NEGOTIATION TACTICS are a set of skills for life. We are constantly negotiating through life, and we all find ourselves in a negotiation situation at some time. Whether you are negotiating a multimillion dollar deal, negotiating a salary rise, negotiating with the car salesman or just negotiating with your partner or children, we all negotiate through our life. I have been negotiating deals for large corporate companies and media companies for over twenty years, and yet I still find myself in situations where I end up in a negotiation with my four year old daughter over how much candy she can have. I say she can have one, she says three, we settle on two. How does a four year old know some of these negotiation tactics? And what can we learn from children’s behaviour. Negotiating is an essential skill set that we pick up at an early age as we are developing, yet how come so many of us lose that skillset as we become older. Negotiation tactics are a set of tools, that we can draw on in any negotiation siutation. Only when we truely understand the tools in our tool box, and which tools to draw upon to suit the negotitaion situation we are in, can we become true negotiators. So what is negotiation? And what are the essential Negotiation Tactics? Through out this blog we will offer advice and tips and explain the various negotiation tactics available, that can be applied to all most any negotiation scenario.
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Negotiation Tactics
There are many different tactics that are commonly used in the negotiation process. All of them have their place, and many of the methods that have been popularized are specialized for specific types of negotiation. The level of detail the best negotiators put into understanding the human mind and how to use certain tones of voice coupled with specific tactics to lead the other party in the direction that they would like them to head is, to say the least, quite impressive. Just knowing the tactics is only half the battle, but putting them into effective use can be tricky if you do not know how to properly propose them. A few of the more common tactics that are used in negotiations include:
Nibbling
Nibbling is among the most popular of negotiation tactics. The actual strategy is to continue the negotiations after the deal is supposedly done. This tactic is most effective when a great deal of time has been spend finalizing the negotiation and the other party has invested a great deal of time into it. For instance, if you are buying a piece of property, after the deal is finalized you may ask for other accommodations that were not originally part of the plan for the property that you purchased. This can be a fairly risky tactic although a large majority of individuals will not renege on the deal after so much time has been put into it. If you choose to try the nibbling technique, you may not want to ask for too much as this can break down the entire process.
Outright Refusal
One popular negotiation tactic that has yielded a great deal of success is the outright refusal method. This method works by outright refusing the original offer made to you, and asking them to do better. Often times the individual who is making the offer will actually negotiate with themselves and provide you with an offer that is much higher than the offer than was originally made. While this tactic might be simplistic in nature, it is a well documented method that has provided many negotiators with positive results for many years.
Conditioning
Conditioning calls for you to place a starting point in their mind prior to beginning the negotiation. For instance, if someone started to discuss a negotiation for the purchase of a boat with you, and you initially responded by saying “You’ll be wasting your time unless you are willing to offer $10,000 and haul it after the sale.” This allows you to give them a starting figure that is much closer to the end result you are looking for than you would have been otherwise. This is an age old method that has always been an effective negotiation tactic. Keep in mind that this tactic can also cause the individual you use it on to not make an offer on the item at all.
Calling Bluffs
Calling the opposing party’s bluff is a negotiation tactic that can really be to your advantage. For instance, if you have a house that is for sale for $200,000, and they claim that their bank will only qualify them for a $175,000 loan, you can call their bluff by saying that you can not let it go for less than $190,000. If you would like, you can also make up an excuse as to why you can not go any lower than that amount in order to make it seem as if you too have your limits. For instance, you could say that the money is going to cover your child’s college education, and that that is as low as you are willing to go. By taking their financing problem and responding with an explanation of why that won’t work, you will be able to make them come out of their shell if they are truly interested in the product that you are selling.
