Use ‘pre-suasion’ to positively influence customer decisions

‘Pre-suasion’ is the art of capturing and channelling attention to move people in your direction so that they are more willing to agree with your idea or offer before they encounter it!

In your business, how often have you used pre-suasion to influence a customer decision so that the outcome is favourable?

Remember, it’s much harder to change someone’s mind once they have made their decision. The key to persuading someone to decide in your favour is to prepare the ground before you present your offer. You need to set the scene.

Professor Robert Cialdini, an eminent social psychologist, describes this in his must-read book, Pre-suasion – A Revolutionary Way to Influence and Persuade:

• Know how to set the stage and get the desired result.
• Pre-suasion – the process of moving people in your direction to get them to be more willing to give assent to a process or idea before they even encounter it.

Cialdini believes that ‘the highest achievers spend more time crafting what they do and say before making the request.’

For example, no one really wants to stop for a street survey, do they? So how do you drive survey responses from 29% of those asked up to 77%? You put pre-suasion to work!

Ask a question which directs their attention and focus to something that is relevant to what you want. In this case, when people were first asked, “Are you a helpful person?” they generally responded positively. And then, when asked if they would fill out a brief survey, 77.3% said yes.

Asking a ‘helpful’ question first caused a small shift in attention, giving them a channel of focus, which made people more likely to say yes to the survey.

The success of this survey is a perfect example of pre-suasion – moving people in your direction BEFORE you even ask what you want to ask.

How can you use this example in your business? Imagine if you could increase the percentage jump in your favour from 29% to 77% – it’s worth a try, don’t you think?