<i>Get people to agree with you first</i><p>A slight twist to this: get people to say yes.<p>My "success rate" (with approaching women) went up drastically when I changed the first words out of my mouth to "<i>Can you hear me?</i>". I now ask this even when I know a woman doesn't have earphones on.<p>Why does it work? I have a couple of guesses. It is a question that you can't help reply to. And inadvertently when you answer this question, you begin paying more attention to the party that asked.<p>In ad-speak, this pretty much takes care of the A(attention) in AIDA.
My wife is the Guadagno in Guadagno and Cialdini and if the reporting of her findings is any guide, ignore the rest of the article. Her findings were that women will not respond well to email unless there's an existing relationship. Men will respond better to email if there's an existing negative relationship, but it otherwise makes no difference.<p>The error is forgivable if the writer only read the title of the article.
> <i>Guadagno & Cialdini research (2002) showed that men seem more responsive to email because it bypasses their competitive tendencies. Women, however, may respond better in face-to-face encounters because they are more ‘relationship-minded’</i><p>Yawn. Maybe we just don't want to deal with salespeople but instead judge the product on our own without being harassed. How is that supposed to be competitive?<p>Oh, I forgot, the self-fulfilling world of pop psychology, brought to you by eternal twin slogans "<i>It's true if you think it's true</i>" and "<i>You can convert any social belief into a universal truth by citing agenda-driven studies</i>". The greatest Jedi mind trick is convincing people that your Jedi mind trick actually works.
One of the best ways to influence people is to ask someone to do a favor for you. Especially if the person you are asking has more perceived power. It is called the "Ben Franklin Effect"<p>Teenage girl (to teenage guy):<p>"Can you help me with my homework?"<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Franklin_effect" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Franklin_effect</a>
> Upsell a product that cost 60% less<p>> The time-tested 60×60 rule says that your customers will buy an upsell 60 percent of the time for up to 60% of the original purchase price.<p>These two statements are not the same... Or was this to be an example of #17? ("87% of people believe everything if there’s a percentage in it")
"13 things you can do right now to increase your conversion rate.<p>#1: block the content."<p><a href="http://i.imgur.com/GTgzM.png" rel="nofollow">http://i.imgur.com/GTgzM.png</a>
And there's even a reference in here to the HN topic of the day - swearing in front of an audience!<p>> 2. Swearing can help influence an audience. Light swearing, that is. (Go overboard and lose all credibility.)
Eww. Pop psychology.<p>Persuading people is a lot easier if you look at it as mutually trying to make the best decision--to be persuaded as much as to persuade--instead of some stupid gimmicky power grab. "I felt so powerful because I got someone to agree with me!" Feel powerful when you're right, feel powerful when you're wrong and can admit it, but feeling powerful because someone else thinks you're right is folly.
For what it's worth, most of these examples (and more) are in Cialdini's book Influence:<p><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Influence-Psychology-Persuasion-Business-Essentials/dp/006124189X" rel="nofollow">http://www.amazon.com/Influence-Psychology-Persuasion-Busine...</a>