How One Hypnotic Story Brought 15 Automatons to My Door

In 1844 the great circus promoter P.T. Barnum bought an automaton from
the famous magician, Eugene Robert-Houdin.

An automaton is a mechanical device that imitates life. Think of them
as early robots. In the middle of the eighteenth century, automatons were
all the rage: Mechanical ducks and elephants, pictures with moving parts,
even human androids that could write, draw, and play musical instruments.
They were haunting, magical, intricate, detailed, and usually meticulously
crafted out of watch parts, metal and wood.

The one Robert-Houdin created was a life-sized figure able to write and
draw, and even answer simple questions. He once displayed it before the King
of France. Barnum heard of it on his tour in Europe with General Tom Thumb
and bought it. But that legendary automaton was lost in one of Barnum's many
fires.

I spoke to a few people who still build automatons---which is an almost
lost art today---to see if someone could rebuild the one Robert-Houdin made
and Barnum owned. Most said it would cost about a quarter of a million
dollars and take well over a year to complete.

I passed.

But then one day a month or so ago I got a call from a potential new
client. He was a delight to talk to. He performs magic, runs a speakers
bureau, and was familiar with most of my books. During the course of
our lively conversation he floored me by announcing that he inherited a few
automatons.

I couldn't believe it.

"You what!" I blurted, almost too excited to speak.

"I have some automatons my best friend made," he explained. "He left
them to me in his will."

"How many do you have?"

"Oh, I dunno, maybe fifteen."

"Fifteen?!?" I mumbled, truly shaken to the core that he had any
automatons let alone over a dozen of them.

"I have one that does mind reading and another that levitates," he said.
"They all do something different."

You can't imagine how stunned I was to hear about this. It was like
finding the Holy Grail of Automatons. While these particular devices are
all modern and no where near as valuable as the one made by the great
magician Robert-Houdin, ANY automaton today is a rare and collectible item.

I was intrigued.

And I wanted those automatons.

"How much do you want for them?" I asked.

"I could never sell them," he said. "I inherited these from a man who
lived to be ninety and treated me like his own son. I've got them in
storage."

At that point I did something naturally and instantaneously. Right there
on the spot I weaved a hypnotic story that changed my life --- and his.

Here's how it went:

"I understand how you feel," I began. "About twenty years ago the
landlord I had at the time knew I was into music. He heard me play the
harmonica and knew I had an interest in learning to play the guitar. One day
he just gave me a guitar he had for over fifty years. He just handed it to
me. But he
said one thing I never forgot: 'You can give it away but you can never sell
it.' I promised him I would keep my word. I still have that guitar today.
I'm never going to sell it but I will give it away when the right person
comes along."

Well, that hypnotic story did the trick. The prospect on the phone heard
my story and in his mind he heard the phrase, "It's okay to give the
automatons to Joe but you can't sell them to him."

All we had to do from there is negotiate a fair arrangement so he could
feel comfortable giving me the fifteen automatons. After a week of going
back and forth, we agreed that I would help him with some specific
marketing in exchange for his collection.

I now own those automatons.

Later, once the deal was done, I asked him what made him change his
mind about parting with the rare items.

"It was your story about your landlord," he explained. "That really got
to me. I could easily imagine my friend who gave me the automatons being
okay with me giving them to you but not selling them to you."

Hypnotic stories can work wonders. Whenever you want to persuade
someone, consider telling a story about someone who did what you want the
person you are persuading to do. The story can seep in easier than a direct
command. And the results can be miraculous.

Look at me --- I'm now surrounded by automatons. I'll soon be opening
"The Joe Vitale Museum of Automated Life and Other Curiosities."


Joe Vitale's newest book is "The Greatest Money-Making Secret in History,"
available in May. He is author of numerous other books, including the
international #1 best-seller, "Spiritual Marketing," the best-selling
e-book, "Hypnotic Writing," and the best-selling Nightingale-Conant
audioprogram, "The Power of Outrageous Marketing." See his catalog of books
and sign up for his free newsletter at http://www.mrfire.com