8 ms·

Lesser Known Ways to Persuade People

310 points by peeplaja 15y ago

skizm 15y ago
#12 makes me sick, but is understandable I suppose. I feel like it implies anecdotal evidence > fact based evidence.
badclient 15y ago
Get people to agree with you first A slight twist to this: get people to say yes. My "success rate" (with approaching women) went up drastically when I changed the first words out of my mouth to "Can you hear me?". I now ask this even when I know a woman doesn't have earphones on. Why does it work? I have a couple of guesses. It is a question that you can't help reply to. And inadvertently when you answer this question, you begin paying more attention to the party that asked. In ad-speak, this pretty much takes care of the A(attention) in AIDA.
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
- arepb 15y ago
  This has been proven to be one of the things that helps grease the slide for a prospect to become a customer. One of the key things a salesperson does is to get the prospect to get accustom to a "series of yesses." Even the smallest yes, such as Salesperson: "Nice weather today, isn't it?" Betty, unsuspecting: "Ah, yes..." The thinking being that since the final sale will require one big yes, building up a series of small yesses gets the prospect in the habit (albeit subconsciously) of agreeing with the salesperson.
- gcl2 15y ago
  You might have been inadvertently employing the "disarming" technique used by pick up artists. "The Game" is an amazing book detailing the techniques used by pick up artists (and no, it's just for people who want to pick up ladies but more generally about influencing people).
  - badclient 15y ago
    As someone who has met a few of the people from The Game, I can tell you it's mostly crapware with very little to learn from. The basic flaw with The Game(and most of the games of the characters in it) is that they take this to such extreme that instead of becoming charming and attractive, you become a paranoid insecure jerk. That said, The Game has helped motivate many to take action in a critical area of their life.
    - Helianthus 15y ago
      I always refer to it as a 'cargo cult' theory of human interaction
      - skore 15y ago
        I always wondered what bothered me about these 'The Game' approaches to "successfully influence people" and I think you really nailed it down. OF COURSE people will find it easier to agree with you if they have agreed with you before - that should be obvious. The question is - what do you have to do to get that? 'The Game' seems to say - "well, anything that is necessary, of course", as though aping people into nodding was some kind of accomplishment and as though that accomplishment in itself was admirable and healthy. I'd rather have people actually agree with me in small things that we both care about and then be happy to agree with me big time. If you need to bullshit, "warm up" or in some other ways mislead people (and yes, that includes "Weather is great, isn't it?" when you don't really care about the weather), you are building a pile of very tiny lies to make the jump to the big lie less noticeable. At some point, you will just cross the bullshit horizon, the point at which MOSTLY what you do is lie to and trick people - and have fun with your empty soul while you're at it. It is indeed a cargo cult - you do achieve things with it, but then you sit there in your wooden mock-up flight control tower next to your empty dirt runway wearing your headphones made of straws and wonder why you never seem to actually be happy.
        temphn 15y ago
        But it's not a cargo cult if it works, or even partially works.
- abbasmehdi 15y ago
  Oh my God, you've just made "Can you hear me?" the most commonly used pick-up line in the south bay. ;)
  - badclient 15y ago
    Oh wow, sad that I could actually see that happening going by the gullible nature of the community. I'm pretty confident though that by the time its gone through the community's marketing machine, it will turn into some creepy move, available on DVD for $1,000. Alas I got much out of the Bay Area scene back in the day so as long as the secret stays away from NYC I'm good :)
- keiferski 15y ago
  Reminds me of a scene in Boiler Room: Ask him questions. Ask him rhetorical questions. It doesn't matter, just get a 'yes' out of him. If you were drowning and I threw you a life jacket, would you grab it? Yes. Good. Pick up 200 shares. I won't let you down. Ask him if he wants to see 30-40% returns. What's he gonna say, 'no, I don't want to see those returns'? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izOIOvguncU&feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izOIOvguncU&feature=relat... (possibly nsfw, language)
  - ims 15y ago
    If you liked this movie, may I suggest the David Mamet movie that inspired it: Glengarry Glen Ross (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104348/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104348/). Brilliant (but NSFW, language) "Always Be Closing" scene to give you a feel for it: www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-AXTx4PcKI
- shin_lao 15y ago
  It's a foot in the door, you obtain a little something to obtain much more afterward. It's because we tend to not contradict ourselves and act the way we acted, because doing otherwise would be irrational, right? :D "I've started to talk to this stranger, there is no reason I stop now". Of course there must be a ground for agreement in the first place, you cannot force someone to do something he absolutely doesn't want to do with this technique.
frisco 15y ago
The title should be cropped to, "Lesser Known Ways to Persuade People".
Natsu 15y ago
> Upsell a product that cost 60% less > The time-tested 60×60 rule says that your customers will buy an upsell 60 percent of the time for up to 60% of the original purchase price. These two statements are not the same... Or was this to be an example of #17? ("87% of people believe everything if there’s a percentage in it")
Helianthus 15y ago
Eww. Pop psychology. Persuading people is a lot easier if you look at it as mutually trying to make the best decision--to be persuaded as much as to persuade--instead of some stupid gimmicky power grab. "I felt so powerful because I got someone to agree with me!" Feel powerful when you're right, feel powerful when you're wrong and can admit it, but feeling powerful because someone else thinks you're right is folly.
- badclient 15y ago
  Someone can feel powerful because they got someone to agree with them and because they believe they are right. As a salesman, you don't get compensated for "feeling right". Welcome to the real world. Persuading people is a lot easier if you look at it as mutually trying to make the best decision Depending on your definition of "gimmick", the above may also be considered a gimmick.
Udo 15y ago
> Guadagno & Cialdini research (2002) showed that men seem more responsive to email because it bypasses their competitive tendencies. Women, however, may respond better in face-to-face encounters because they are more ‘relationship-minded’ Yawn. Maybe we just don't want to deal with salespeople but instead judge the product on our own without being harassed. How is that supposed to be competitive? Oh, I forgot, the self-fulfilling world of pop psychology, brought to you by eternal twin slogans "It's true if you think it's true" and "You can convert any social belief into a universal truth by citing agenda-driven studies". The greatest Jedi mind trick is convincing people that your Jedi mind trick actually works.
- greyish_water 15y ago
  Maybe we just don't want to deal with salespeople but instead judge the product on our own without being harassed. It astonishes me that you're able to describe interactions with salespeople as being "harassed" yet can't understand how it could be construed as competitive. (Not that the study you're dismissing has anything to do with salespeople... You'd be better off attacking the tenuous and speculative suggestion that author has made based on a reading that study rather than attempting to nuke the proverbial site from orbit with such a monumentally tired argument as "I don't believe it so it can't possibly be true".)
  - Udo 15y ago
    > It astonishes me that you're able to describe interactions with salespeople as being "harassed" yet can't understand how it could be construed as competitive. You make it sound like I'm drooling into a cup. So the competitiveness hypothesis resonates with you personally? Don't just imply that I'm stupid, explain to me what the competition actually is, and why I am automatically triggered into participating just because I have a penis. > You'd be better off attacking the tenuous and speculative suggestion that author has made based on a reading that study rather than attempting to nuke the proverbial site from orbit with such a monumentally tired argument as "I don't believe it so it can't possibly be true" I'm straining to see how this rhetoric can come from someone who is - in their own words - "just here for the polite and friendly atmosphere". However, I think I am attacking a piece of tenuous and speculative suggestion the author has made. I get that you disagree, I just don't get your specific objection.
Alex3917 15y ago
For what it's worth, most of these examples (and more) are in Cialdini's book Influence: http://www.amazon.com/Influence-Psychology-Persuasion-Business-Essentials/dp/006124189X http://www.amazon.com/Influence-Psychology-Persuasion-Busine...
- peeplaja 15y ago
  Actually they're not. I specifically point out in the beginning of the article that I don't cover stuff from Cialdini's Influence (as it's been over covered). Who hasn't read it yet, definitely should.
  - Alex3917 15y ago
    Ah ok. I just skimmed over this and assumed they were from Cialdini, because I have heard most of them before.
Riverbed 15y ago
And there's even a reference in here to the HN topic of the day - swearing in front of an audience! > 2. Swearing can help influence an audience. Light swearing, that is. (Go overboard and lose all credibility.)
- pbhjpbhj 15y ago
  The example is saying "damn"! Is that really considered swearing?
  - gujk 15y ago
    It is sad that we have lost the fine and colorful distinctions between swearing, blaspheming, cursing, and vulgarity.
- epaga 15y ago
  I love how his site says "Sign up for my dang RSS feed"...he's trying to follow his own advice, though dang is arguably a VERY light swear.
pavel_lishin 15y ago
"13 things you can do right now to increase your conversion rate. #1: block the content." http://i.imgur.com/GTgzM.png http://i.imgur.com/GTgzM.png
- bomatson 15y ago
  hahahah not too persuasive, huh?
- peeplaja 15y ago
  Conversion is action (not reading), so actually this works well. While I don't like popups as much as the next guy, its ridiculously effective. 80% of opt-ins come via popup (all double opt-in).
wallflower 15y ago
One of the best ways to influence people is to ask someone to do a favor for you. Especially if the person you are asking has more perceived power. It is called the "Ben Franklin Effect" Teenage girl (to teenage guy): "Can you help me with my homework?" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Franklin_effect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Franklin_effect
- omarchowdhury 15y ago
  I think in your example case, the teenage guy would be helping for different reasons.
cr4zy 15y ago
Being confident and not one sided is a hard place for me to get sometimes. But being positive does help with that :)
Tloewald 15y ago
My wife is the Guadagno in Guadagno and Cialdini and if the reporting of her findings is any guide, ignore the rest of the article. Her findings were that women will not respond well to email unless there's an existing relationship. Men will respond better to email if there's an existing negative relationship, but it otherwise makes no difference. The error is forgivable if the writer only read the title of the article.
- nandemo 15y ago
  I hope your wife doesn't send you a lot of emails.
skeletonjelly 15y ago
How to get a post noticed on HN this week: don't swear, but mention swearing.

310 points by peeplaja 15y ago

skizm 15y ago

#12 makes me sick, but is understandable I suppose. I feel like it implies anecdotal evidence > fact based evidence.

Get people to agree with you first A slight twist to this: get people to say yes. My "success rate" (with approaching women) went up drastically when I changed the first words out of my mouth to "Can you hear me?". I now ask this even when I know a woman doesn't have earphones on. Why does it work? I have a couple of guesses. It is a question that you can't help reply to. And inadvertently when you answer this question, you begin paying more attention to the party that asked. In ad-speak, this pretty much takes care of the A(attention) in AIDA.

deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
arepb 15y ago
This has been proven to be one of the things that helps grease the slide for a prospect to become a customer. One of the key things a salesperson does is to get the prospect to get accustom to a "series of yesses." Even the smallest yes, such as Salesperson: "Nice weather today, isn't it?" Betty, unsuspecting: "Ah, yes..." The thinking being that since the final sale will require one big yes, building up a series of small yesses gets the prospect in the habit (albeit subconsciously) of agreeing with the salesperson.
gcl2 15y ago
You might have been inadvertently employing the "disarming" technique used by pick up artists. "The Game" is an amazing book detailing the techniques used by pick up artists (and no, it's just for people who want to pick up ladies but more generally about influencing people).
- badclient 15y ago
  As someone who has met a few of the people from The Game, I can tell you it's mostly crapware with very little to learn from. The basic flaw with The Game(and most of the games of the characters in it) is that they take this to such extreme that instead of becoming charming and attractive, you become a paranoid insecure jerk. That said, The Game has helped motivate many to take action in a critical area of their life.
  - Helianthus 15y ago
    I always refer to it as a 'cargo cult' theory of human interaction
    - skore 15y ago
      I always wondered what bothered me about these 'The Game' approaches to "successfully influence people" and I think you really nailed it down. OF COURSE people will find it easier to agree with you if they have agreed with you before - that should be obvious. The question is - what do you have to do to get that? 'The Game' seems to say - "well, anything that is necessary, of course", as though aping people into nodding was some kind of accomplishment and as though that accomplishment in itself was admirable and healthy. I'd rather have people actually agree with me in small things that we both care about and then be happy to agree with me big time. If you need to bullshit, "warm up" or in some other ways mislead people (and yes, that includes "Weather is great, isn't it?" when you don't really care about the weather), you are building a pile of very tiny lies to make the jump to the big lie less noticeable. At some point, you will just cross the bullshit horizon, the point at which MOSTLY what you do is lie to and trick people - and have fun with your empty soul while you're at it. It is indeed a cargo cult - you do achieve things with it, but then you sit there in your wooden mock-up flight control tower next to your empty dirt runway wearing your headphones made of straws and wonder why you never seem to actually be happy.
      - temphn 15y ago
        But it's not a cargo cult if it works, or even partially works.
abbasmehdi 15y ago
Oh my God, you've just made "Can you hear me?" the most commonly used pick-up line in the south bay. ;)
- badclient 15y ago
  Oh wow, sad that I could actually see that happening going by the gullible nature of the community. I'm pretty confident though that by the time its gone through the community's marketing machine, it will turn into some creepy move, available on DVD for $1,000. Alas I got much out of the Bay Area scene back in the day so as long as the secret stays away from NYC I'm good :)
keiferski 15y ago
Reminds me of a scene in Boiler Room: Ask him questions. Ask him rhetorical questions. It doesn't matter, just get a 'yes' out of him. If you were drowning and I threw you a life jacket, would you grab it? Yes. Good. Pick up 200 shares. I won't let you down. Ask him if he wants to see 30-40% returns. What's he gonna say, 'no, I don't want to see those returns'? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izOIOvguncU&feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izOIOvguncU&feature=relat... (possibly nsfw, language)
- ims 15y ago
  If you liked this movie, may I suggest the David Mamet movie that inspired it: Glengarry Glen Ross (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104348/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104348/). Brilliant (but NSFW, language) "Always Be Closing" scene to give you a feel for it: www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-AXTx4PcKI
shin_lao 15y ago
It's a foot in the door, you obtain a little something to obtain much more afterward. It's because we tend to not contradict ourselves and act the way we acted, because doing otherwise would be irrational, right? :D "I've started to talk to this stranger, there is no reason I stop now". Of course there must be a ground for agreement in the first place, you cannot force someone to do something he absolutely doesn't want to do with this technique.

frisco 15y ago

The title should be cropped to, "Lesser Known Ways to Persuade People".

Natsu 15y ago

> Upsell a product that cost 60% less > The time-tested 60×60 rule says that your customers will buy an upsell 60 percent of the time for up to 60% of the original purchase price. These two statements are not the same... Or was this to be an example of #17? ("87% of people believe everything if there’s a percentage in it")

Helianthus 15y ago

Eww. Pop psychology. Persuading people is a lot easier if you look at it as mutually trying to make the best decision--to be persuaded as much as to persuade--instead of some stupid gimmicky power grab. "I felt so powerful because I got someone to agree with me!" Feel powerful when you're right, feel powerful when you're wrong and can admit it, but feeling powerful because someone else thinks you're right is folly.

badclient 15y ago
Someone can feel powerful because they got someone to agree with them and because they believe they are right. As a salesman, you don't get compensated for "feeling right". Welcome to the real world. Persuading people is a lot easier if you look at it as mutually trying to make the best decision Depending on your definition of "gimmick", the above may also be considered a gimmick.

Udo 15y ago

> Guadagno & Cialdini research (2002) showed that men seem more responsive to email because it bypasses their competitive tendencies. Women, however, may respond better in face-to-face encounters because they are more ‘relationship-minded’ Yawn. Maybe we just don't want to deal with salespeople but instead judge the product on our own without being harassed. How is that supposed to be competitive? Oh, I forgot, the self-fulfilling world of pop psychology, brought to you by eternal twin slogans "It's true if you think it's true" and "You can convert any social belief into a universal truth by citing agenda-driven studies". The greatest Jedi mind trick is convincing people that your Jedi mind trick actually works.

greyish_water 15y ago
Maybe we just don't want to deal with salespeople but instead judge the product on our own without being harassed. It astonishes me that you're able to describe interactions with salespeople as being "harassed" yet can't understand how it could be construed as competitive. (Not that the study you're dismissing has anything to do with salespeople... You'd be better off attacking the tenuous and speculative suggestion that author has made based on a reading that study rather than attempting to nuke the proverbial site from orbit with such a monumentally tired argument as "I don't believe it so it can't possibly be true".)
- Udo 15y ago
  > It astonishes me that you're able to describe interactions with salespeople as being "harassed" yet can't understand how it could be construed as competitive. You make it sound like I'm drooling into a cup. So the competitiveness hypothesis resonates with you personally? Don't just imply that I'm stupid, explain to me what the competition actually is, and why I am automatically triggered into participating just because I have a penis. > You'd be better off attacking the tenuous and speculative suggestion that author has made based on a reading that study rather than attempting to nuke the proverbial site from orbit with such a monumentally tired argument as "I don't believe it so it can't possibly be true" I'm straining to see how this rhetoric can come from someone who is - in their own words - "just here for the polite and friendly atmosphere". However, I think I am attacking a piece of tenuous and speculative suggestion the author has made. I get that you disagree, I just don't get your specific objection.

Alex3917 15y ago

For what it's worth, most of these examples (and more) are in Cialdini's book Influence: http://www.amazon.com/Influence-Psychology-Persuasion-Business-Essentials/dp/006124189X http://www.amazon.com/Influence-Psychology-Persuasion-Busine...

peeplaja 15y ago
Actually they're not. I specifically point out in the beginning of the article that I don't cover stuff from Cialdini's Influence (as it's been over covered). Who hasn't read it yet, definitely should.
- Alex3917 15y ago
  Ah ok. I just skimmed over this and assumed they were from Cialdini, because I have heard most of them before.

Riverbed 15y ago

And there's even a reference in here to the HN topic of the day - swearing in front of an audience! > 2. Swearing can help influence an audience. Light swearing, that is. (Go overboard and lose all credibility.)

pbhjpbhj 15y ago
The example is saying "damn"! Is that really considered swearing?
- gujk 15y ago
  It is sad that we have lost the fine and colorful distinctions between swearing, blaspheming, cursing, and vulgarity.
epaga 15y ago
I love how his site says "Sign up for my dang RSS feed"...he's trying to follow his own advice, though dang is arguably a VERY light swear.

pavel_lishin 15y ago

"13 things you can do right now to increase your conversion rate. #1: block the content." http://i.imgur.com/GTgzM.png http://i.imgur.com/GTgzM.png

bomatson 15y ago
hahahah not too persuasive, huh?
peeplaja 15y ago
Conversion is action (not reading), so actually this works well. While I don't like popups as much as the next guy, its ridiculously effective. 80% of opt-ins come via popup (all double opt-in).

wallflower 15y ago

One of the best ways to influence people is to ask someone to do a favor for you. Especially if the person you are asking has more perceived power. It is called the "Ben Franklin Effect" Teenage girl (to teenage guy): "Can you help me with my homework?" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Franklin_effect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Franklin_effect

omarchowdhury 15y ago
I think in your example case, the teenage guy would be helping for different reasons.

cr4zy 15y ago

Being confident and not one sided is a hard place for me to get sometimes. But being positive does help with that :)

Tloewald 15y ago

My wife is the Guadagno in Guadagno and Cialdini and if the reporting of her findings is any guide, ignore the rest of the article. Her findings were that women will not respond well to email unless there's an existing relationship. Men will respond better to email if there's an existing negative relationship, but it otherwise makes no difference. The error is forgivable if the writer only read the title of the article.

nandemo 15y ago
I hope your wife doesn't send you a lot of emails.

skeletonjelly 15y ago

How to get a post noticed on HN this week: don't swear, but mention swearing.