Influence: Science and Practice by Robert Cialdini
BOOK REVIEWS BY BINOD
BINOD’S RATING: 8/10Life is hectic.
We cannot analyze every decision we need to make. So we depend on shortcuts like "if everybody thinks it's good, then it must be good". Those shortcuts are quite helpful and most of the time they work.
But they are occasionally exploited. This book is about how people use our mental shortcuts to get us to say "YES". You'll learn the six universal principles, how to use them to become a skilled persuader—and how to defend yourself against them.
“The aim is to get someone to want to buy quickly, without thinking too much about it.”
Key points
Our markets thrive on mass consumption of products and services that are not essentials, but still, they land up in our homes. Why are we often unable to fight the temptation to buy something we have no use of? How exactly do we fall for these marketing gimmicks?
This book has the answer.
Cialdini repeatedly uses the term ‘click, whirr’, which explains our behavior patterns when we encounter a situation for which we have a ‘programmed reaction’.
He kicks off with the fascinating Contrast Principle. On spending a high amount on an expensive thing, we are very likely to spend money on something less expensive than the initial product, but which is still expensive enough if compared to its alternatives in the market. For example, we may splurge on alloy rims if we have spent a fair deal on the car. The more we spend on our suit, the more we are likely to spend on shoes and tie. etc.
The six other important principles that marketing agents employ to get our assent are Reciprocation, Commitment and Consistency, Social Proof, Authority, Liking, and Scarcity.
1)Reciprocation –
People tend to return a favor. Thus, the pervasiveness of free samples in marketing. If someone tries to sell you something and you pass (say $5 of $1 raffle tickets), they’ll try and sell you something less that you’ll end up buying because you feel bad (1 $1 raffle ticket).
2) Commitment and Consistency -
The foot-in-the-door technique. Ask a person to make a small commitment, which manipulates their self-image. Later, they’ll be more likely to comply with more and larger requests that are consistent with this image. Written commitments are especially effective.
For example, in car sales, suddenly raising the price at the last moment works because the buyer has already decided to buy.
During the Korean war, the Chinese got American POWs to make public commitments of various things. Then they made those commitments even more public, which the US soldiers had to stand by to be consistent. That consistency then led the POWs down a path of minor forms of collaboration – without them really thinking about it as such. Result? Fantastic propaganda. Also, the Chinese were highly effective in getting Americans to inform on one another, in striking contrast to the behavior of American POWs in World War II. Escape plans were quickly uncovered, and the escape attempts themselves always unsuccessful.
“A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.”
3)Social Proof –
People will do things that they see other people are doing.
For example, in one experiment, one or more confederates would look up into the sky; bystanders would then look up into the sky to see what they were seeing. At one point this experiment aborted, as so many people were looking up that they stopped traffic.
Introverted preschoolers who saw introverted kids become social in a movie were more inclined to go play after watching the movie.
Cults are formed due to this. People follow the crowd because they believe in the “wisdom” of the crowd.
4) Authority –
People will tend to obey authority figures, even if they are asked to do unreasonable acts. A person's title, clothes, and trappings (status symbols) affect their perceived authority.
The Milgram experiments involved shock therapy and people obeyed a guy in a lab coat and inflicted pain on another human being.
A waiter who advises against a more expensive item early in the meal will gain the trust of everyone at the table, and then he can suggest more expensive items and more items through the course of the meal.
A jaywalker is more likely to be followed by bystanders when the jay walker wears a suit and tie than when he wears regular street clothes.
5) Liking –
People are easily persuaded by other people that they like.
Cialdini cites the marketing of Tupperware in what might now be called viral marketing. People were more likely to buy if they liked the person selling it to them even though they didn’t need the items!
6)Scarcity –
Perceived scarcity will generate demand.
For example, saying offers are available for a "limited time only" encourages sales.
A cookie is more attractive if there are two of them than if there are 10 of them.
Or how the author's brother sold cars while in school. He advertised a car and had three prospective buyers make appointments to see the car at the same time. This created intense competition due to scarcity. The buyers failed to realize that the competition's increased pressure had nothing to do with the merits of the car.
Or the sales tactic used by toy sellers, with artificially created scarcity. Parents promise their children a favored toy for Christmas. Supply of the toy is deliberately reduced by the manufacturers from toy stores before Christmas, so parents end up buying a substitute toy. Later, after the Christmas season, children remind their parents of their promise. So, parents have to return to the stores and buy the originally promised toy!
The trick is that as the world gets more complex, these 6 things also provide us with social shortcuts, to function with minimal effort. But this means we have to be vigilant - to make sure we are not being taken advantage of. Cialdini notes that we often get that funny feeling in the pit of our stomach when we are being manipulated against our will, and he suggests using that feeling/intuition to our advantage - to recognize when we are at risk.
“After all, the higher you climb, the more your success depends on making other people successful. By definition, that’s what coaches do.”
What rocked
The essence of his research has been assembled in 7 chapters. Each chapter sets out case studies, social experiments, research and psychological analysis of human behavior, different methods by which we are convinced to do or not do a certain thing, etc.
He provides a multitude of great examples, which also range widely from Chinese communist interrogations to fraternity hazings, from selling cars to child-rearing, from religion to politics, and much more.
It's got some neat tricks to escape from being pressured into buying stuff or contributing to charities you don't like. It will teach you how to protect yourself against exploitations of your mental shortcuts without giving them up.
It has many tips and tricks to coax customers, clients and friends into complying with your wishes.
What sucked
One legendary incident which is almost de rigeur in any book on pop psychology is the Kitty Genovese murder in NY. What is disappointing is that his fifth edition continues his inaccurate presentation of the Catherine Genovese myth despite that it has been widely discredited. The truth was simply that there were only a few witnesses, two neighbors called police and she died in the arms of a third. Just another myth that the author should have been aware of, as the truth has been in the public record for decades.
He declares that "we should be willing to use boycott, threat, confrontation, censure, tirade, nearly anything to retaliate" to those exploiting our natural triggers to "short cut" the massive amounts of information presented to us. For example, dismissing any show that uses fake laughter, not giving any tips to bartenders who "salt" their tip jar and the like. This is taking it too far.
It’s possible he wrote this book for the consumer, so they understood how they are being manipulated and how to overcome it. The irony is, he explains exactly how these auto-responses work and therefore this book has become quite popular among marketers and salesmen and other “compliance professionals”!
The book was written in 1984 so obviously, it doesn't take into account our social media, instant access online world. Which is a shame, as I’d loved to have read Cialdini’s views, experiments, examples and conclusions on areas like click-bait, memes, phishing, the online radicalization of lone actors, etc.
Cialdini likes to use "Click, whirr" throughout, repetitively. The “click” meaning - activation/trigger and “whirr” meaning - reaction/sequence of behaviors. This is a very weird way to describe behavior and it would make more sense and thus a smoother read if he'd just written "trigger/reaction".
Conclusion
It is extremely rare to find a book on psychology that is this insightful and credible and at the same time a fast-paced, entertaining read. Influence is such a book and now you will realize that you’ve been manipulated so many times before and how it was done. Also, most of your past failures at influencing people will make sense now.
But more rewardingly, you will now know how easy it is not to be exploited. And become influential yourself.