Tag Archive for: presuasion

Stop! I mean, Go! Confused?

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Mixed signals cause a lot of confusion. In business confusion in communication often leads to errors, delays and lost opportunities. It’s like telling someone to stop, then go, then stop. Do that and they will be confused. “But I thought you want me to…?”

This was top of mind recently when I was working on a presentation around the ideas of pre-suasion. Pre-suasion focuses on things you can do before you make a request of someone to increase the odds of hearing yes. A couple of examples include:

  1. A man sending flowers to a woman before asking her out. Flowers boost the chance of getting a date because they prompt thoughts of romance.
  2. Playing upbeat music later in the day. This will lift the mood and energy at a training event or conference. If you want people to say “Yes” to you then your chance goes up significantly if they’re feeling energetic and positive.

Much of persuasion and pre-suasion take place at the subconscious level which means, most of the time people are unaware of the impact. Something that affects your thinking is color. For example:

  1. Green has positive associations for most people. It conjures up thoughts of “Go” because of traffic lights. In the United States it makes people think about money because that’s the color of our printed currency. And more recently, it prompts thoughts of the environment.
  2. Red is usually experienced in a more negative way. When you’re losing money, you’re said to be “in the red.” Red signals to “Stop!” because of traffic lights and stop signs. It’s also the color of aggression – think Tiger Woods in Sunday in his trademark red shirt. And then there’s blood!

Sometimes marketers, advertisers and others forget these associations and hurt their efforts when it comes to moving people to action. This came to mind when I was on the New Yorker Magazine site recently. A pop-up box appeared to encourage people to subscribe to the monthly magazine and the “Sign me up” button was red. As I looked around the site I found another instance of the same thing.

The website designer probably thought the color stood out and would get attention. While it does that, it also subconsciously is telling your brain to stop. The magazine would be much better off having a green box because it signals “go” as in “Go ahead and sign me up!”

On the flip side, if you wanted someone to stop doing something it would be unwise to incorporate the color green. Doing so will cause confusion because the subconscious will think “Go!” and end up working against the conscious.

Conclusion

You might think what I’ve just described is insignificant but it matters. Despite a very good economy businesses are always looking for ways to impact the top and bottom line. If something as simple – and costless – as aligning the right colors with the actions you want people to take can reduce expenses or increase sales why wouldn’t you take advantage?

Brian Ahearn, CMCT®, is the Chief Influence Officer at Influence PEOPLE, LLC. An international speaker, coach and consultant, he’s one of only 20 people in the world personally trained by Robert Cialdini, the most cited living social psychologist on the topic of ethical influence. Brian’s LinkedIn Learning courses Persuasive Selling, Persuasive Coaching and Building a Coaching Culture: Improving Performance through Timely Feedback, have been viewed by more than 65,000 people! Have you watched them yet? Click a course title to see what you’ve been missing.

ROI – Return on Influence – It’s Greater than You Realize

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ROI – Return on Influence
It’s Greater than You Realize

Your businesses is always concerned with ROI – return on investment. When you company spends money, it expects to make more in return otherwise it might as well just invest in the stock market. When it comes to persuasion there’s an ROI – return on influence – and it’s greater than you realize.

Strategically implementing the science influence into your sales, marketing and leadership is easy and quite often costless. But, the key is knowing what to do and when to do it. I’ll share a few examples of the impact influence can have – ROI –  in sales, marketing and leadership.

Sales: Reciprocity and Liking

In one study three times more people said yes to the same request. The difference was that request came after an initial, bigger ask was rejected. That’s an application of reciprocity. When you’re selling do you censure yourself, lowering your expectations, because you think the other person would never go for your “platinum” product? If so you’re making a big mistake.

You probably know people like to buy from those they know, like and trust. A study of Tupperware sales showed twice as often the reason for purchase was the social bond (principle of liking) when compared to product preference and need. Are you building and leveraging relationships to improve your sales?

Marketing: Scarcity and Authority

Bose speaker sales jumped by 45% when the marketing team incorporate scarcity, changing “New” to “Hear What You’ve Been Missing.” Do you alert potential customers about what they’re miss out on when they don’t do business with you?

If that wasn’t enough, sales increased another 65% when Bose incorporated authority. This was accomplished when they addde testimonials from reputable organizations to their marketing piece. Are you tapping into authority and scarcity in your marketing?

Leadership: Consistency, Pre-suasion and Because

If you’re a leader do you ask instead of telling people what to do? Incorporating the principle of consistency in this way can make a big difference in the number of people who say yes and follow through. A restaurant saw their no-show rate drop from 30% to 10% when taking reservations simply by changing a statement into a question.

As a leader, when rolling out a new initiative do you “set the stage” by tapping into the power of pre-suasion? In one study more than twice as many people were willing to give their email address to a marketer when a pre-suasive question was asked right off the bat.

When you make an ask, do you use the word because? You should because in one study 50% more people complied with the same request when it was tagged with because and a reason was given.

Conclusion

Here’s the good news – you don’t need to blow up your sales process, rework your entire marketing campaign or implement a whole new leadership model to get the ROI you want. Learning how to ethically influence others based on decades of scientific research is the first step. After that it’s a matter of incorporating your new knowledge into what you’re already doing. It’s virtually costless and as you saw in the examples shared, your return on influence – ROI – will be greater than you realize.

Brian Ahearn, CMCT®, is the Chief Influence Officer at Influence PEOPLE, LLC. His Lynda.com/LinkedIn Learning course, Persuasive Selling, has been viewed by more than 50,000 people! Persuasive Coaching went live earlier this year and Creating a Coaching Culture will be online in the second quarter. Have you watched these courses yet? If not, click a course name to see what you’ve been missing.

Brian Ahearn, CMCT®, is the Chief Influence Officer at Influence PEOPLE, LLC. An international speaker and trainer, he’s one of only 20 people in the world personally trained by Robert Cialdini. Brian’s LinkedIn Learning course, Persuasive Selling, has been viewed by more than 53,000 people! Persuasive Coaching went live earlier this year and Creating a Coaching Culture will be online in the second quarter. Have you watched these courses yet? Click either to see what you’ve been missing.

Are You Ever Really Past Your Past?

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Have you ever observed a friend who reacted in a certain way and it was apparent his reaction had to do with something from his past? Maybe your friend was unable to make a commitment and you know it’s because of past relationship where he was burned. Or perhaps you knew someone who was afraid to try something new because last time she did so it turned out horrible. In both cases the past is impacting the present. Are we ever really past the past? Closer to home; are you ever really past your past?

Last week I wrote about the book Before You Know It: The Unconscious Reasons We Do What We Do by John Bargh, PhD. It was such an interesting book that I’m reading through it again. The first section, chapters 1-4, have to do with our past and how it shapes who we are. The past includes our evolutionary past as a species, our personal history, the culture we grow up in and recent events. As we take a quick look at each, remember that virtually all of this impact takes place at the subconscious level.

Evolutionary Past

Whether or not it’s apparent to you, your ancestors helped shape who you are. I’m not talking about your great, great, great grandparents. I’m referring to the human race over the course of history.

Much of what we do comes from our genetic make-up. The genes that survived over the millennia are passed on from one generation to the next are the ones that impact your thinking which drives much of your behavior.

Human genes have two main priorities – help us survive another day and procreate. Both priorities ensure the human species will continue on. Those inherited genes impact things like who you’re attracted to, who you’re afraid of, your willingness to follow certain leaders and the groups you’re a part of. Your tendencies for each of those choices, along with many other choices, have been heavily influenced by your ancestors from long, long ago.

Personal History

Your personal experiences, whether or not you can recall them, are another huge determinant of how you think and behave. It’s a mistake to believe only the big or traumatic events of life shaped you. How much do you recall from your first few years of life? Probably nothing but they’re called “the formative years” for a reason.

It’s during your first few years of life you begin to learn about trust and relationships. How you were parented during that time shows up in your ability to build trusting, intimate relationships. How outgoing you are, confidence and many other traits come in large part from your experiences in early childhood.

Culture

It was eye opening to learn how impacting culture is without our awareness. For example, there is a societal perception that Asian people are good at math. There’s also a stereotype that girls are not as good as boys when it comes to math and science.

In studies where Asian women were asked to list their ethnicity, but not gender, they did better on math tests than Asian women who were not asked to list their gender or ethnicity. When Asian women were asked to list their sex, but not ethnicity, they did worse compared to the control group of Asian women who listed neither. It’s theorized the results in both cases are a result of the cultural norms that women subconsciously carry with them.

Lest you think the study of Asian women was a fluke, studies show African Americans do worse on certain standardized tests when they list their ethnicity as compared to those who are not asked to do so. How culture views us impacts how we view ourselves to a large degree.

Recent Events

You don’t have to dig into evolution, your family upbringing or culture to see how the past can impact you. Sometimes looking back a few minutes or hours is all you need to do.

Have you ever had a stressful commute home where other drivers set you off? If so, did you notice the impact on your mood and emotions afterwards? The “hangover” from events like that can cause you to be short with others where you’d normally exhibit patience. You may not notice you’re acting impatiently until someone points out the obvious.

Conclusion

In a very real sense the past is never past because so much of the past affects who you are in the present moment. The more you understand how the past may affect you the better positioned you’ll be to make course corrections for yourself and others.

Brian Ahearn, CMCT®, is the Chief Influence Officer at Influence PEOPLE, LLC. His Lynda.com/LinkedIn Learning course, Persuasive Selling, has been viewed by more than 50,000 people! His latest course, Persuasive Coaching, just went live. Have you watched them yet? If not, click on either course name to see what you’ve been missing.