Robert Cialdini’s book, INFLUENCE, is one of the most important you can read in your life. Here is a breakdown of the book's most important highlights + personal notes.

Explanation Principle

• I have to use the copier vs
• I have to use the copier because i am running late

Contrast Principle

• If seeing two things, the latter will seem drastically different
• Light object then heavy - object feels REALLY heavy
• This is why 500 seems like nothing after you buy a 3500 suit!
• Real estate sales guy -> show a dumpy house, then a really nice house!

Rule 1

RECIPROCATION

"We should try to repay, in kind, what another person has provided us"

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The Free Sample

• but they must be made aware that you're doing something for free

Strong Cultural pressure to reciprocate a gift, even an unwanted one, **but there is no such pressure to purchase an unwanted commercial product**

• so, you need to have already built some rapport with your client for this to really work!

Unfair exchanges

• woman accepts a drink = more sexually availably!?

Concessions

• Once you say no once, its tough to say no twice
• Boy scout selling tickets
• then swaps to chocolate bars for a lesser price!
• Reject the Retreat Technique
• The gifted negotiator will ask for something way out there, then come back around
• Makes everyone feel like a winner
• Responsibility
• We were able to meeting in the middle
• Satisfaction
• I got him to come way down

Perceptual Contract Principle

• after being exposed to price of something larger, less expensive offer appears WAY smaller
• buy a 2k suit, the $150 dollar tie is nothing

Rule 2

Commitment and Consistency

Human beings have a (often subconscious) nearly obsessive desire to be consistent with what we have already done.

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Horse Betters at a race track

• once bet is placed -> far more confident it will win

Beach Blanket story

• if someone gets up and walks away, and has items stolen, no ones reacts
• if the person asks you watch their things, then someone trys to steal them, 19/20 people chase after them!

Consistent Decision making

• made up mind on a topic - easier to stay there

Automatic Consistency actually often times hides the subconscious from imperfect realities

• "shields us against thought"

COMMITMENT IS THE KEY

If I can get you to make a commitment (that is, to take a stand, go on record), I will have set the stage for your automatic and ill considered consistency with that earlier commitment.

• once the stand is taken, you're locked in 🙂

Cold Calling Technique: "How are you doing today" (pg 51)

• people generally respond with fine, which makes it much harder to appear grouchy on the back end, when you transition to the ask!

Start Small and Build

• Foot-In-The-Door Technique
• In sales, lock down any sort of small transaction, then begin to scale up.
• you've got one commitment, keep em coming

The Magic Act

• Watch what people do
• NOT what they say

Writing things down

• Physical evidence that act happened
• Can be shown to other people
• Simply require more work than verbal ones
• more work = more commitment
• severity of initial = higher commitment to group
• frats/military
• Pro tip - WRITE GOALS DOWN

The Inner Choice

• commitments most effective when
• active
• public
• effortful
• Last part is biggest though:
• inner responsibility
• Freedman Study

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Approach with children:

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This is the only way to get people to buy into decision making long term - they need to BELIEVE themselves

Lowball method:

• offer great deal, get to the finish line, deal changes
• already so committed that they take the deal anyway
• also works with human interaction "i promise ill change"

Rule 3

SOCIAL PROOF

We determine what is correct by finding out what other people think is correct

This one is so engrained in the subconscious its silly:

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and

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The Social Proof Phenomenon:

The greater the number of people who find any idea correct, the more the idea will be correct!

When we are unsure of ourselves, the situation is unclear, or uncertainty reigns

• that is when social proof is king
• Uncertainty = the right hand man of social proof!!
• when it doubt -> well this is what the crowd is doing so i am too
• this leads directly in the Herd Mindset

Remove Ambiguity when dealing with groups

• make specific assignments to specific people

Social Proof also strongest when we view others as similar to ourselves

• this is why the relate is such a massive part of the sales process
• you need to be just like the person on the other side of transaction!

Rule 4

LIKING

We most prefer to say yes to the requests of someone we know and like

This is why warm intros play so hugely in sales:

• "whom suggest I call on you"
• turning the person down is like rejecting the friend!

Halo Effects

• physical attractiveness -> good looking = good

Similarity

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• being aware of and capitalizing here is VITAL whenever possible in sales

Compliments

• Actor McLean Stevenson once described how his wife tricked him into marriage:
• she said she liked me!
• By simply telling someone you like them is effective
• We're absolute suckers for flattery across the board

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• Even fake compliments flatter us on a subconscious level!!

Contact and Cooperation

• We like stuff we're familiar with
• this is why customer touches are crucial
• increases familiarity!!

Association

• weatherman being yelled at for bad weather!

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• luncheon technique
• people become fond of things / items they are talking about while eating
• why lunch meetings are so big - not by accident!
• Sports another massive example
• lucky fans, can only wear certain jerseys, none of this matters at all

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Rule 5

AUTHORITY - Follow An Expert

Most of us put an alarming high level of faith into the 'expert' point of view

• example = Milgrams Experiment
• Patients were simply unable to defy the expert "lab coated boss" who told them to keep shocking the patients on the other end

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We are literally trained from the second we're born that obdience to the proper authority is RIGHT and the improper authority is WRONG

• its absolutely drilled into our subconscious so deeply
• RELIGION is a big part of this as well
• but also school, stories, the military, the government, everything

Connotation, not Content

• if we're getting click, whirred by authority figures:
• were just as vulnerable to the symbols of authority as we are to the substance!
• AKA - DONALD TRUMP
• Scott Adams talks about this nonstop

Titles

• titles w/ authority status lead to height distortions!

Clothing

• subconscious triggers of authority figures
• "uniforms' big here - hospitals, suit and tie, police uniforms, etc

Interestingly, w/ Trump in the White House and all of the back and forth w/ COVID-19, a lot of authority rhetoric has since been brought to light!

Rule 6

SCARCITY - The Rule of the Few

"The way to love anything is to realize that it might be lost"

The scarcity principle simply states that opportunities seem more valuable to us when their availability is limited.

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• Think about it! This is most definitely true for me - tend to remember pain much more than gain

Limited Number tactic

• product is running out - won't last long!
• whether true or not, its going to increase the immediate value of the item in the customers eyes!

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This works with any sort of item:

• Written items appear to be more persuasive if we can only get it from one source
• EXCLUSIVITY

Going from having an abundance to scarcity will produce the most dramatic effects from the scarcity complex. Its not even close.

• People see things as more desirable when they have recently become less available as opposed to it being scare all the time
• Ultra strict parents -> more rebellious children
• Chocolate chip cookie experiment
• less available, the more delicious

Highlights our Competitive Nature as well

• not only do we want the same item more when scarce, we want it most when we have to compete for it 🙂