First impressions stay. The first time you see something, whether it’s food and drink, music, a location or a person, you can decide how you feel about it. When you struggle to build a retail place for your small company, what you do to make a reputation will have a huge effect on success. It’s more like a cliché. There are some figures out there that suggest that decisions are made in a matter of seconds — seven to be exact. If it’s a potential customer who visits your office for the first time or a high-calibre candidate who comes for a job interview, you’ll want to make sure they see the best that your organization can give.
Why Do First Impressions Matter?
First impressions matter for a number of reasons, depending on the situation you find yourself in. A perfect example of this is when you speak to a new customer or investor. If you’re competing with other firms that sell the same product or service, you could only get one shot at impressing. You ought to make your first impression because it’s not your last impression. Several research and articles have addressed the psychological effect early experiences can have on how people interpret knowledge and make choices. First experiences, legitimately or wrongly, could have a huge effect on how someone feels of you and your small company.
How to Make Your First Impression Last?
Following are a few ways you can make a good first impression:
Appropriate Business Attire
Whenever you meet a client, whether you are having a leisure activity or a business meeting, it is important that you display yourself well and appropriately. It is equally important to inform your staff and other members on what your company deems acceptable business suits.
Let’s hope you take advantage of trade fairs and conventions, which are ways to network with a lot of people at the same time. When you want to create a memorable impact at a meeting, “you will create the first impressions in a day between 30 and 100.” Making a good first impression consists of several factors such as appearance, the topic under discussion, your behaviour, your goals and accomplishments, especially the way you communicate nonverbally.
It may seem unnecessary to highlight the value of clothes when making a first impression. But if people make rash decisions subconsciously, how you look is the secret to influencing how they view you. It’s expected to be common sense that you don’t want to look awful. Yet you don’t want to come off as static and formal as well. That could make you seem unapproachable. Make sure that the wardrobe is suitable and well-tailored. Tailoring goes a long way to make you look comfortable. Seek to be trendy without being too glamorous.
Have your potential consumers in mind when selecting the look that you and your staff and other members should present. What could be “out there” for one business could be completely appropriate for another.
Put Them First
Your overall actions and the choices you make will have a great deal of effect. Your driving philosophy should be: place the wishes and interests of others above your own. Listen rather when you’re talking, expressing a true interest in the person you’re with at the moment. Don’t let the people who walk by you and wish to communicate their new gadgets confuse you. Don’t think about discussions that you’ve had or are planning to have soon.
It’s become extremely difficult for people to provide each other with their undivided attention without being interrupted by their phones, if not by anything else. Give others your undivided attention is a blessing, and those you meet will love it. Hold the reason why you (the network) are at the forefront of your mind. Don’t get carried away by trying to generate profits. That’s not the point, and you’re going to come off as deceitful if you want to sell to people you’ve just met. Be aware of how your behaviour may be perceived.
Have Your Goals and Plans Sorted Out
Getting relaxed in an unknown environment is going to be a lot better if you get into a situation with a strategy. Have a reason to pick that specific spot. Figure out who’s going to be there and know the main individuals or businesses you want to communicate with. Be sure you’ve got your business cards ready to go while you mingle.
We all know that meeting people has the potential to be uncomfortable, so ask some interesting questions ahead of time. Stop traditional, cliché concepts like telling people what they’re doing. Also avoid controversial subjects such as nationalism, religion, maybe even sports teams. Another circumstance in which you are likely to find yourself is that you are caught in a relationship where you wish to leave. Get a plan to extricate yourself respectfully. You might claim that you need to use the toilet, so you don’t want to take too much of the person’s time.
Try to Remember Names
Anything else that is a smart idea is getting to know the names of the people you encounter. This is a challenging technique to learn when you meet too many new people at the same time. But it’s true because it makes people feel appreciated. Remember to say your name when you first talk and use it more than once during your chat. This will make you recall it better. If you happen to be running into someone more than once and really remember his or her name, the person is going to be really surprised. I think this is because so many of us are unable to recall names.
Work on Your Nonverbals
One tricky part of getting to know people is that we don’t understand how we’re going to get to know them. That is understandable. It will be boring to examine how we interact subconsciously each second of the day. Yet you might have entrenched patterns that will make you send messages that you don’t want to send regularly. If that is the case, you may like someone to remind you to help you connect better. Do you seem hesitant, bored, approachable or stiff, unfriendly or welcoming? Are you looking at people and having contact with the eye? How are you going to pose while you talk to them? It’s quick to believe that you’re moving one way without understanding that you really aren’t. Self-analysis is useful, but it is important to get a more realistic perspective.
Ask your peers, colleagues, and family members how you normally approach someone, particularly when you first meet people. Be sure you get advice from people who can be frank with you and provide you with useful input. The more you can sync your non-verbal interactions with what you really want to communicate, the more successful the communicator you can be overall — and the better first impression you’ll make.
The idea that the first impressions are so vital is that they last long past. This is because of something called the primacy effect, which means that when someone sees something before other things in a series, they recall the first thing rather than the last.
