The basic lesson? Do your homework!

Transactions are lost, in most cases, not because of buyers and sellers, but because of incompetent and untrained real estate salespeople. Poor presentation skills are the number-one reason for failed transactions. Developing the presentation skills you use when negotiating is paramount to increasing your closing ratios. Good presentations have three components: a visual component, a factual component, and an emotional component. To develop your style and skill as an effective negotiator, you must learn how to integrate all three components.

Negotiations require more than just the ability to talk or communicate. Negotiators use factual documentation to prove the points that they are trying to get across--documents such as statistics, computer reports, articles, and records that will support the points they want to make.

Great negotiators also use visual props such as pictures, laptop displays and multi-media computer programs to support their points. Today's technology capabilities permit salespeople to bring a laptop to the negotiating table, log on to the Internet, and surf through websites that will support their presentation. For example, by logging on to the MLS and showing clients comparables that have sold and new comparable listings, together with a prepared CMA, salespeople can dramatically improve their ability to set--and justify--a sales price.

Using factual documents and visual or technological props at the presentation will imporve the salesperson's negotiation skills. However, the salesperson must remember that buying and selling involves an emotional decision. For this reason, it is absolutely essential to develop emotional presentation skills as well.

The salesperson's goal, finally, is to use props, technology, and facts to support the buyers' or sellers' main motivations, their reasons for wanting to move or sell. Let's say a client is relocating to a new neighborhood. A program called "Know the Neighborhood" can be used to give the client all the details about this new area. The program will cover details about schools, crime, churches, employment, transportation, shopping, and roads; it will even generate comparisons with other areas that client might be considering.

The basic lesson? Do your homework, and never go to the negotiating table unprepared to support your presentation. Keep your clients emotionally involved.