Body Language Expert: What Trump Understands About First Impressions

0:00Zac Thompson:Mark, welcome to the podcast. Jack, Zac, thanks for having me. Great thrill to be here. It's amazing to have you. Big question to get into it, Mark. Go for it. Who are you and what problem do you solve? So I'm Mark Bowden. I'm an expert in human behavior and body language and help people all over the world to stand out, win trust, gain credibility every time they communicate, including some of the leaders of the G7. So I guess the problem is that I'm helping people with is, you know, do you feel that you have enough credibility? Do you think you could have some more? Do you think trust is at a maximum for you?

0:39If you're at your maximum trust, maximum credibility, turn off now. You don't need any help from me. You probably have a monopoly or something like that. You know, you probably have no competition and a monopoly. And if that's the case, you know, I salute you and goodbye. But for everybody left, which I imagine is everybody, here we are to raise trust and credibility through communication.

1:04Zac Thompson:Lovely. Yeah. If you're listening and you think you've got 100 % credibility, you're a narcissist. Don't enjoy it. So if we got all of the people in the world that you've helped or you've worked with or who have listened to something, what kind of through lines would we see? Maybe what are the symptoms that they're facing in day to day life? Yeah, anxiety, I would say at different levels and not all the time. But in certain situations, they're going into certain situations. Could be could be a context, could be. Well, it's always going to be context, but could be people, could be amount of people, could be subject matter, could be.

1:43There's a whole bunch of context. But the majority of the time, they're OK. hey, it's all right. They're not having to perform outside of the normal. They're not in an extraordinary situation. But there comes a time in their work life, in their career, where they're suddenly going, hang on, this is now extraordinary. This is outside of what I've had training for, or I've seen other people do, or I've seen other people do, and they've been able to tell me, hey, here's how you manage this situation. Don't worry. Here's what you do. And so they come to me because they're going, you know, I don't know what to do in this situation to perform at my maximum.

2:28And there are severe ramifications for not performing at their maximum. They're going to lose a really important deal. They could lose a really important promotion. they could lose incredible credibility there. So does that help, Zach? Does that help you kind of understand the context there?

2:48Jack Frimston:It's like you've done this before, Mark. That's the vibe you're giving me right now. You mentioned deals then, right? So let's start with deals. Yeah. And let's talk a little bit about first impressions, right? So there's a lot of people that are perhaps walking into the boardroom for the first time. They want to get the balance right between first impressions, but I am here to sell something. and I want to get that balance right. What tips have you got for someone in terms of making first impressions, but certainly letting the other side know, I'm kind of here to do a job? Yeah, well, in both, a great first impression is about that predictability, about, okay, I think I can trust this person.

3:29Because a great first impression is one of trust, that the other people's human brains are going, you know what, I think I can predict what's going to happen. and I think it's going to be good for me. I think the future is good with this person. Okay. And so let's just talk about predictability of movement. Do you notice when I move, for example, is that I will definitely finish a gesture and it will land. Okay. I'm going to now stop that predictability of movement. Okay. And things that I do won't quite land or won't won't quite finish. Yeah. There's a lot more asymmetrical gesture that I'm doing at the moment as well.

4:14Do you notice how you instantly don't trust me as much? Now I'm going to be really clear. I'll actually be symmetrical with my gestures as well. I'll make sure that they land and they stay there just for that little bit longer. That's causing your brain to go, hang on, I think I'll be able to predict Mark. And therefore it goes, well, if he's more predictable, then that'll be good for me. Therefore, Mark is good for me. And so when I start to deliver you the numbers, for example, you feel those numbers are better. And you maybe have no other way of judging those numbers, you know, because I could say to you, for example, look, Zach, it's a five million dollar deal.

5:00and we will be on time and we will be on budget. Okay? You've got no context for that. Now I'm going to tell you, look, Zach, it's a$5 million deal and we will be on time and we will be on budget. It's like, it's the same numbers. It's the same pitch. When I'm symmetrical and the gestures land and they stay, i.e. everything is more predictable. You like me better and you like my numbers better and you have no context for the numbers. You've done no due diligence over those. So I hope that kind of displays for you there. It would be nice if I could say, hey, Zach, do this gesture, do this thing, do this thing.

5:44But it's really about, look, do what you're going to do, but make it predictable. Make it consistent. Hope that helps you.

5:53Jack Frimston:Massively. For the audio listeners, definitely worth switching to video. That was really interesting. The tonality even stayed the same with the two examples that you gave. So the tonality stayed the same, but actually my interpreted experience felt very different in what you were doing. Yeah, absolutely. Well, look, I live in your head right now. I am an actual real human being and I live in my own head and in the physical world, actually. But ultimately, I'm a perception that you have of me. And so the key is, is that how can I influence your perception of me so that you get the message that I need you to get?

6:35Now, obviously, I could manipulate you with that. But ultimately, then you'd find out that it wasn't true what I said and you'll be upset with me. You'll be disappointed with me. What I want is that you're delighted with me, that I get a perception across to you. And then you find out when you kind of, you know, taste the product, taste the service that you go is better than he even said. Like it's even better, you know, because if you buy into me and then you're disappointed, well, you'll tell everybody. You'll propagate that message massively. If you're delighted with me, unfortunately, you propagate the message less.

7:22It's the unfortunate thing. I must make you delighted in me, knowing that if I make you disappointed in me, you'll let everybody know about that.

7:38Jack Frimston:what what about those scenarios where i'm thinking like my perhaps my lawyer or my solicitor i might think they're a bit of a whatever i want to insert name that you're thinking it or something like that but that experience doesn't prevent me from working with them um so what where would you sit on that in terms of liking someone or just having a job to get them yeah Yeah. So good augmentation of that. Look, it's about predictability. If I go, look, you know, Zach, my lawyer is a complete shark. I mean, predictable, but that's what I need. You know, I mean, he's not only a shark to them. It's a shark to me.

8:22I don't like him. They hate him, but that's what I need. That's what I need. Okay. I still trust you, Zach, because trust is a prediction of the future. How do I think this is going to turn out for me? None of us know the future. We don't know what's going to happen next. So what we do is we manage the not knowing, okay, in order to carry on with our lives. Those of us that come to a point in our lives, or we have some moments where we cannot manage the not knowing, that will often spiral into depression, into affective disorders, all kinds of things. It's like, I don't know what's happening in the world.

8:57I can't predict this. This is horrible. The human brain and body hates that stuff. So it needs to manage the not knowing. And one of the things we use, one of the algorithms that we use for managing that not knowing is if insufficient data, for example, default to a negative, if unpredictability default to a negative. So you can be a pain in the ass, Zach. But if you're a consistent pain in the ass and you do a good job for me, it's like, look you don't you won't want to go out for dinner with him but he's a fantastic you know whatever you know so so yeah this whole thing of likability um is is not essential but it's more useful than it isn't I mean if you could be my lawyer and super likable and do a great job, I'm probably more likely to go, hey, friends and family and colleagues, go use Zach.

10:00You'll love him. He's a great guy. He's fantastic. Okay. You know, I do have some people that I work with and people will go, oh, you know, who should I use as, you know, supplier X? And I'm like, yeah, I'm not going to give them my supplier. They're hard work. I mean, They're predictably hard work. They do do a great job, but you've got to be the kind of person who can manage that. So I wouldn't trust them with my friends and family, but I am okay around them. I hope that helps you on that one, Zach.

10:37Zac Thompson:There's an interesting bit where it's obviously happening in our subconscious, but on first impressions, it probably feels like it's probably happening in more on a conscious level, like, oh, this is the first time I'm meeting Mark. What am I feeling? What am I thinking about him? Is there a point, Mark, where it like crosses over into, right, okay, first impression's done. You're now in this category of trust, don't trust, avoid at all costs. And like, once someone's in one of those categories, is it ever possible to come out of it? Is it possible to move and change? Like, what does that look like?

11:13Yeah, lovely. So you've heard it all the time, you can never change a first impression. Of course, that's inaccurate. Of course, you can. The key is knowing exactly what you need to do to trigger that change in first impression, because you can change a first impression, but it could take ages and massive resource, and therefore, you're never going to achieve it. What we need to know is, if you've made the wrong impression, or you need to change the impression, what do you need to do to change that? Because you're right, what happens over time is, and it could be quite a short period of time, quite a long period of time, but what happens over time is that our social mammalian brain starts to gather a whole bunch of data that says this will always remain the same.

12:01We can now set this. Jack is this kind of person. He showed me that over enough time that I never now need to reassess Jack yeah he's he's done you know Jack's a good guy or or Jack's the the wrong guy for this yeah um so so so that will happen and certainly when that happens in the social mammalian brain then we'll start to go and tell other people about it and go here's what what is definite about him now it's not necessarily definite about you You may be different with different people. I've set my assumptions at this point. And now, Jack, you're going to have to do some very specific things to change that assessment and change those assumptions because they're locked into a part of my brain to make life simple for me.

12:53Jack is always X, you know, is always this. It means I never need to notice you again in many ways. So now you need to know if you if you want to change that assessment you've got to know what is the trigger you know and so it can be different for different people different cultures different societies one of the best ways to do it is to ask somebody hey you know what would you need to know what would you need to see to know that I am x so so let's just say uh Jack that I've broken some trust with you yeah you're now now like mark is completely untrustworthy whatever reason and i know that okay and i want trust back with you i need to gain trust i just go hey jack feels to me like you know you don't quite trust me in some way and look that's that's that's okay but i'd love to change that what would you need to see from me and hear from me to know that you can trust me yeah and so now I've got to really listen for you saying hey Mark you'd have to do this and this would have to happen yeah and you might go Mark it's never going to happen and I would go yeah I listen I know that Jack I know that but just imagine imagine that I could win trust with you what would have to happen yes I've got so this is now influence and persuasion influence to be in flow with somebody, to be in the water with them.

14:23I've got to get in the water with you and go, where are you going with your impression of me right now? And let me join in with that. So I go, look, I know you don't trust me. I get it. Of course not. Why would you? Yeah. And then I've got to give persuasion, which is I'm going to give an option. Hey, what if you did?

14:42Jack Frimston:What if you did? What would be the behavior? What would be the pattern that you'd need to see? Yeah. Now, I'm not going to covertly then give you that pattern, not because I couldn't covertly do it, but it's actually more effective to tell you that I'm going to do it. Because then your guard goes down. You're like, oh, the guy is going to try and persuade me that he's trustworthy. Okay, I've seen you coming. It's like, yeah, you have seen me coming. I've told you that I'm coming. But also, you've told me what you need to see. Yeah? So we both now know where we're both coming from. So I go, hey, Jack, look, I'll tell you what I'm going to do.

15:21I'm going to do my outright best to show you that I can do that for you. And I want you to tell me when I'm not doing it. I want you to point out to me because I want your trust and I'm going to do this for you. I'm going to start this today. And I'm going to start this right now. So now I tell you the persuasion that's going on. And now because your guard is down, because I've told you, I can work at a much more unconscious level with you. Because the worst thing that would happen in influence and persuasion is I don't tell you I'm going to do this. You go, I bet Mark's going to do this. I better keep my watch out for him.

16:04And now you'd be seeing it in everything, even when I'm not doing it. You go, there it is. there it is i can i knew he was being coercive or or manipulative or or whatever anyway jack look long answer there but what you know give me your take on that give me your feedback on

16:21Zac Thompson:on that i think it's great and i think like we we talk a lot about it like the honest admission we we start our sales calls when we cold call i'll say mark i'll be honest with you it's a sales call you can hang up or let me have 30 seconds so we're getting there so like some of the things you were saying and maybe some of the labeling like I was spotting some of the key ingredients and I thought it was beautiful persuasion feels like there's a bit of a a dirty feeling around even the word persuasion anymore and and I think we talk about it like well can can you persuade anyone of anything I don't know you can make them think I can take a horse to water but I can't make him drink when you said about persuasion it wasn't you should trust me it was what would you need to see to trust me so what what what what do you think people are fundamentally getting wrong about persuasion as a skill so persuasion to my understanding comes from uh i think greek to move hard okay so okay so if you're moving somebody hard then you must be moving them from somewhere it's giving options persuasion is a set of options now that's not to say you can't stack the deck on the options okay so i always think about it as the three bears got mummy bear baby bear daddy bear and so you go so you first of all you've done influence which is to get in the water with them and go look i see where we're going here yeah and join them and go i get it i get that we're going this way yeah um which i think is your you know a piece of persuasion that you're definitely doing there is that hiding in plain sight hey just to be open this is a sales call because you know they're thinking that this is a cold call they've already gone here's a cold call so you're way ahead of them you're actually you know going yeah it is yeah absolutely let me tell you up front this is a cold call now there's a piece of persuasion which is can hang up or give me 30 seconds yeah okay so it's an it's an it's an option now my guess is with your give me x amount of seconds my guess is is you've stacked it in some way there's already a hint of value in that there's already a hint of like okay there's this which has nothing the world remains the same for you or there's X amount of seconds with me where there's a possibility of some value coming.

18:59Yeah. Now, that's a piece of piece of persuasion. And I would say, you know, you've got a potential for three elements you can go for within persuasion. Anything more is confusing. You could go for two. That's fine as well. But maximum three, which is there's an option, which is I'd called Daddy Bear, which is massive resource and just no big payoff.

19:23Jack Frimston:But it looks big. But really, it doesn't really do the job. There's Baby Bear, which is super cheap. But again, it kind of won't get you what you want. Or there's Mummy Bear, which is, look, it's a nice amount of resource investment in it. And it's a really good tried and tested outcome on on this it'll never look grand or like you know daddy bear like we put we gave it our maximum you know but there's no risk of like everybody goes yeah and it was rubbish you know and and do you really want to go for that cheap option where you don't you know it's only a little thing but it just does nothing yeah so I think those are the persuasive measures there is you're you're only giving options and you're going hey so listen what do you want to do that's it just what do you want to do so this this kind of pattern recognition predictability piece is it ever possible that the the reads that we make are actually so close together so i someone who is nervous could also be confused with someone who is lying so you could make the wrong judgment because actually perhaps the signals and the body language and my own lived experience as the interpreter of those look somewhat similar yeah uh so so often people say the brain is is like a computer so it's nothing like a computer because on a computer computer would go i am reading um behaviors x y z and therefore if this then that it's a binary system Yeah.

21:04And it's a and it's an on off trigger system. The brain doesn't have an on off trigger system within its its neurons, its axons. It has this calcium chemicals, an electrical system, which is on offs. But there's this calcium system where calcium goes across a synapse of a fluid. Yeah. And depending on the day and depending on the month and depending on the human being and depending on how much that brain has been used or that even that neuron has been used within the last few moments. depends on how much calcium is needed to flick the switch on. So it's like this chemical switch. So I could do something in my behavior today that's going to flick the switch for you, Zach, and tomorrow, because you didn't have enough sleep or X happened just before, that switch isn't flicking anymore.

22:03It's like, hang on, that didn't work. Well, because it's Zach on a different day. Or that's not, that isn't Zach. That worked on Zach. That's Jack now. And Jack has a different, you know. So now we've got to, and look, the key is, is we only have so much resource as well. So can I really keep coming and trying and trying and trying with you, Zach, with the same idea again and again? Because I run out of fuel in the end. Like, you know, in the world of cold call, it's like, I've only got so much time. I need economics here. I need behavioral economics, which is, what is the minimal thing I can do to flick most people's switches most days?

22:53And then, based on that, go, okay, so who have I got here today? Who exactly have I got here today? And what exactly do I minimal need to do in order to keep this conversation going? So it's a complex system. And in complex systems, you need simple tools, not complicated tools. And so probably what you find in the world of sales and sales calls, and there's a whole bunch of people out there who've built themselves really complex systems. you know if this then do this and then do this like oh man it's like you're gonna forget that you're gonna run out of energy within the first you know three calls on that or what do I do next what do I do next with all these flow charts of if this then that if this then that and cascades of flow it's like okay what are the one two three things I can constantly do to keep myself buoyant and keep going and then have the tenacity and brilliance in the moment and spare neurons in the moment to go, hey, what if I give this a go with this person?

24:05Why don't I give this a go? Give it a gamble. Give it a gamble and try it out. And if it doesn't work, what's my recovery? What's my simple recovery from this? Not complex recovery. yeah so look all of that to say you're absolutely right is that we will make snap judgments about people and it will depend on the day sometimes what judgments we make and depend on the culture what judgments we make and also we've got to know when we're trying to make other people judge us in the right way that they're running the same system so we and it's a complex system and it can change day to day. So we need really simple triggers to help them like symmetrical movement that I'm doing for you right, right now.

24:53Yeah. Like simple things like, Hey, just going to tell you upfront, this is a cold call. I can do that every day. I can do that every all day, every day. I can go, well, how am I going to open this call? I'll just open like that, you know, and then I'll recover. If it doesn't go how I thought it was going to go, then then i can be i can i can worry about my recovery rather than worry about my opening yeah you know look you asked me hey mark tell us tell me about yourself i'm mark bowden i'm an expert in human behavior and body language i help like i know that yeah so i'm not worried about what the hell am i gonna say i'm always gonna say that and then i'm gonna go how did they react now I'm going to worry about what's my recovery from their reaction.

25:44Anyway, hope that helps you there, Zach.

25:47Jack Frimston:Oh, God. I'm so tired. I've just been talking to qualified prospects all day without any wait time.

25:53Zac Thompson:How have you been doing it? Because I've been cold calling people on my mobile, and I reckon I've spoke to one person.

25:57Jack Frimston:No, no, no. Stop that right now and use Nooks.ai. Why? What does Nooks do? It finds me the right people to call, and it calls them, and it connects with them over and over and over again.

26:10Zac Thompson:So you're saying it's Nooks.ai and I can just be speaking to qualified decision makers all the time? No other better connection, right? Wow, Nooks.ai.

26:20Jack Frimston:Maybe a slight tangent, but I just really love your thoughts on this, maybe given where you live in the world as well. Donald Trump obviously meets a lot of world leaders in front of cameras and he looks like he makes a very deliberate play in that initial handshake. You know, those famous things, I think, Vladimir Putin pulling people in. And what's happening there? Is that for the cameras I'm trying to sell something? Is that for the person in front of me? And how much is there really in that first handshake? That's for his audience. Yeah. He wants his audience to see him as the strong man. He's a popularist by anybody's account.

26:59It would be fair to say he's a populist politician. And by that, I mean, he says and does the things that people go, yeah, yeah, I kind of do that. You know, it's pop. You know, pop is if you can't do it, it's not pop. Yeah. So so progressive rock, most of us can't play it. Okay. That's not pop. Yeah. Pop is, you know, rock and roll. You know, still your mother might not like it. okay pop yeah your mum's gonna love it okay so so you can do it and everybody's gonna like the majority of people are going to like it or enough people are gonna like it and get it it's gettable it's like i'm just see what he's doing there see what he's doing i could do that yeah i'd do that yeah for sure so that's what he's doing it's a populist move to go look i'm the i'm the strong arm here yeah and and so that his audience will go uh the audience that already likes him so his audience because he's not trying to change anybody's mind here you know this isn't an election move yeah he's not he's not doesn't need voters at this point he's already in it's very hard to remove somebody once they're in they kind of have to walk themselves out to be honest you know you can even impeach them in the US.