Simple ways to improve improvising skills learned from Professor Sweet’s class and several years being terrible at memorizing lines for high school plays.
1. Anticipate what the other person is going to say. Don’t try and mind read, don’t put words into their mouth, but be ready for anything from the person you’re trying to sell to. This will help you come up with an off script question faster, and it will keep the conversation from lagging.
2. Avoid, like um. For a while I did this all the time when trying to improvise during presentations. It is a terrible habit and hard to break, but once broken it will make improvisation come more naturally and help the conversation flow.
3. Try doing something fun that involves improvisation and subtle lying. This is something to do in free time, at a party or just when hanging out with peers. Play weird board games that encourage you to get out of your comfort zone and make you do weird stuff and force you to make something up. It might help increase creativity and quick- thinking in a slipping sale.
4. Have the right mindset. If you go into a sale or a pitch ready to follow a script completely, your improvisation will suffer. If you are ready to be caught off guard or need to improvise, you will know what to say and when to say it.
5. Don’t get carried away. Don’t let improvisation hurt you. Don’t spill all of your candy in the lobby and don’t answer any unasked questions. Be prepared to know when to shut up so that you don’t lose a sale.
BoweryJE22
You’re so right! Improv is such an important part of the selling process. You can’t just walk into a sales situation expecting to read directly from a script. You have to have the ability to read a person and just know what to say. Without this ability, you have a reduced chance of catching the prospect’s interest.