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10 Great Ways To Command Your Listener To Pay Attention

by Peter Murphy

These tips are a great starting point to help you to get someone to listen carefully when that other person is not paying any heed to what you are saying.

1. Speak more softly. This will cause most people to ask you to speak up!

2. Confuse your friend. Say something that does not make sense. For example, the cat drove me over because my car is getting serviced! This is a very effective way to get people to open their ears to your words.

3. Use silence by refraining from saying any more. Very often this pause in conversation is uncomfortable and demands that someone says something. Wait for your friend to speak first.

4. Appeal to his values. When you direct the conversation to something that is important to your listener what you say becomes very difficult to ignore. Let us say you are talking about cleaning the house and you want it to look spotless. Talk about how good it will feel when it is nice and clean if he values feeling comfortable and does not notice how the place looks.

5. Create urgency. Mention that you only have a few minutes to talk because you have to be somewhere else. It is now or never so listen up!

6. Ask your buddy if he can keep a secret. This ought to get his attention since we love to be privy to restricted information. Then tell him that you will reveal all after you discuss what it is you want to say.

7. Tell a joke or a humorous story. Once you have their attention and they are smiling they will be more receptive to your message.

8. Speak with massive enthusiasm and smile a lot. This wave of high energy is hard to resist even for the most reluctant audience.

9. Play with the pace of your speech by speaking way too fast or way too slow until you are asked to repeat yourself! Got him!

10. Compliment something about your companion. People love to feel admired and appreciated and if you sincerely compliment someone they will know you have good taste. If you have good taste you must be worth listening to!

Peter Murphy is a peak performance consultant. He recently produced a "Five-Day Persuasion Skills Mastery" e-course. To sign up at no charge, mail to 5daypersuasion@sendfree.com.

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