Hey don't use what you're about to learn for evil, please.
So, at the beginning of his 2015 shareholder letter, Warren Buffett, the greatest investor of all
time said "I've made some dumb purchases".
A little later, he also said "I was wrong in my evaluation of the economic dynamics
of the company or the industry in which it operates, and we are not paying the price
for my misjudgments.
I will commit more errors, you can count on that.
If we luck out, they will occur at our smaller operations".
Warren Buffett starts every annual shareholder letter talking about his mistakes.
Contrary to how other companies share their results, where they try to spin their results
to make them look as good as possible, Warren Buffett does not hide and in fact, leads with
mistakes he's made.
There's a lesson here, which is some serious mind control stuff which is that in order
to persuade other people of what you want them to hear, you need to first build credibility
and trust.
Only then will people be willing to listen and trust what you later say.
Warren Buffett builds this trust by leading with his mistakes giving the impression that
he knows fully everything that's going on in his business empire.
And this is Warren Buffett we're talking about!
His reputation needs no introduction.
So the lesson for you is that if you want to persuade people, you must get them to trust
you first.
Go against your inclination to hide and spin negative facts, be open and honest about weaknesses
and other people will be more willing and ready to hear you message.
Now, Warren Buffett is not only the greatest investor alive, you may not realize this,
but Warren Buffett's verbal skills are second to none.
Today, I wanna talk about three more techniques that Warren Buffett's a master at that you
would be wise to learn if you want to captivate and persuade people at his level.
So, let's start here.
In responding to people who say he's so frugal he doesn't spend money on looking good: "I
buy expensive suits.
They just look cheap on me".
In describing his investing philosophy: "You only have to do a very few things right in
your life so long as you don't do too many things wrong".
What's the common thread between these two famous sayings?
Yes, its a play on words and in particular what I call "Stringing Opposites Together".
Its an advanced technique, but many of his famous and brilliant sayings are based on
this particular technique that you can use.
Somehow, this technique is extremely memorable because they become easy to remember, but
basically the key is to use a "home word" and then use its opposite, such as expensive/cheap,
or right/wrong.
Now, here's another type of play on words.
Here he is describing his investment philosophy: "It's far better to buy a wonderful company
at a fair price than a fair company at a wonderful price".
In talking about the problem of accounting fraud: "It has been far safer to steal large
sums with pens than small sums with a gun".
And here is one of his most well known sayings describing overvalued markets: "We simply
attempt to be fearful when others are greedy and to be greedy only when others are fearful".
What's the common thread here?
I call this technique the "Flip Flop" technique.
In this technique, you're sentence consists of a two part statement which is then followed
by another two part statement but flip flopped.
This is an advanced verbal technique that's not easy to use but very memorable but very
easy for others to remember.
Now, let's move on to the third technique.
In talking about active traders: "We believe that according the name 'investors' to institutions
that trade actively is like calling someone who repeatedly engages in one-night stands
a 'romantic'.
In talking about investments he likes: "Woody Allen once explained that the advantage of
being bi-sexual is that it doubles your chance of finding a date on Saturday night.
In like manner - well, not exactly like manner - our appetite for either operating businesses
or passive investments doubles our chances of finding sensible uses for Berkshire's endless
gusher of cash.
In talking about patience: "No matter how great the talent or efforts, some things just
take time.
You can't produce a baby in one month by getting nine women pregnant."
Now, what 's the common thread here?
Its metaphor.
But not just any tired old metaphor, but sexual or relationship metaphors, something people
just intuitively understand.
You can always connect anything in life to the sexual/human relationship realm, and that's
what these types of metaphors are so powerful.
Now, if you're interested in learning more about metaphor and how to use them powerfully,
sign up for my course "Master of Metaphor".
Go to www.artofverbalwar.com/metaphor and sign up so you'll be notified when the course
is available and I'll also give you a sneak preview of the course.
The course will not be made available to the public, so you have to be on this list to
get in.
Okay, that's it for today.
I'm Min from The Art of Verbal War, and hey, please subscribe to this YouTube channel.
www.artofverbalwar.com/metaphor