YES, curiosity is important when doing a presentation to buyers or sellers. You can automatically test the level of interest in whatever you are presenting based on whether you are getting the sensory feedback and behavior indicating that your client may be curious. They will lean forward a little and their eyes will be tracking what you are presenting to them.

What I’m going to ask is more related to self curiosity. How curious are you about THEM? Because the only thing we can really control in a client situation is our own state and our own behavior. We can’t force them to be curious about what we are presenting unless we have an interest in them.

Notice that whenever we are curious, our senses are focused on that which has our attention. When we become curious about clients, we are more interested in them than our own self talk.  We get a holiday from all of our (very normal but not always helpful) internal chatter about how we might persuade them or what we are going to have for dinner as soon as we leave. Clients know we are curious when we are giving them the body language and eye contact that is congruent with curiosity. The language patterns of curiosity are simple..” I’m curious”, or “tell me more about that…”

Curiosity means we are not telling/selling, we are ASKING questions.

Being curious is optimal in these situations:

• If you have a buyer or seller who is angry or is very critical of something. For instance, the seller who calls to say you are not advertising the home enough will shift once you start to be curious.
• When things don’t turn out as we planned. Ever have a buyer who has changed their mind? Instead of being reactive, get curious! It puts the focus on them.
• We forget something or make a mistake.  Don’t you hate that moment when a detail gets overlooked? Being curious causes us to shift our attention away from blame and guilt and into something better.
• We find ourselves going negative or getting cranky. The fastest way to shift into a better state is to get curious.

Honest curiosity is a gift to our clients.

Watch for next week’s blog on the NLP curiosity installation process…