adventures in sound
February 29, 2008
As you begin to listen to what I’m describing, you will hear the ways these words can describe anything and everything. When you orient your words to work with auditory people you will find it deeply resonating with them. Calm your voice for even greater appeal when verbalizing your message. When you tune in to what your clients and prospects are telling you, you become more empathetic thus assisting the rapport process.
In the first paragraph I put in a bunch of these auditory words so that you can hear what they sound like strung together. The best way to learn the different processes is to have lists of each type — auditory, visual, kinesthetic — and study them so that you can come up with them quickly depending on which system your prospect or client is operating in.
Just like we talked about ways to understand the visual person, let’s talk about ways to understand and recognize an auditory person.
To begin with, auditory people have some distinct vocal characteristics. One type is a bit sing-songy when they talk. Many radio disc jockeys, for example, are oriented towards the auditory.
These folks may have a lot of affect and their pitch will rise and fall. In other words, their speech can be quite dramatic.
Another type of auditory person speaks in a droning monotone. This is an easy one to figure out. They speak deliberately and they expect you to listen to what it is they’re saying. They phrase things carefully and thoroughly so that they are very certain to make their point clearly.
And of course, you’ll also hear them use a lot of auditory words in their language.
You can also watch their eyes for hints. Whereas a visually oriented person looks up (towards the pictures they’re creating in their mind), the auditory person looks side to side (towards their ears).
A lot of times, you’ll notice an auditory person tilt their head to the side, as if they’re talking on a phone. They may be doing this to also hear you better and to understand more what you’re saying. If you see this, you can be certain that you’re talking to an auditory person.
Auditory people are much less concerned with how close you stand to them. They’re really not making pictures and it doesn’t really matter.
We are all auditory, visual and kinesthetic to one degree or another but the power comes in where a person weighs heavily to one and when you begin to integrate these words into your vocabulary.
Auditory examples: Al Gore. Regardless of how much coaching he gets, or how hard he tries, his speeches are monotone. Dick Cheney. Notice how he cocks his head and also has a monotone speech pattern.