Just when you think that you’ve got everything nailed down in a sales  negotiation, you just might run into the issue of escalating authority. Sure  you’ve reached a deal with the other side of the table, but then all of a sudden  somebody else gets involved and it turns out that they don’t like your deal.  What’s a sales negotiator to do?

What Is Escalating Authority?

The escalating authority tactic is a sneaky one – often you don’t see it  coming until it’s too late. The way that it works is actually pretty simple. You  sit down with the other side of the table and you work to hash out a deal. In  the end, you both finally come up with a deal that you believe that both of you  can live with.

Emotionally you believe that you are just about done with this sale and you  start to think about all of the other things that you need to start to work on.  That’s when you get surprised. What happens is that the other side of the table  comes back to you and says that there’s a problem.

What he says is that there are other people in his organization who have to  approve the deal that the two of you have created. He’ll tell you that somebody  is unwilling to approve the deal as it currently stands. They want more  concessions from you in order for them to sign it.

You might be saying to yourself “I’d never give in and agree to more  concessions.” Well, it turns out that a lot of us actually do give in and do end  up making more concessions – that’s why this technique is so effective.

How Can You Make Escalating Authority Work For You?

We all think the same thing when we bump into a powerful new negotiating  technique: how can I make this thing work for me?  If you are going to want to  harness this powerful tool, then you’re going to have to understand why it  works.

The main driver behind this technique is that the other side of the table  already has a significant investment in making the deal happen. The escalation  to authority is based on the other side being willing to do more in order to  achieve what they think is already almost theirs.

When they encounter the escalating authority tactic, the other side believes  that they have only two choices. The first is to make a concession and allow the  deal to happen. The other is to refuse to make a concession and be willing to  sit down and start the negotiating process all over again.

How Can You Defend Against Escalating Authority?

If there’s a powerful negotiating tactic out there, then you know that  someday it’s going to be used against you. When this happens, and it will,  you’ll need to know what to do in order to counteract its powerful force.

Right off the bat, you’ve got the most powerful countermeasure available to  you: leave. Get up and walk out the door. If you do this, then all of the power  associated with the escalating authority tactic instantly vanishes.

When this tactic starts to be used against you, you need to immediately  inform the rest of your company what is going on. Your purpose for doing this is  pretty simple: you want them to get used to the idea of waiting – no deal is  going to be struck anytime soon.

One final countermeasure is to just wait. Just as you have a large investment  in making a deal happen, so too does the other side of the table. This means  that if you just put a stop to everything, they’ll soon start to feel as though  the deal that was almost theirs is starting to slip away. This may force them to  drop their request for more concessions.

What All Of This Means For You

In the end, the use of escalating authority should be viewed simply as being  yet another negotiating tactic that we all have available to us. As with all  such tactics the key is to understand when it should be used.

When you’ve gotten the other side to commit to a doing a deal, but you think  that you can still get some more concessions out of them, the escalation tactic  can be a good tool to use. However, if someone starts to use it against you,  then you’ll need to inform the rest of your company so that they will support  you as you deal with it.

Anytime other people get involved in a negotiation in which a deal has  already been reached an element of danger is introduced. The deal that seemed to  be so close, may now look farther away. Careful how you use escalating authority – just make sure that the gains that you’re looking for are worth the risk that  you’ll be introducing.

Dr. Jim Anderson http://www.blueelephantconsulting.com/

Your Source For Real World Negotiating Skills™

Dr. Jim Anderson has spent over 20 successful years negotiating sales of all  sizes. Dr. Anderson offers you his insights on how to develop your negotiating  skills so that you can approach sales negotiations with more confidence that  you’ll be able close more deals and close them faster!

I love to negotiate. Give me an objective, sit me down across the table from  somebody who has what I want and let me at them. However, as gung-ho as I am,  there are times that I run out of new things to say. I’ve said it all. What  should I do next?

Say It Again Sam

When you enter into a sales negotiation, you (should) have a very clear set  of objectives that you want to accomplish. Every negotiation is different and so  it can take a number of different paths.

You’ll generally have a chance to state your case. It’s what happens after  that which can make life interesting. Specifically, if the other side doesn’t  really respond – if they are not angrily attempting to counter your every  demand, you may find yourself in an awkward situation.

The other side has not agreed to your requests, but they haven’t not agreed  to them either. What’s a negotiator to do?

It turns out that the answer is rather simple – just start repeating  yourself. That’s right: say what you’ve already said once again. If when you’re  done, things are still getting quiet, then start it all over again and tell ‘em  what you’ve already told them.

Why Repeating Yourself Is So Effective

All of this might strike you as a bit wacky. I mean, if you’ve told the other  side what you want and why you want it, what need could there possibly be for  you to start to repeat yourself?

This might surprise you a bit, but there is a very good chance that the other  side of the table may not have heard what you said the first time that you said  it. There are all types of studies out there that show that people will do a  better job of picking up on what you are saying if you repeat it (over and over  again).

Professional speakers discovered this a long time ago and during their  speeches they’ll touch on the same points multiple times. As negotiators, we  need to have the courage to do the same

We need to realize that if the opportunity presents itself, then we need to  seize it. Repeating ourselves may be the one thing that it takes to reach a deal  in our next negotiation.

What All Of This Means For You

Even the best of us can run out of things to say during a sales negotiation  before we’ve reached a deal with the other side. We’ve said what we had to say  and now we’re running on empty.

Never fear – a good sales negotiator knows that the sounds of silence need  never drift across the negotiating table from your side. Instead, back things up  and identify your key points again. Once you have them in hand, repeat what you  said the first time – over and over again.

This odd but strangely powerful technique will allow you to fill the space in  the negotiation and can work miracles – hearing your points again may cause the  other side of the table to adopt them as your own. Realizing that not every word  that tumbles out of your mouth has to be a novel thought is something that can  empower every sales negotiator.

Dr. Jim Anderson http://www.blueelephantconsulting.com/

Your Source For Real World Negotiating Skills™

Dr. Jim Anderson has spent over 20 successful years negotiating sales of all  sizes. Dr. Anderson offers you his insights on how to develop your negotiating  skills so that you can approach sales negotiations with more confidence that  you’ll be able close more deals and close them faster!

There are basically four types on security. These are physical security,  access control, surveillance systems and intrusion alarms. These four areas make  up most of the security world. Understanding each of these areas and knowing how  they can help you will allow you to better protect your business, facility or  institution.

The first area is physical security. This starts at the most basic forms of  security which are the doors and mechanical locks that prevent people from just  going anywhere and entering secure areas. There are many types of doors for both  interior and exterior applications and depending on the application ensuring a  well-constructed door is the first step to good security practices. But in order  to hold the door closed there needs to be some type of lock.

Keys locks and  basic mechanical push button locks are the most common types of security used to  this day. These locks are inexpensive and depending on the lock can provide a  good amount of safety and security. Using higher security locks that offer added  security features such as restricted keys, and reinforced strikes are preferred  when trying to increase your security.

The second is access control. Access Control can be a single point of access  or thousands but it electronically restricts people from entering secured areas.  Basic types of access control are keypads that provide PIN access codes to  enter. The most common type of access control in today’s market sn called  proximity card access control. This is a credit card sized card that when held  up to a reader (typically within 2 to 6 six inch away) the card transmits a  secure code which is then determined by a security system whether access is  allowed or not. Other types of access control technologies are smart cards.

Smart Cards are very similar to proximity but the cards contain a much larger  amount of information which can easily be changed by the security system or  other systems that may interface with the card. This technology, over the last  few years has begun to increase in popularity mainly due to the government’s use  of a Common Access Card or CAC which is a smart card. The most advanced type or  access control is called biometrics. Biometrics utilizes human characteristics,  such as fingerprint, hand print of facial recognition to determine who a person  is and what access rights they have in a security system. This technology is  somewhat expensive compared to proximity but many times is used in combination  with proximity or smart cards for higher security areas.

The third area is surveillance systems or closed circuit television (CCTV)  systems. This level of security uses cameras placed at strategic areas to  capture video for live display and archived playback. There are many  technologies used in today’s camera surveillance systems, analog or cameras  using coaxial cable or IP cameras which use Ethernet cable. The days of  recording to standard tape are almost completely gone and have been replaced by  digital video recorders (DVRs) and network video recorders (NVRs).

The  difference between the two is a digital video recorder is based on using analog  coaxial cameras and a network video recorder using IP or network cameras. Some  of today’s recording system are taking advantage of both technologies and have  been deemed “Hybrid” systems. These systems allow you to use both older legacy  coaxial cameras and still being able to take advantage of the latest IP network  cameras.

The fourth and final area of security is the intrusion alarm system or  burglar alarm system. These systems are commonly used in both homes and  businesses across the country. They can be relatively inexpensive depending on  the size and functionality and provide a good quality level of security. These  burglar alarm systems use different detection devices such as, motion sensors,  door contacts, glass break sensors, and inputs switches such as panic buttons to  detect an intruder.

The signals from the devices are transmitted to a central  control panel which then communicates to a central monitoring station. The  central monitoring station is a location that receives the alarm signals from  the control panel and then contacts the police, fire or emergency services and  dispatches then to the location of the alarm.

These four areas of security are what make up a very large industry. These  systems are used in homes, commercial locations and institutions to protect  people, property and assets on a location. If you are looking to increase your  security use these systems in combination to create a good security  foundation.

Daniel Cogan is the president of Access Security Corp., a security firm that  provides commercial and enterprise integrated security systems Access Security has been installing and  services security systems for the Philadelphia metro area for over 38 years.  Daniel Cogan personally has over 15 years experience in the design,  installation, and servicing of surveillance  camera systems both IP cameras and analog, as well as access control, and  intrusion alarms.

There is a lot of buzz lately in the media around Wi-Fi hotspots. Most likely  you have been using one to access the internet to do some web browsing, checking  email, chatting or banking or shopping online. A Wi-Fi hotspot is an access  point set up in a public area, such as an airport, hotel, restaurant, cafe or  shopping mall.

These hotspots enable you and others to join their network to  access the internet; although it is very easy to connect to hotspots, what  you don’t know is if it is secure and safe to use.

Is the network Secure? 

Last month, PC World predicted some of the biggest security threats in 2012.  One of those is targeting laptops and mobile devices and their vulnerability in  Wi-Fi hotspots. It’s surprisingly easy for hackers to eavesdrop, or even create  a fake hotspot, to lure unsuspecting users into their trap where most identity  theft occurs.

Laptop and smartphone users may not realize it, but they are storing a lot of  personal data on their computers and phones and they are transmitting that same  data across unsecured wireless networks. All that information: names, birth  dates, credit card numbers, banking PINs, is just a treasure for cyber-criminals  who’d love to get at it through an unsecured Wi-Fi network. Compounding this  treasure is the fact that laptop users and many smartphone users are unaware  that their computers and phones are storing all this information, meaning that  even losing their laptop or smartphone can spell big trouble for their  identity.

A recent Experian survey found that only 30 percent of smartphone users take  advantage of public Wi-Fi hotspots, which generally are unsecured, the survey  also found that 50 percent of smartphone users are completely unaware of this  problem. Imagine if the smartphone your employee is using is sending a  confidential company email or making a purchase on the phone using a company  credit card.

An electronic cyber-criminal who gets a hold of that information  can cause serious problems for both your employee, and your company.

One billion smartphones by 2014

The number of smartphone users is expected to exceed one billion by 2014;  cyber-crimes against smartphones could turn into a lucrative business for  criminals unless users and businesses do something about it. A typical password  can be breached in 5 seconds or less, with 37 percent of smartphone users  thinking that a password is all they need for a network to be secured.

What is even more troubling about passwords is that some of the most common  passwords are some of the easiest for criminals to break. Some of the top ten  common passwords are; ‘rockyou’, ‘princess’, ’123456′, ‘iloveyou’, ‘password’,  and ‘abc123′. No wonder 65 percent of people worldwide have been a victim of a  cyber-crime! How can passwords like that be considered secure?

The biggest  danger in all of this is that many laptop and smartphone users don’t see any  danger in using a public Wi-Fi network until they become a victim of identity  theft. This thinking is a serious problem that needs addressing and public  awareness and education is the best method.

Set up your own personal network

One way to protect your business and your employees from those unsecured  Wi-Fi hotspots is to set a personal network of your own called a virtual private  network, or VPN. This network is a centralized telecommunications infrastructure  that requires users to be authenticated and data to be encrypted.

A VPN is much  more secure than a typical public Wi-Fi network because fewer people are using  your specific VPN, and even if someone does get unauthorized entry, the hacker  will not be able to read the data because it is encrypted at such a high  encryption rate. A VPN also provides the same convenience of remote connection  to the Internet as a public Wi-Fi network.

VPN’s provide encrypted data and antivirus protection

If you are interested in setting up a VPN simply do a web search for “VPN”  and the most popular VPNs will pull up in your browser. VPNs are easy to use and  are available for computers, smartphones and tablets. VPNs also provide  antivirus protection as well as encrypting your data. Be sure in selecting a VPN  that the provider your reviewing has the following functionality:

1. Includes B2B plans.
2. Dynamic IP address encryption, tunneling protocol and server rollover.
3. VPN speed is unlimited.
4. VPN bandwidth is unlimited.
5. VPN does not track usage.
6. Includes multiple web-capable mobile devices and various operating  systems.
7. Corporate grade 1024-bit encryption data security.
8. Built in software warning message when surfing the internet  unprotected.
9. Third party certification and proof of protection such as Spinci  authenticating the VPN provider.
10. 24/7-365 customer support.
11. Domestic and international servers.

These features are the essentials in selecting a quality VPN provider,  knowing you have this functionality will give you peace of mind and the  confidence knowing when your connected to your VPN your protected.

Lastly, it is important to educate your employees about those dangers, but an  even better way is to open up a VPN for your employees to use when conducting  business on their laptops and phones. This way, businesses don’t have to worry  about the strength of the passwords, or where employees are using their laptops  and phones, or what kind of data employees are storing on their laptops and  phones. All internet activities can be done securely on a VPN.

PC World article: http://www.pcworld.com/article/242174/2012_in_security_rising_danger.html.

Experian survey: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2011/01/prweb4968294.htm

Laura Lopez is a performance strategist, leadership specialist and branding  expert with more than 20 years of corporate leadership experience. Laura’s book,  The Connected and Committed Leader, is available via her Web site at http://www.laura-lopez.com, at your local bookstore or on http://www.Amazon.com. As the  owner of her own business, Laura helps companies and business associations  achieve more sustainable business results through the power of leveraging  diverse talent with effective leadership and branding. She is available for  speeches, workshops and customized programs. Laura can be contacted via her Web  site at: http://www.laura-lopez.com.

Mobile Marketing is a method of establishing communication with the targeted  consumer through mobile device. Medium of communication used is simple marketing  text, encouraging the consumer to visit their mobile website or motivating them  to participate in an audience based campaign. Few of the tools of the business  and some of the concepts used in mobile marketing are MMS, USSD, Bluetooth,  infrared, wireless social media, mobile internet, and mobile applications.

Mobile Marketing not only enables people to connect to internet through their  cell phones, but also strengthen various communication medium in easy and  efficient channels. It is cheaper than traditional marketing resources for both  marketer and consumer. It is simple for any of the age group to understand the  advertisement spread through mobile marketing.

Mobile Marketing Fairly New to U. S. 

In United States of America, mobile marketing technology was not used widely  until few years back. In June 2008, cell signs reported that every month  approximately seventy five billion of mobile marketing texts were sent. Number  of mobile users is double of active email users in the country. These mobile  marketing texts were read within fifteen minutes and response comes within an  hour compared to email in which for a response it may take months.

In thirty countries ratio of population to number of mobile device is 1:1.  Eighty percent of population in United States are active mobile user. Sixty  percent of earth’s population which is about four billions are using mobile on a  regular basis. China itself has more than four hundred million subscribers.  These facts proves that mobile marketing has a wide scope in world of marketing  and it is a only medium which provides easy path for the companies to market  their product directly to the customer. Coverage of mobile network connections  is continuously increasing and with that number of subscribers is also  increasing. Ninety percent of these connections are prepaid.

Customers can be easily engaged

Mobile SMS Marketing is an exciting method in the world of marketing. It  provides meaningful method to reach the targeted audience at the right time with  the best offer in form of SMS. The effectiveness of SMS marketing can be  determined by the fact that majority of people can’t live without SMS. We keep  sending text at every minute. It proves the ability to achieve instant access to  the targeted customer anywhere and anytime. SMS marketing is a new communication  medium to increase the response rate in a marketing campaign. It also means that  customers can be easily engaged.

There are several interesting methods of SMS marketing to boost your  business. The first one is to distribute vouchers or coupons through SMS. This  can increase the sale rate of a business. It also attracts lot of customers to  open sale. These SMS coupons can be easily redeemed at any outlet of a specific  business.

Alerts, updates and reminders about appointments are an excellent method for  service providers and attract customers to increase sales. For example a car  repairing company is sending a SMS to its client reminding about servicing of  their car. Even several banks and cellular network providers are using this  technique to provide several easy features to their customers.

A very interesting and fruitful idea is inviting bid for auction of  particular product through SMS. Companies invite bid on product such as  electronic items, washing machine, television, mobile phone or car. The winner  of auction is the person with the lowest and unique bid. Through this kind of  SMS marketing, companies can attract attention of customers to a specific  product.

Bluetooth has limited reach, but can be effective

There are few interesting methods for mobile marketing. One such method is  marketing through Bluetooth proximity. Bluetooth has a limited reach among  audience. Mobile user can send ads, images, business card and it also contact  people through audio without need of their mobile number. This kind of mobile  marketing is used in trade shows, activities and events in which customer’s cell  phone are in close proximity of Bluetooth device.

Mobile phone applications are very interesting tool in the field of mobile  marketing. Majority of people uses mobile phone to find cooking recipes, ATM  location or location of an address. There are mobile applications available  which meets all kind needs. Popularity of mobile application has recently grown.  There are several reasons behind the increased popularity. Reasons such as  development of smart phones and popularity of smart phones among mobile  subscribers are responsible for increased popularity of mobile application.

Companies are targeting these mobile applications to sell and market their  product. This marketing strategy provides spectacular experience to their  consumer which is relevant to the marketed product. Companies achieve their aim  by offering new benefit, rewards, creation, entertainment, collaboration and  communities to the mobile user for daily requirements. For example, amazon is  offering a new mobile application which allows shoppers to search products by  uploading photo of what they are willing to buy.

Females, in general, do not ignore or delete mobile messages

Various companies are offering their customers free downloads of ringtones,  wallpapers, mobile games and tagging advertisement with each of these feature to  market their product. Effectiveness of SMS mobile marketing is evident with the  fact that thirty seven of urban population receives SMS marketing such kind of  products. Thirty six percent of urban population receives SMS related to  entertainment, media companies, news and music.

May be few males ignores or delete such marketing oriented messages but  females doesn’t do such kind of thing. According to a research females tries to  enquire further about marketed product by interacting with customer care or  straight away approaching the store. But males are very much interested in  utilizing free coupons and discounts offered through SMS.

So we can understand the fact that SMS is widely used all over the world to  advertise products. Several companies are taking tactical advantage of this  excellent medium by advertising their products and offers.

Mobile marketing produces higher response rates compared to other marketing mediums

Mobile marketing is an interactive and meaningful medium to interact with the  customers. It also gives instant access to customers irrespective of time and  location. Mobile  Marketing produces higher response compared to other marketing medium and  communication medium. If your company is not utilizing this weapon to sell your  product then straight away go for mobile marketing and see the  difference.

Pat King has been an innovator in the Internet Marketing business since 2007.  Pat works with many companies to help them build a high powered online presence  for their businesses. Pat’s goal is always to build a long term relationship  with his customers by consistently going above and beyond to ensure that they  are getting most our of his services. In the past year Pat has made Internet  Marketing for small businesses his number 1 priority simply because his passion  is to help small businesses be more successful. Pat has re launched is company  Premier One Marketing and offers a wide variety of cutting edge products from  state of the art web design, email marketing, social media, mobile marketing and  most recently has launched one of the most cutting edge products in the industry  which is a All In One Marketing platform that allows you to market to your  customers and leads through a 5 multi channel platform making your marketing  efforts much more efficient and effective.

For more information about his services you can check out http://www.PremierOneMarketing.com to see all the services  offered.

Yemi Akinsiwaju is a Business Growth & Leadership Development Consultant  helping major organisations in the U.K successfully improve their business  results.

He is also an international speaker, a coach, mentor and business strategist  to SMEs and a published author of the highly acclaimed personal development  classic, Scorecard: Achieving Success and Balance in A Turbulent World.

He can be contacted via: http://www.DaySpringConsult.com

How does industry value a patent or a patent application? The short answer is  it “depends”. It depends on several factors such as what type of industry your  invention falls into (ie: a new drug patent will be valued in a different manner  than a new software patent). However, there are some fundamental valuation  techniques that are used across all industries. The two most common are:

1. Estimated future income (also called discounted cash flow or  “DCF”)

2. Market comparables or “market comps”

Let’s start with the income approach or DCF since it’s a little more  complicated. This valuation approach tries to estimate how much income your  patent will generate over its life (usually 20 years). There are many things  which go into this calculation such as;

-market size and growth rate (how many customers are there in years  1-20?)

-market penetration (how many of these customer will by your product?)

-market penetration curve (will more customer buy your product as your brand  grows?)

-costs (how much does it cost you to produce your product?)

-taxes

-net income (essentially your profit per year)

-discount rate (this accounts for risk and the time value of money)

You can essentially use the categories above to build a spreadsheet that  projects the amount of profit (net income) your invention will hopefully make  over the life of your patent. You then use the discount rate which is a  percentage such as 10% that accounts for risk and the time value of money (since  a dollar earned 20 years from now is less valuable than a dollar earned today).

You use all these numbers to calculate the estimated value of your invention in  today’s dollars. This is called the Net Present Value or NPV and investors love  to talk about NPVs.

Don’t worry! There is an easier method.

The market comparable or “market comp” method should be familiar to most of  you since that’s what is commonly used to price your house or a piece of  properly. Just like you can value a house based on how much a similar house in  the neighborhood sold for, you can do the exact same for a patent. When looking  at a house you would have to account for things like; square footage, number of  bedrooms, lot size, etc.

When valuing a patent based on a comparable, you would  have to look at the actual deal or transaction that took place. Was the deal for  world-wide rights? How long was it for? Was it an exclusive deal or a  non-exclusive deal?

It’s extremely unlikely that you will find an exact match for your patent or  the type of deal you are trying to do but you can sometimes get close enough to  put a rough value on your patent. So where do you find these comps?  Unfortunately that’s the tricky part. There are companies that will sell them to  you for a hefty price and consultants that will charge you to do this work. If  you want to try to find some yourself, one method that I use is trying to find  deal terms from publicly available sources such as United States SEC filings.

All public companies must file financial documents with the United States  Securities and Exchange Commission or SEC. Often times these filings will  include patent purchases or patent license agreements. So if you can identify  some public companies in your invention’s area, you can access their SEC filings  and search for terms such as “patent” or “license” or “royalty”.

Another method is to do very specific google keywords searches for “company  name + license agreement” or “company name + royalty”. If you play around with  google long enough you will eventually find some agreements for patent purchases  or license deals that may be useful to you. This takes some time and practice to  master.

A third option is to look at company press releases. Often times the  companies involved in a patent license or sale agreement will post this  information as a press release. Your google search should pick those up but  sometimes it doesn’t.

As you can see there are several ways to value a patent or patent  application. It should not matter which method you choose but you should at  least use one of them. It is always good to have solid data and reasoning behind  why you think your patent or your invention is worth a certain value.

Learn how to patent an idea and view provisional patent examples to help you get started with your  patent process.

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When I’m working with negotiators who are trying to become better, they  always ask me what the secret to moving to the next level is. For years I always  told them that there was no “silver bullet” that would allow them to make the  jump. It was just going to take a lot of hard work.

Lately I’ve decided that I’ve been wrong. It turns out that there is one  thing that any negotiator can do that will allow him or her to move up to the  next level. This secret turns out to be something that all of us should be doing  anyway. In fact I think that it should really be part of the negotiation  definition: planning the negotiation.

Negotiating Is Dynamic, Why Bother To Plan?

Nobody could possibly object to the idea of creating a plan to guide your  actions during a negotiating session, right? If this is what you think, then  you’d be wrong. I get a lot of push back from my clients when I suggest  this.

What they tell me is that they view negotiations as being a dynamic thing.  They don’t think that a plan will do them any good – it will quickly become  useless and so why waste the time creating one in the first place?

I have a saying that I share with my clients when they say this: plan your  work, work your plan, and it will all work out. Yes, a lot of things that you  can’t possibly anticipate may happen during a negotiation process. However, by  having a plan you’ll know where you want to go during the negotiations and  you’ll know how you want to get there.

The Best Way To Develop A Negotiating Plan That Will  Work

If I’ve been able to convince you that having a plan for your next  negotiation is the way to go, then perhaps your next question will be how can  you get better at creating plans for negotiating?  It turns out that this is  actually pretty easy to do.

The first thing that you’ll want to do is to do some role-playing. Because of  the dynamic nature of negotiating, you’ll never be able to know exactly how the  other side is going to react to your proposals. If you can get someone to play  the role of the other side of the table, then when you make your proposals you  just might be surprised by their reaction. This is a good thing – you can update  your plan to take this kind of reaction into account.

Additionally, during the actual negotiations you will want to make sure that  you and your team have enough time to make sure that you are staying on plan.  This means that you should plan on taking frequent caucus breaks. Only by  re-synching with your team will you be able to get your side of the table back  onto your plan if things have goon awry.

What All Of This Means For You

All of us want to become better negotiators. We spend a lot of time  researching new negotiation styles and negotiating techniques; however, it turns  out that one of the most powerful ways to become better has been under our noses  all along: practice planning. It’s so simple that we’ve overlooked it for too  long.

Sometimes a negotiation seems to be too dynamic. I mean how could you ever  hope to plan for something that changes that much? However, it turns out that by  having a plan, you’ll always know where you want to go and how you’ll get  there.

In order to make sure that your plan will work for you, you can take the  extra step and do some role-playing before the actual negotiations start. By  doing this you can adjust your plan so that it accounts for the actions that you  believe that the other side may take.

Having a plan gives you something that every negotiator needs before a  principled negotiation starts: self-confidence. If you know what you want and  how you’re going to get it, then there’s a much better chance that what you’ve  negotiated is going to end up producing a good deal for both sides.

Dr. Jim Anderson http://www.blueelephantconsulting.com/

Your Source For Real World Negotiating Skills™

Dr. Jim Anderson has spent over 20 successful years negotiating sales of all  sizes. Dr. Anderson offers you his insights on how to develop your negotiating  skills so that you can approach sales negotiations with more confidence that  you’ll be able close more deals and close them faster!

Oh, and if you want to follow Dr. Anderson on Twitter, he can be found at: http://twitter.com/drjimanderson