From a very early age, we humans are exposed to storytelling. Stories are the ultimate form of persuasion when used strategically.

If you told nothing but stories--no pitch, no features or benefits--just stories, you could be very successful in business.

When you tell a story, it puts your listener--your prospect or client--into a receptive state where they accept with ease what you're telling them. They bypass the resistance that has been built up in our cynical times. And when you can touch the heart of a prospect, it makes them feel important. These feelings can be tapped into with stories.

In order to persuade people, you need to have the faith and belief of your prospects. Facts do not accomplish this rapport.

Today most people have highly attuned B.S. detectors as a result of being confronted with a constant barrage of messages and requests. People don't like to feel they're being persuaded or sold, but when you use stories to get your message across, this gives your potential client the ability to make up their own mind in the way you want them to.

People need to have two questions answered in order to trust you: 1) Who are you? - which is what you're going to be focusing on - and 2) Why are you here? Once they know those two things, they can trust you.

When you're sitting down in front of an affluent prospect talking and they don't know who you are or why you're there... they're not really going to trust you.

In both The Persuasion Factor and my Elite Coaching Club, I teach storytelling as well as other physical and verbal rapport strategies specifically designed to gain the trust of your affluent prospects.

If you feel like you need more support, you can wait to read all of my future articles in the coming months or you can get on the fast track by starting with my Persuasion Factor program.

Stories mesmerize and suck people in. They fit into the indirect permissive model, not the direct authoritarian model of communication. And once again, therein is one of the most significant powers of stories.

What's your story? Are you from humble beginnings? Have you overcome adversity? Did you beat the odds in some facet of your life? Is your story a fairy tale?