying is an emotional decision.

Think about someone you know who recently made a purchase—like a car. Cars make a great example because people frequently buy cars that express their identity.

If people want to be seen as caring about the environment, for example, they might buy a Prius or a Chevy Volt. If they want to be seen as rebellious or free, they might buy a Corvette or a convertible. People hate minivans because minivans are a practical vehicle. Minivans express that you have kids. Enter the sports utility vehicle—you can be practical and still express yourself!

You get the picture. People buy based on emotions.

In Customer Centric Selling, Michael Bosworth and John Holland sum up what good sales people know:

When a buyer decides to buy from a particular seller, it is an emotional decision. Equally, when a buying committee decides to buy from a particular vendor, it is an emotional decision. When a buyer decides to pay an asking price rather than holding out for a lower price, it is an emotional decision. When a buyer decides to buy from a person he or she is comfortable with, rather than shopping for the lowest possible price, it is an emotional decision.

If we think of objections as logical objections, our gut response is going to be to rush to overcome the objection with facts and data.

• Has a sales person ever tried to sell you something before you were ready?
• Have you ever felt pushed by a sales person?

The same thing can happen in political conversations if you try to “tell someone” about the best solution.

This is what conservatives mean when they say “liberals will try to tell you what’s right.” What’s more convincing: when someone tries to “tell you” something, or when you figure it out for yourself?

Because we often misunderstand objections, here’s a short process you can use to respond.

The difficulty we often face is that when we’ve done a great deal of research on solutions and believe we know what the best solution is, it’s easy to be impatient with people and want to jump to solutions. Or jump to trying to overcome an objection with the entire arsenal of facts and data at your disposal.

A colleague I used to work with gave me a piece of advice once about how to view objections. To this day I remember his advice:

If we think of objections as logical objections, our gut response is going to be to rush to overcome the objection with facts and data.

• Has a sales person ever tried to sell you something before you were ready?
• Have you ever felt pushed by a sales person?

The same thing can happen in political conversations if you try to “tell someone” about the best solution.

This is what conservatives mean when they say “liberals will try to tell you what’s right.” What’s more convincing: when someone tries to “tell you” something, or when you figure it out for yourself?

Because we often misunderstand objections, here’s a short process you can use to respond.

The difficulty we often face is that when we’ve done a great deal of research on solutions and believe we know what the best solution is, it’s easy to be impatient with people and want to jump to solutions. Or jump to trying to overcome an objection with the entire arsenal of facts and data at your disposal.

A colleague I used to work with gave me a piece of advice once about how to view objections. To this day I remember his advice:

An objection is an expression of emotional need.

For me, this cut against the grain of everything I’d learned. In the academic realm, objections are typically questions raised based on research or someone’s own scientific experiences. In the academic world, objections are scientific objections (at least that’s the claim of science).

Politics has much more in common with sales, and, in my experience, if you treat them as expressions of emotional need, your chances of overcoming them increase.

This is because if you start with emotional need as an underlying assumption, you’ll approach the situation differently.

Here’s a framework for overcoming objections.

1. Listen. The first thing you want to do is make sure you listen to the objection. Often, we’re so eager to explain our own point of view that we sweep right past what the other person is saying.

2. Acknowledge. Acknowledge honestly the fact or need being expressed. One way to do this is to repeat what the person is saying in your own words. I will often say something like “Let me make sure I understand what you’re saying” and then phrase back what they’ve said in my own words. Be honest. Avoid cliches like “I know you feel.”

3. Ask questions. The emotional need may not be obvious from the surface objection. A great example of this is climate change. I know many people who believe in climate change but will strongly argue the corporate line that science is divided.

Asking questions, I found out that people who are against climate change often believe that coping with climate change will kill jobs.

This is an emotional fear that has little to do with the science of climate change itself. Claiming science is divided on the issue is simply the rationalization.

4. Address their need. This will vary by situation, but here it’s critical to have an understanding of facts and solutions. Please don’t think I’m claiming that facts and solutions aren’t important. They’re critical.

I’ve simply found that it’s much more effective if you use them at the right time; we often start too early.

After you understand the emotional need, address it.

In the case where people are afraid dealing with climate change might kill jobs, for example, it’s important to lay out the economic case.

Sticking with my climate change example, if the emotional need is jobs, I will talk about the economic opportunity we have for developing clean energy technologies.

I’ll talk about success stories like Germany and how we, in the U.S., should be leading when it comes to technology instead of following. Knowing the emotional need allows you to have a real conversation with people instead of simply calling them “climate deniers” and throwing a mountain of scientific research at them.

5. Restate your belief. You want to be sure people understand why you’re taking a particular position. Because when it comes to politics, people make decisions at the emotional level, the level of right and wrong.

In the case of climate change, I’d relate this back to my beliefs about the economy, how it should work to benefit everyone, and how we should leave the world a better place for our kids. An economy based around a finite resource like oil is not sustainable. It might work in the short term, but long-term we should be working to develop a sustainable economy.

6. Ask for feedback. Remember it’s a conversation. Though this is listed as step #6, this really should be done throughout. What are your thoughts? What have you experienced? People are more likely to believe you if you help them get there themselves. Let them propose solutions, let them ask questions, let them talk about their experiences. I’ve found that if I think of myself as a guide more than a political activist, I tend to have much better conversations. And quite often, I’ve found I’ve learned as much or more than I’ve been able to help. In any situation, you are always both guide and student.

7. Repeat various steps as necessary. Though I’ve laid this out in a numbered format, in conversations you’re quite likely to go through many of these steps multiple times. Don’t get frustrated. It’s a process.

Repeat as needed and remember that if someone is still talking with you, they’re still somehow interested. Note that I said talking, not trolling. If someone is trolling you, they have decided you are only worthy of attack. Don’t waste your time trying to convince these people. Focus on independents.

This process works best in a one-on-one situation where you can have a conversation and there’s no fear of an audience. The same process works for groups, however, you just have to also take into account group dynamics and facilitation.

Example: The Pulse nightclub attack in Orlando

Police respond to a shooting at the Pulse Nightclub on South Orange Avenue in Orlando (City of Orlando Police Department/Wikimedia)

With the Trump administration in charge, we’re going to be facing many attacks where they try to take one example and extend it to a larger group of people (gays, Muslims, blacks, liberal “elites,” atheists, etc).

The emotional need is fear. You can’t win this fight with rationalization.

One thing you can do though is to focus the fear on the individuals that committed the crimes, rather than an entire race or group of people.

After the Orlando nightclub attack I was just as mad as any conservative. Some guy I know was trying to blame all Muslims.

This was my response:

I can only tell you what I think. I definitely don’t have all the solutions.

To me, where it starts is with justice and making sure we hold the moral high ground. I think this starts with going after the right people and holding the right people accountable. For example, with this a-hole in Florida. I hold him accountable. Maybe ISIS too to some extent. The radicals. I do not hold all Islam accountable.

The reason I believe this is the following. We win when more people are on our side. When we hold the moral high ground in the above fashion, the rest of the world is on our side against ISIS and the shitbags. When we blame all of Islam we create enemies where we didn’t have them before. The latter is what happened when we invaded Iraq. We created enemies that should have been on our side. Btw, this is also why ISIS and folks like them want a holy war and constantly try to start one. They want the game to be Christianity versus Islam. I’d rather not give them what they want.

And yeah … does it f*ckin’ suck sometimes that we aren’t “eye for an eye”? Yeah. I’d like to say I’m better than that but the truth is sometimes I think it would feel good. When this happens, I try to remember what these shitholes want and also to hold true to my beliefs about justice and about people.

To my surprise, my very, very conservative friend agreed with me.

Why?

I had listened and understood his emotional need. I honestly acknowledged his emotions with my own honest anger. And yeah, I was pissed.

Then I restated my belief that we should focus on the terrorists and not all of Islam in order to hold the moral high ground and not create more terrorists.

Coda

Remember, when you’re introducing new ideas to people, it’s going to take time—especially at first. This is where repetition and different ways of explaining your belief—personal stories, anecdotes, examples, studies, and so on—help people to understand.

In the years to come, we’re going to be working to win people over, working to encourage people to fight with us. There will be many objections.

It’s helpful to remember that objections are expressions of emotional need.

David Akadjian is the author of The Little Book of Revolution: A Distributive Strategy for Democracy (ebook now available). Cross posted at Daily Kos.