About the book

What a great book! Filled with insights, deep understanding of human behavior and wealth of data. I suggest that everybody should read this.

Having said that I dislike the idea that the book sees (potential) customers as victims ”move its victims to fulfil their agreements and to engage in further such agreements.”

What are the key learnings?

Key learning of the book is that “all the weapons of influence discussed in this book work better under some conditions than under others. If we are to defend ourselves adequately against any such weapon, it is vital that we know its optimal operating conditions in order to recognize when we are most vulnerable to its influence.”

Key learning is also that “internal consistency is a hallmark of logic and intellectual strength, while its lack characterizes the intellectually scattered and limited among us. Emerson, but in the popular version of what he had said. Actually he wrote, “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.”

Key learning: ““The enemy is the simple state of uncertainty. Social proof – bystander effect (one vs. three persons) and uncertainty (without a glue one seeks advise from the behaviour of others – while everybody is doing so…:-)”

Key learning: FEW PEOPLE WOULD BE SURPRISED TO LEARN THAT, AS A RULE, we most prefer to say yes to the requests of someone we know and like. The clearest illustration I know of the professional exploitation of the liking rule is the Tupperware party, which I consider the quintessential American compliance setting.

Key Learning: “The joy is not in experiencing a scarce commodity but in possessing it.”

WEAPONS OF INFLUENCE 

Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler. —ALBERT EINSTEIN

WEAPONS OF INFLUENCE:

– ”Because” and then, adding nothing new (Xerox)

– The “expensive = good” stereotype (Turquoise)

– The contrast principle is virtually undetectable. (Sell the expensive suit first)

Provide a reason and use the word BECAUSE: Harvard social psychologist Ellen Langer demonstrated “a well-known principle of human behavior says that when we ask someone to do us a favor we will be more successful if we provide a reason. People simply like to have reasons for what they do.” For example: “Excuse me, I have five pages. May I use the Xerox machine because I have to make some copies? The result was that once again nearly all (93 percent) agreed, even though no real reason, no new information, was added to justify their compliance.”

RECIPROCATION The Old Give and Take… and Take

“The rule for reciprocation. The rule says that we should try to repay, in kind, what another person has provided us. We are human because our ancestors learned to share their food and their skills in an honored network of obligation,” 

“How does liking for a person affects the tendency to comply with that person’s request? People are more willing to do a favor for someone they like. People we might ordinarily dislike can greatly increase the chance that we will do what they wish merely by providing us with a small favor prior to their requests. Another person can trigger a feeling of indebtedness by doing us an uninvited favor.”

For example: “Only after the Krishna member has thus brought the force of the reciprocation rule to bear on the situation is the target asked to provide a contribution to the Society. Of course, the power of reciprocity can be found in the merchandising field as well, for example the “free sample.” The beauty of the free sample, however, is that it is also a gift and, as such, can engage the reciprocity rule.”

“Another consequence of the rule, however, is an obligation to make a concession to someone who has made a concession to us. The reciprocation rule brings about mutual concession in two ways. 

– The first is obvious. It pressures the recipient of an already-made concession to respond in kind. 

– The second, while not so obvious, is pivotally important. Just as in the case of favors, gifts, or aid, the obligation to reciprocate a concession encourages the creation of socially desirable arrangements by ensuring that anyone seeking to start such an arrangement will not be exploited.”

Large-request-then-smaller-request: First to make a larger request of me, one that I will most likely turn down. Then, after I have refused, you would make the smaller request that you were really interested in all along. Provided that you have structured your requests skillfully, I should view your second request as a concession to me and should feel inclined to respond with a concession of my own, the only one I would have immediately open to me—compliance with your second request.”

Case: “By presenting the zoo trip as a retreat from our initial request, our success rate increased dramatically. Three times as many of the students approached in this manner volunteered to serve as zoo chaperons.” 

Case: “Labor negotiators, for instance, often use the tactic of beginning with extreme demands that they do not actually expect to win but from which they can retreat in a series of seeming concessions designed to draw real concessions from the opposing side. Rejection-then-retreat technique shows that if the first set of demands is so extreme as to be seen as unreasonable, the tactic backfires.

 “A important goal was to obtain from prospects the names of referrals. The percentage of successful door-to-door sales increases impressively when the sales operator is able to mention the name of a familiar person who “recommended” the sales visit.”

Rules:

– The rule for reciprocation. The rule says that we should try to repay, in kind, what another person has provided us.

– The rejection-then-retreat technique—its incorporation of the reciprocity rule.

– This larger-then-smaller-request strategy is effective for a pair of other reasons as well. 

Case: “The tendency of a man to spend more money on a sweater following his purchase of a suit than before: After being exposed to the price of the large item, the price of the less expensive one appears smaller by comparison. In the same way, the larger-then-smaller-request procedure makes use of the contrast principle by making the smaller request look even smaller by comparison with the larger one. If I want you to lend me five dollars, I can make it seem like a smaller request by first asking you to lend me ten dollars.”

Case Watergate: In the context of Liddy’s initial extreme requests, it seems that “a quarter of a million dollars” had come to be “a little something” to be left as a return concession. ‘I have a plan to burglarize and wiretap Larry O’Brien’s office,’ we might have rejected the idea out of hand. Instead he came to us with his elaborate call-girl/ kidnapping/ mugging/ sabotage/ wiretapping scheme…. He had asked for the whole loaf when he was quite content to settle for half or even a quarter.” 

The clearest utilization of this aspect of the larger-then-smaller-request sequence occurs in the retail-store sales practice of “talking the top of the line.” Here the prospect is invariably shown the deluxe model first. If the customer buys, there is frosting on the store’s cake. However, if the customer declines, the salesperson effectively counteroffers with a more reasonably priced model.

Case Brunswick: During the first week, customers… were shown the low end of the line… and then encouraged to consider more expensive models—the traditional trading-up approach…. The average table sale that week was $ 550…. However, during the second week, customers… were led instantly to a $ 3,000 table, regardless of what they wanted to see… and then allowed to shop the rest of the line, in declining order of price and quality. The result of selling down was an average sale of over $ 1,000.

How to say NO? But how does one go about neutralizing the effect of a social rule like that for reciprocation? It seems too widespread to escape and too strong to overpower once it is activated. Perhaps the answer, then, is to prevent its activation.

COMMITMENT AND CONSISTENCY Hobgoblins of the Mind 

It is easier to resist at the beginning than at the end. —LEONARDO DA VINCI

“Psychologists have long understood the power of the consistency principle to direct human action. Prominent theorists such as Leon Festinger, Fritz Hieder, and Theodore Newcomb have viewed the desire for consistency as a central motivator of our behavior. But is this tendency to be consistent really strong enough to compel us to do what we ordinarily would not want to do? There is no question about it. The drive to be (and look) consistent constitutes a highly potent weapon of social influence, often causing us to act in ways that are clearly contrary to our own best interests.” 

Case: “Take, as proof, what happened when psychologist Thomas Moriarty staged thefts on a New York City beach to see if onlookers would risk personal harm to halt the crime. In the study, a research accomplice would put a beach blanket down five feet from the blanket of a randomly chosen individual—the experimental subject. After a couple of minutes on the blanket spent relaxing and listening to music from a portable radio, the accomplice would stand up and leave the blanket to stroll down the beach. A few minutes later, a second researcher, pretending to be a thief, would approach, grab the radio, and try to hurry away with it. As you might guess, under normal conditions, subjects were very reluctant to put themselves in harm’s way by challenging the thief—only four people did so in the twenty times, that the theft was staged. But when the same procedure was tried another twenty times, with a slight twist, the results were drastically different. In these incidents, before taking his stroll, the accomplice would simply ask the subject to please “watch my things,” which each of them agreed to do. Now, propelled by the rule for consistency, nineteen of the twenty subjects became virtual vigilantes, running after and stopping the thief, demanding an explanation, and often restraining the thief physically or snatching the radio away.”

COMMITMENT IS THE KEY “What produces the click that activates the whirr of the powerful consistency tape? Social psychologists think they know the answer: commitment. If I can get you to make a commitment (that is, to take a stand, to go on record), I will have set the stage for your automatic and ill-considered consistency with that earlier commitment. Once a stand is taken, there is a natural tendency to behave in ways that are stubbornly consistent with the stand. As we’ve already seen, social psychologists are not the only ones who understand the connection between commitment and consistency. Commitment strategies are aimed at us by compliance professionals of nearly every sort.

Click & whirr “For the salesperson, the strategy is to obtain a large purchase by starting with a small one. Almost any small sale will do, because the purpose of that small transaction is not profit. It is commitment. Further purchases, even much larger ones, are expected to flow naturally from the commitment. The tactic of starting with a little request in order to gain eventual compliance with related larger requests has a name: the foot-in-the-door technique. You can use small commitments to manipulate a person’s self-image; you can use them to turn citizens into “public servants,” prospects into “customers,” prisoners into “collaborators.”

“One final tip before you get started: Set a goal and write it down. Whatever the goal, the important thing is that you set it, so you’ve got something for which to aim—and that you write it down. There is something magical about writing things down. So set a goal and write it down. When you reach that goal, set another and write that down. You’ll be off and running. Yet another reason that written commitments are so effective is that they require more work than verbal ones.”

Commitment… “It appears that commitments are most effective in changing a person’s self-image and future behavior when they are active, public, and effortful. But there is another property of effective commitment that is more important than the other three combined. To understand what it is, we first need to solve a pair of puzzles in the actions of Communist interrogators and fraternity brothers.

Lowball…..a way to mess with your client…. No matter which variety of lowballing is used, the sequence is the same: An advantage is offered that induces a favorable purchase decision; then, sometime after the decision has been made but before the bargain is sealed, the original purchase advantage is deftly removed. It seems almost incredible that a customer would buy a car under these circumstances. Yet it works—not on everybody, of course, but it is effective enough to be a staple compliance procedure in many, many car showrooms.

SOCIAL PROOF Truths Are Us 

Where all think alike, no one thinks very much. —WALTER LIPPMANN

In this topic there is a resemblance to the wisdom of crowds…. “The principle of social proof. It states that one means we use to determine what is correct is to find out what other people think is correct. The principle applies especially to the way we decide what constitutes correct behavior. As a rule, we will make fewer mistakes by acting in accord with social evidence than contrary to it.”

CASE: In the case of canned laughter, the problem comes when we begin responding to social proof in such a mindless and reflexive fashion that we can be fooled by partial or fake evidence.

“Since 95 percent of the people are imitators and only 5 percent initiators, people are persuaded more by the actions of others than by any proof we can offer.”

“The principle of social proof says so: The greater the number of people who find any idea correct, the more the idea will be correct.”

Standing in queue…. “In general, when we are unsure of ourselves, when the situation is unclear or ambiguous, when uncertainty reigns, we are most likely to look to and accept the actions of others as correct.”

“Especially in an ambiguous situation, the tendency for everyone to be looking to see what everyone else is doing can lead to a fascinating phenomenon called “pluralistic ignorance.”

“Bystander angle”:

– The first reason is fairly straightforward. With several potential helpers around, the personal responsibility of each individual is reduced: “Perhaps someone else will give or call for aid, perhaps someone else already has.” So with everyone thinking that someone else will help or has helped, no one does.

– The second reason is the more psychologically intriguing one; it is founded on the principle of social proof and involves the pluralistic ignorance effect. Very often an emergency is not obviously an emergency. What is going on? In times of such uncertainty, the natural tendency is to look around at the actions of others for clues. We can learn, from the way the other witnesses are reacting, whether the event is or is not an emergency.

Single person acts, groups DO not…. “The smallest number of bystanders took action, though, when the three-person groups included two individuals who had been coached to ignore the smoke; under those conditions, the leaks were reported only 10 percent of the time.

“All the conditions that decrease an emergency victim’s chances for bystander aid exist normally and innocently in the city: (1) In contrast to rural areas, cities are more clamorous, distracting, rapidly changing places where it is difficult to be certain of the nature of the events one encounters. (2) Urban environments are more populous, by their nature; consequently, people are more likely to be with others when witnessing a potential emergency situation. (3) City dwellers know a much smaller percentage of fellow residents than do people who live in small towns; therefore, city dwellers are more likely to find themselves in a group of strangers when observing an emergency.”

Call for help… “The key is the realization that groups of bystanders fail to help because the bystanders are unsure rather than unkind. They don’t help because they are unsure of whether an emergency actually exists and whether they are responsible for taking action. When they are sure of their responsibilities for intervening in a clear emergency, people are exceedingly responsive!”

“Embarrassment is a villain to be crushed here. In the context of a possible stroke, you cannot afford to be worried about the awkwardness of overestimating your problem.”

“Stare, speak, and point directly at that person and no one else: “You, sir, in the blue jacket, I need help. Call an ambulance.” Isolate one individual from the crowd.”

“In general, then, your best strategy when in need of emergency help is to reduce the uncertainties of those around you concerning your condition and their responsibilities. Be as precise as possible about your need for aid. Do not allow bystanders to come to their own conclusions because, especially in a crowd, the principle of social proof and the consequent pluralistic ignorance effect might well cause them to view your situation as a nonemergency.”

“Pick out one person and assign the task to that individual. The principle of social proof operates most powerfully when we are observing the behavior of people just like us. But, in addition, there is another important working condition: similarity.” 

CASE In 1977, the Reverend Jim Jones: In the alien, Guyanese environment, then, Temple members were very ready to follow the lead of others. The first was the initial set of their compatriots, who quickly and willingly took the poison drafts.

LIKING The Friendly Thief 

The main work of a trial attorney is to make a jury like his client. —CLARENCE DARROW

Liking and people we know helps us achieving a YES. “Other compliance professionals have found that the friend doesn’t even have to be present to be effective; often, just the mention of the friend’s name is enough. Although it is generally acknowledged that good-looking people have an advantage in social interaction, recent findings indicate that we may have sorely underestimated the size and reach of that advantage.”

CASE: “A study of the Canadian federal elections found that attractive candidates received more than two and a half times as many votes as unattractive candidates. In fact, the attractive defendants were twice as likely to avoid jail as the unattractive ones.”

Similarity…. “Dress is a good example. Several studies have demonstrated that we are more likely to help those who dress like us. As trivial as these similarities may seem, they appear to work. One researcher who examined the sales records of insurance companies found that customers were more likely to buy insurance when the salesperson was like them in such areas as age, religion, politics, and cigarette-smoking habits.”

Compliments…. “We are phenomenal suckers for flattery. Although there are limits to our gullibility – we tend, as a rule, to believe praise and to like those who provide it, oftentimes when it is clearly false.”

Lunch…. “The least recognized benefit, however, may be the one uncovered in research conducted in the 1930s by the distinguished psychologist Gregory Razran. Using what he termed the “luncheon technique,” he found that his subjects became fonder of the people and things they experienced while they were eating. It was a literature dedicated to the study of the association principle and dominated by the thinking of a brilliant man, Ivan Pavlov. Razran’s luncheon technique. Obviously, a normal reaction to food can be transferred to some other thing through the process of raw association. Razran’s insight was that there are many normal responses to food besides salivation, one of them being a good and favorable feeling. Therefore, it is possible to attach this pleasant feeling, this positive attitude, to anything (political statements being only an example) that is closely associated with good food.”

HOW TO SAY NO 

“We don’t attempt to restrain the influence of the factors that cause liking. Quite the contrary. We allow these factors to exert their force, and then we use that force in our campaign against them. The stronger the force, the more conspicuous it becomes and, consequently, the more subject to our alerted defenses.

“In the twenty-five minutes I’ve known this guy, have I come to like him more than I would have expected?”

AUTHORITY Directed Deference 

Follow an expert. —VIRGIL

CASE Professor Stanley Milgram and electric shocks: “It is the extreme willingness of adults to go to almost any lengths on the command of an authority that constitutes the chief finding of the study.”

“There are several kinds of symbols that can reliably trigger our compliance in the absence of the genuine substance of authority:

– Titles Titles are simultaneously the most difficult and the easiest symbols of authority to acquire.

– Clothes A second kind of authority symbol that can trigger our mechanical compliance is clothing. Less blatant in its connotation than a uniform, but nonetheless effective, is another kind of attire that has traditionally bespoken authority status in our culture: the well-tailored business suit.

– Trappings owners of prestige autos receive a special kind of deference from us.”

SCARCITY The Rule of the Few 

The way to love anything is to realize that it might be lost. —G. K. CHESTERTON

Potential unavailability…. “With the scarcity principle operating so powerfully on the worth we assign things, it is natural that compliance professionals will do some related operating of their own. Probably the most straightforward use of the scarcity principle occurs in the “limited-number” tactic, when the customer is informed that a certain product is in short supply that cannot be guaranteed to last long. As opportunities become less available, we lose freedoms; and we hate to lose the freedoms we already have.”

“Romeo and Juliet effect.” Do couples suffering parental interference react by committing themselves more firmly to the partnership and falling more deeply in love? According to a study done with 140 Colorado couples, that is exactly what they do. that interference also made the pair feel greater love and desire for marriage.”

Whenever we confront the scarcity pressures surrounding some item, we must also confront the question of what it is we want from the item.

How to avoid? 

– Think straight, do not panic with scarity.

– Think the reason why you want owning or the functinality.

How should we change according to the book?

Maintain the internal consistency, because it “is a hallmark of logic and intellectual”.

What should I personally do?

Defend myself from the “the joy of possessing a scarce commodity”.

Summary

The book in six words – ”Pay every debt, as if God wrote the bill.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson)