Influencing Others - Ron Hudson

Social Influence Gone Bad

After watching the video, did you say to yourself, “I would’ve stood my ground and continued giving the correct answer.” If you said that to yourself, or something similar, I’m not surprised. I’ve heard similar statements from others that have seen or heard me describe the scenario in the video. I certainly told myself with absolute certainty that’s what I would have done. The reason I would’ve done so, and I’m assuming your reason’s the same, is I wouldn’t lie. In particular, it is due to the fact that the scenario is based on such a trivial circumstance.

But, what about a circumstance that isn’t trivial? How about one that pertains to our health and well-being? Stick with me here.
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Perceptual Persuasion Strategy: NLP Reframing

Hi, Ron Hudson here! Welcome back to the Immediate Influence Blog. It’s been quite a while since my last post. In fact, I’ve gone almost 30 days without posting anything. But, here I am today to reveal a powerful strategy of influence known as Reframing. Reframing enables you to alter, shift, or change an individual’s and/or audience’s perceptions about an experience, idea, political view, product, etc.

Last week, a friend of mine who serves in our country’s military sent me an email of which you are about to read a portion now. After reading this portion of the email, I guarantee you will walk away understanding the power of Reframing. Ready?

“Luke AFB is west of Phoenix and is rapidly being surrounded by civilization that complains about the noise from the base and its planes, forgetting that it was there long before they were. A certain lieutenant colonel at Luke AFB deserves a big pat on the back. Apparently, an individual who lives somewhere near Luke AFB wrote the local paper complaining about a group of F-16s that disturbed his/her day at the mall.”

The complaint:

“Question of the day for Luke Air Force Base:

Whom do we thank for the morning air show? Last Wednesday, at precisely 9:11 A.M., a tight formation of four F-16 jets made a low pass over Arrowhead Mall, continuing west over Bell Road at approximately 500 feet. Imagine our good fortune! Do the Tom Cruise wannabes feel we need this wake-up call, or were they trying to impress the cashiers at Mervyns early bird special?

Any response would be appreciated.”

Name withheld

-end of complaint

The response:

“Regarding ‘A wake-up call from Luke’s jets’ on June 15, at precisely 9:12 a.m., a perfectly timed four-ship fly by of F-16s from the 63rd Fighter Squadron at Luke Air Force Base flew over the grave of Capt. Jeremy Fresques. Capt. Freques was an Air Force officer who was previously stationed at Luke Air Force Base and was killed in Iraq on May 30, Memorial Day.

At 9 a.m. on June 15, his family and friends gathered at Sunland Memorial Park in Sun City to mourn the loss of a husband, son and friend. Based on the letter writer’s recount of the fly by, and because of the jet noise, I’m sure you didn’t hear the 21-gun salute, the playing of taps, or my words to the widow and parents of Capt. Fresques as I gave them their son’s flag on behalf of the President of the United States and all the veterans and servicemen and women who understand the sacrifices they have endured…

A four-ship fly by is a display of respect the Air Force gives to those who give their lives in defense of freedom. We are professional aviators and take our jobs seriously, and on June 15 what the letter writer witnessed was four officers lining up to pay their ultimate respects.

The letter writer asks, ‘Whom do we thank for the morning air show? The 56th Fighter Wing will make the call for you, and forward your thanks to the widow and parents of Capt. Fresques, and thank them for you, for it was in their honor that my pilots flew the most honorable formation of their lives.”

Lt. Col. Grant L. Rosensteel, Jr.

USAF

-end of response

I imagine that it’s safe to assume that the complainant’s perception of that event was completely altered. Wouldn’t you agree? I’m also willing to make a second assumption about the emotional state of the complainant. I’m guessing that he/she went from indignant sarcasm to embarrassed, humbled, and sad for Capt. Fresques wife and parents. What emotions did you experience right after reading the complaint? How quickly did the response cause a shift in your emotions? That’s the power of Reframing.

In closing, it’s difficult to know all of what is going on in many situations that may cause you to feel angry, sad, frustrated, etc., so do yourself a favor in the future and ask yourself these simple questions: How do I feel about being ___ about this? What else might be going on here that I’m totally unaware of now? In asking those questions, you’ll notice the intensity of your emotion(s) lessen, and you’ll be able to handle tense situations much better. Will you do that for yourself?

One more thing. I encourage you to invest time today to let our servicemen and women know how grateful you are for their willingness to die for our freedom.

May God bless the military forces of these United States! Thank you all.

With gratitude and respect,

Ron

A restaurant’s artful use of influence that surprised and delighted me

“Aged and hand–cut especially for Friday’s, half a pound of one of the most flavorful, popular steaks around, expertly seasoned and fire–grilled to your order. Then glazed and served with our Jack Daniel’s glaze and creamy mashed potatoes.”

“Honey, I’m ordering the Jack Daniel’s Flat Iron Works entree! It looks delicious!” After reading the same description, my wife says, “Order that for me too.” Mouth watering, I quickly picked up our cordless phone and began dialing the number listed on the TGI Friday’s website. Seconds later, I found myself impressed by how professional and courteous the young lady was that answered the phone. After learning that I wanted to place a carryout order, she placed me on hold. About a minute or so later, a young lady name Miriam picked up and began interacting with me. Miriam, was personable, cheerful, and eager to help me!

You might be wondering, “Where is the artful use of influence that surprised and delighted you?” The incredible reality of influence is, it frequently effects us without our conscious awareness. In this particular situation, I found myself liking both of the TGI Friday’s employees right away. What’s amazing is I didn’t realize the specific tool of influence that had started working on me until I sat down to write this post. No, it wasn’t hunger! It was what Dr. Robert Cialdini labeled as “Liking” in his best-selling book, “Influence: The New Psychology of Modern Persuasion.”

I’ve owned that book since 1991. I’ve read it countless times. And, I’ve even completed an advanced training course with six tapes and workbook about the principles Dr. Cialdini revealed in the book. Hopefully, you recognize that the reason I’m divulging all that info is not to impress you, but to impress upon you that regardless of my extensive study and utilization of the principles of influence, they still have an impact on me. The main reason for this is that I go into many situations knowing what I want. What do I mean? I knew full well what I wanted from TGI Friday’s. I wanted to be treated courteously, cheerfully, and in a timely manner. I also wanted a delicious meal. With the exception of my steak not being cooked exactly the way I wanted it, the folks at TGI Friday’s located at 61st & Memorial in Tulsa, OK, delivered on all fronts.

Wait a minute! Now, let me tell you how they surprised and delighted me. After I arrived at the restaurant, Miriam greeted me with the same cheerful and eager-to-help attitude. Then she went the extra mile by offering me a drink while I waited for her to get my food and change. By the way, I turned down the drink. Anyway, when Miriam returned with my bag of piping hot food, she also handed back the Buy One, Get One Free Jack Daniel’s entree coupon I was given for my birthday with the manager’s approval. I remember asking her, “You’re giving the coupon back?” Miriam cheerfully said,”Yes, I am! You can use it again until the April 30th expiration date. Isn’t that cool?” I said, “Yes, that’s very cool!” I grabbed the bag food and gave her a tip.

Do you think I used the coupon again before the expiration date? Absolutely!

I’m curious. Can you identify all of the six principles of influence that occurred during my experience with TGI Friday’s staff? If you’re a master of influence, it should be easy for you. Please write your answer in the comment section below.

I also highly recommend that you sign into that Twitter Remote thingy to the right over there. You see it? It’s a great way for you to be seen (and discovered) by the other, almost *1,900 folks who visit my blog each month. I’m so grateful to know that you and many other people enjoy my blog. Have a great weekend!

To your success,

Ron

*The number denotes an approximation of the average number of unique visitors to this blog during January 1, 2009 – April 30, 2009. The exact total number of unique visitors is 7,575. Thank you so very much for being one of those visitors!

Old School Marketing Tactics that Influence Buying Decisions

Today we have access to all types of incredible technologies that can improve our marketing performance. Each technology offers varying benefits to us, the end user. The technologies that have captured our attention, whether we are marketing to consumers or businesses, involve social media. One of the main reasons is that social media allows us to easily reach both audiences– locally and globally.

However, I encourage you to remember the power of a simple letter or post card to easily reach people, specifically your target audience, in your own backyard or across the globe. mail Yes, I’m talking about good old fashion, direct mail. Direct mail can be used to generate leads/inquiries, sales or repeat sales. For example, I’ll use a retailer that has been around for more years than I can remember – Sears. As a result of being a Sears credit card customer, I continually noticed their successful execution of the best marketing techniques in existence today.

One of the techniques/tactics Sears continually uses to entice people to buy items is the offering of name brand premiums. This is also known as, “Gift With Purchase.” Additionally, they use premiums to motivate people to buy more during a particular transaction.

Sears has successfully offered special discounts, prizes, or gifts to coax me into making a purchase. They have also used discounts with graduated percentages based on the size of a transaction. Yet another technique/tactic Sears has used is adding expiration dates to “Gift With Purchase” deals in an effort to create a sense of urgency.

Each on of these techniques/tactics has worked on me, moreover millions of others, which means if you implement them properly, you’ll get a similar or better result. The bottom line is making sure that your marketing efforts include many different approaches. Relying on only one marketing effort can be detrimental to the long-term success of your enterprise.

Think about it for moment.

Let’s pretend you have spent all your time marketing yourself with social media tools in the last twelve months. Keep playing along with me. Just suppose, when you wake up in the morning, you decide to watch the morning news and, to your dismay, your favorite reporter says, “Facebook, twitter, and Linkedin have been infected by one of those crazy viruses and will be inaccessible for one month.” What would you do?

Whether or not you think that will ever happen, I implore you to implement various marketing activities to generate traffic, bring in leads/inquiries, convert sales, and win repeat business.

How to Influence A Buying Decision – A Farmer’s Story

Welcome back! This post is a follow up to my previous post, “10 Powerful Offers that Influence Buyers Decisions in Your Favor.” However, as you can see, I haven’t provided another list of offers, but a story. The reason is that stories oft times convey messages much faster than other forms of communication. By the way, this particular story is a favorite amongst marketing consultants. Ready? Read.

Once upon a time, a father went shopping for a pony to buy for his daughter. After looking at a few dozen ponies, the man’s decision was almost made. It had come down to a choice between two ponies. They were quite similar, in fact, the price was the same. He decided to take another look so he could make a final decision.

The first farmer was eagerly attempting to sell his pony and went on and on about how gentle and cute his pony was, but the father didn’t decide. The second farmer was different in his approach. He didn’t brag about the pony, he simply said…

Farmer and a pony “Sir, I’m certain your daughter will love this pony so here’s what I’ll do: Give me a check, and I’ll hold it for 30 days. I’ll bring you a saddle, a bridle, the pony and enough hay for 30 days. If your daughter decides to keep the pony, let me know at the end of the 30 days, and I’ll cash the check. Otherwise, I’ll give you back your check, pick up the pony and even clean up where he’s been.”

Which farmer do you think sold their pony?

Can you see that if you eliminate the risk of transacting business with you, it will powerfully instill confidence in buyers?

Additionally, the farmer delivered value far beyond what the father anticipated–or even imagined. How much more value can you deliver than buyers anticipate, or even imagine?

I’m curious. Have you had experiences similar to the father in the story that caused you to make a purchasing decision? Which part of the experience impacted your decision most? Why? If you truly have something that will benefit other readers, please write your comments below. Thanks!

Warmly,

Ron

10 Powerful Offers that Influence Buyers Decisions in Your Favor

Today I, like you, will see or hear a number of commercials for a plethora of products and services. Naturally, we’ll ignore a significant amount of the commercials and continue focusing on whatever activity is a priority in the moment. That is, until one of the commercials is able to convey a message similar to the one at end of the following video.

One of my favorite copywriter’s of all time is Brian Keith Voiles. Brian is one of the most honest, caring, talented, and gifted people I’ve ever met in my life. During the time that I learned copywriting from him, he absolutely shocked me. You see, he taught me that the most powerful part of a salesletter (a commercial in print) isn’t the headline but the offer. Anyway, I was inclined to believe him for two reasons. The first reason was his impressive list of clients. The second reason was his results!

Before, during, and after you write any salesletter that you truly want to increase the size of your bank account review the following short list:

1. Free Trial – Simply put, this offer means allowing someone to try out your product free for a specific period of time. The common periods are 10, 15, or 30 days or more. The power of this offer lies in it’s removal of risk from the transaction for your prospect.

2. Bill Me Later – This is a popular offer amongst magazine and newspaper publishers. The customers make a decision to subscribe now at a discounted price – but are billed after several issues have been mailed. How many publishers have induced you to subscribe with that offer?

3. Free Gift – Offering customers, who are considering your product or service, a free gift can be all the incentive needed for them to buy. However, allowing them to keep that gift, even if they return the product, will typically cause a dramatic increase in sales. Will people take advantage? Yes. Why do it? Tests have proven that the significant increase in sales outweighs the number of returns.

4. Money-Back Guarantee – Generally, people feel slightly uncertain about making purchasing decisions. Therefore, it is important to eliminate that feeling by offering to give a full refund for products after they are returned. Again, the sales increases for companies offering Money-Back Guarantees far surpass the numbers of returns.

5. Double-Your-Money-Back-Guarantee – Our research shows that most people won’t return products, so companies will often dramatize their offer for low priced items this way.

6. Long-Term-Guarantee – When a company is confident that their product or service will deliver, they will offer guarantees that extend beyond the common 30- or 60-day guarantee. They will offer customers a one-year, multi-year, or lifetime guarantee.

7. Early-Bird Discount – This offer motivates customers to order fast and sometimes more of a product. A word of advice. Make the discount a real discount.

8. Price Increase Announcement – It’s amazing how few companies communicate with their existing customers prior to increasing their prices. This offer can endear customers to a company because they feel important when given such an opportunity. In turn, they will buy the company’s products and oftentimes buy more than needed. Additionally, they tell their family, friends, and co-workers.

9. No Contract, Cancel Anytime – Often used by businesses offering continuity type programs, this offers customers right to use a product (i.e., perishable items) or service for as long as they want without any commitment. Fitness clubs are one type of business that offer members this opportunity because a small segment of our society will continue using the facility for more than 90 days. This way, the fitness club avoids chancing members who will sign a year long agreement, but stop paying their bill after 90 days.

10. Free Demonstration – This works quite well for all types of products and services because the customer convinces himself that a product or service is right for him. Needless to say, once a customer has convinced himself a product or service will work for him, he will buy that product or service rather quickly.

There are many types of offers to make to prospective/existing customers to influence their buying decision in your favor. I thought this short list would be helpful to you in making that happen for your business. Thanks for reading!

With your success in mind,

Ron

Conformity: The Influence of Social Media?

There I was sitting at my desk, back straight, shoulders slightly forward, rubbing my beard with my hand, and contemplating what I would write about when it dawned on me! “Write about conformity aka Social Proof as it relates to Social Media,” I said to myself. Then I questioned whether or not YouTube had a video that would help demonstrate the power of groups to influence behavior. After a few minutes of searching, I discovered the following video to illustrate the topic of this post. Go ahead and click on the play button now, please.

Welcome back! Are we so easily influenced nowadays? I’ll answered that in another post with a more recent video. Right now, I want to quickly answer the question I posed in the title of my post.

Yes! Yes, we have conformed to the influence of social media! However, the reasons that we have conformed are that we are fulfilling our basic human needs of 1) connecting with others 2) a sense of accomplishment from having influential and large numbers of connections, and 3) a feeling of uniqueness because of the diverseness of people with whom we are are connected.

Think about it. Millions of people are utilizing social networking sites right now to communicate with family, friends, customers, and clients in an effort to sustain and improve that connection. Fifteen years ago, I don’t think this behavior was as prevalent as it is now. Why? Although America Online (AOL), Compuserve, and others were thriving back then, they were charging members a monthly fee to use similar functions that, today, Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin offer for free. Therefore, why wouldn’t we give in to the attraction of instantly connecting with people around the globe?

These top three social networking sites induce reciprocation with the force of water exploding out of a fire hydrant into the mouth of a thirsty man by offering us the ability to meet some of our basic human needs. In spite of that reality, please avoid neglecting the most intimate relationships you have in order to spend more time connecting with others on social networking sites. Why did I make that appeal? The reason is quite frequently, I hear Tony Robbins’ voice in my head saying something like, “People want to experience love, but they often settle for connection.”

You’re probably asking, “Why would someone do that?” A loving relationship, while incredibly rewarding, can also be extremely painful. That’s why some people will settle for casual and friendly relationships. Even worse are the people who would rather love, and connect with, their pets than real people. Don’t get me wrong I love Samson, our Jack Russell Terrier but the most phenomenal experiences of my life have come from my loving relationships with my wife, children, family, and friends. I am reminded of a phrase that dates back to the seventeenth century, which reads, “No man (or woman) is an island.” Stated differently, no man (or woman) is meant to be alone. I have definitely conformed to that influence. Will you?