Have you ever paid attention to how people interact with one another? I’m betting that most of you don’t.  After you increase your level of awareness, you’ll gain a better understanding of how people generally work. Increasing your awareness levels means that you are consciously paying attention to what is going on around you most of the time.

Having the ability to tell what type of personality someone is within only 30 seconds or so of conversation is probably one of the best communication tools you can learn. Having the know how to detect what a person is allows you to transform the way you should be interacting with that particular client. Since your first few minutes of interaction is the most vital, pay close attention to what they say and how they say it.

Personality Type: Expressive (Let’s do it!)

Now that you’re familiar with the quick and assertive Driver, we move on to the can you shut up already Expressive. Have you ever noticed that every time you go to a party, function, or gathering, there is always this one person who everyone swarms around (maybe it’s you)? Expressive people absolutely love being in the spotlight. Their workplaces are normally messy compared to a neat Analytical. Even though their workplaces, cars, or rooms tend to be messy, they would still be able to find what their looking for through their memory (they don’t necessarily lose everything). Expressive people love to talk, so let them.  They generally have very high emotion and make decisions rather quickly. There are generally excited to see what happens next.

Here are the characteristics of an Expressive:

• Tends to run late, lots of commitments and rushed lifestyle.
• Desires to be center of attention. Will attempt to draw focus of a group.
• Can’t stand being bored, impatient. Will get stressed and fidget in lines, looks for distractions.
• Generally have brightly colored clothing/cars/houses. Values ‘flash’.
• They are animated and lively when they speak or tell stories. Sometimes seems ‘loud’.

As a special note, since many people misinterpret Expressives as people who talk a lot, avoid placing someone in 1 of the 4 personality types by the length in time they talk to you. Analyticals and Amiables also tend to talk a lot after they feel comfortable around someone, so the amount of time they take talking is irrelevant. You must use the other criteria I’ve listed above to determine if one is Expressive or something else.

How to Sell to an Expressive

When dealing with Expressives, all you need to do is let the them talk and slowly steer the conversation in the direction you want to take it by taking control and asking the right questions. Expressives tend to get off topic very quickly so be patient.

I’m not sure if I was always an expressive or that I recently just became one. I questioned which personality I was because it can be difficult to determine it at a young age. I’m certain, now that I’m 23, but I originally started thinking about this when I was 17-18 and I had no clue what I was, most people didn’t. Many times you’ll hear people saying that they’re Expressives because Expressive people usually get most of the attention. Also, since I’m in the sales industry, people like to say that they are Expressives because they are led to believe that all great sales people are Expressives. Obviously this is false and just a common misconception or excuse that people use because they can’t yet achieve the success they want.

Selling as an Expressive

Dealing with an Expressive person from the other personality type’s point of view is relativity easy, but as an Expressive, you need to learn how to tone it down. It’s important for you to realize and understand when your your stories go off on a tangent.

Are you an Expressive? If not, what experiences have you had with an expressive?