Within
the fields of social sciences and especially that of psychology, sociology, and
communications, there exist many well-known processes that are within reach to help
guide us in writing better persuasive messages. These processes have been
theorized by some very well-known and extraordinary thinkers such as Abraham
Maslow, Harold Lasswell, and Everett Rogers. There is no need to reinvent what
has already been thoroughly conceived and tested.
When we
consider the realistic impact of persuasion on human behavior we can grasp the power
it holds over people’s opinions, attitudes, and beliefs. The ultimate objective
and the most powerful aspect of persuasion can
be found within its power of action. We simply want to persuade people
to an extent that guides their behaviors toward the direction of our choosing,
this is the action appeal, and consequently a final goal. The forces that cause
this powerful action is the science within persuasion itself.
Our
writing objectives must be crystal clear before ever attempting to write
persuasively. We must remember that every action
has a potentially positive and negative reaction associated with it. Our
persuasive attempts require full thought and pre-planning.
To begin writing persuasively, we must know our audience and
we must completely understand the purpose of our persuasion with a clear image of
what action we want our audience to take. Answering the who, what, where, when,
why and how questions will present a clear description of our audience to us,
before ever constructing a plan. Most of the time the plan can be cleverly
crafted from this knowledge alone, this information holds the secrets that can
help us write truly persuasive messages.
The nature of persuasion can be properly understood if we
think of it as a stranger. We do not completely open up our full hearts and
minds to strangers, no, it takes time and trust before we begin the process of
allowing strangers into our lives. It is a rare event to construct a single
persuasive message and then to have it effectively change people’s opinions,
attitudes, and beliefs. Humans are social creatures, but social creatures that rely
entirely on emotions, social needs, individual needs, physical needs, and self-assurance
needs in order to process their daily lives.
Any attempt to persuade another person without the thought
and implementation of those needs will end in failure. People’s senses guide
them, they think and reason, but are more motivated to action through satisfying
their needs, their wants and their desires. To simply supply information is not
enough to present reasonable arguments to allow people to change their
thoughts, opinions, attitudes, and beliefs. We must be able to fulfill their
needs. Only then will persuasive actions become behavior actions.
What we can learn about our audiences will tell us exactly
what we need to say to them in order to persuade them to our way of thinking.
We must know everything about our audience, this includes who they are, where
they’re from, what they have experienced or learned, what they know, what they
don’t know, and we must know their current opinions attitudes and beliefs. This
list is far from complete, we must understand every important and non-important
detail concerning our audience in order to be truly effective.
Finding this information is not a difficult task, we are-all-considered
audiences of someone else. We are the audience. Maybe not the exact audience to
a particular event you wish to promote today, but close enough to begin
gathering relevant information to start our data flow. We all share the same
basic needs of emotions, social needs, individual needs, physical needs, and
self-assurance needs. Long story short, we must find and answer every question
pertaining to our audience that we can, this, to summon from our thought banks
every consideration of the 5w’s of our audiences. Only then can the persuasive
elements be unlocked.
Understanding our audience’s expectations, their desires,
their experiences, their perceptions, their emotions, their demographics, their
psychographics, social environment and history along with an understanding of
their values will expose to us the appropriate information to facilitate our
message crafting and distribution techniques. You can imagine and be assured
that people will make their decisions specifically for reasons whether
consciously or not, based on satisfying one or more of their human needs. Do
people purchase new automobiles to satisfy their self-gratifying status needs,
their safety needs, or their economic personal needs, this is the question
which must be determined in order to supply the right pressure tool for
persuasive messaging? All circumstances are the same, there are human needs
that need to be satisfied before new behavior actions can occur. You must
create those actions through determining exactly what motivates your audience
into action.
Imagine for a moment that two products exist, they are so
similar that only the price makes the true difference. Why do people prefer to
purchase the product that costs more? It’s obviously just as good as the one
that can save them some money. There are many things to consider, especially
the quality and risk aspects. The quality of the two products may be so similar
it would be technically impossible to determine any differences; however, the
risk associated with purchasing the product of lesser cost can play emotional games
with the mind. People worry about price-quality-and risk concerns. A product
that costs less, may simply be of lesser quality and have more risk of failure
according to their mindful understanding. Most minds won’t even bargain with
that decision, they choose the path of least resistance, the one that satisfies
their needs without any difficulty in balancing the issues. It simply makes
more sense to them. This is not true for everyone. I myself will go to endless
lengths to come to a wise decision, most of the time this does not lead me through
a path of least resistance. My satisfaction comes from not feeling as though I
was part of the sheep herd, part of the overall marketing plan. There are far fewer
people like me than people who consistently follow paths of least resistance.
Once we have an enormous amount of detail concerning our
audience, placing that information into pro’s and con’s will provide us with
future insight into unlocking any negative areas we should avoid. Not all
positive persuasive attempts turn out positive, gain and loss travel side by
side just like good and evil, you can’t have one without the other. We must be
able to foretell which elements of persuasion can potentially lead to the most
positive behavior actions, and then we must also consider all of the negative
behavior actions that can occur. Always being ready for worst case scenarios is
also a function of public relations.
Most persuasive writing examples utilize the indirect writing
approach, this placing the main persuasive idea last. I do not entirely agree.
The majority of my persuasive writings recognized greater success from
maintaining a common persuasive theme throughout the entire message. This
arrangement allows for clarity and transparency, qualities which are very
important today. Imagine reading an article where the beginning content was
just about the explanation, and then at the end, you finally find out what’s
being asked of you. In my opinion, this technique is dated and sounds like a
bad sales pitch, leaving me wondering why I had to read all the way to the end
to find out what the reader wanted me to do. Instead, repetition in persuasion
works best. From the beginning to the end, make the reader understand what’s
being asked of them, don’t make them wait and wonder. This is transparency, it
is truthfulness, your audience will appreciate the fact that you are not trying
to pull some crafty persuasion technique on them. Yet, it actually is. A consistent
flow of repeated subtle hints is best for the minds of today. People are simply
too busy, impatient, and distracted by other things in their lives, we do not
need to add to that.
Distribution channels and timing of persuasive messages are
just as important as the information you will obtain about your audience.
Understanding your audience will allow you great insight into where and when
will be the best times and ways to reach them. Simply coming up with an idea
for a message and then posting it on Facebook, because you have an account and
you use it all of the time, does not mean this channel and the timing will be
adequate for best persuasion methods. Utilize the channels that best reaches
your audience. Those channels can be anything from flyers posted up at your
local post office to publishing a press release to the local newspaper, or yes,
posting on social media channels. Just be sure it’s reaching your intended
audience. Why? Simple really. Say you posted a message on Facebook about your
business. One-hundred people read the message. Fifty people were actually part
of your intended audience, the other fifty could care less, and may even have
some sort of grudge against your work. That’s fifty people working against your
other fifty. This, ultimately reducing your effectiveness even further. Why
even waste the time to tell people who don’t even care to know about you, don’t.
Instead, tell the ones who will turn around and tell others.
Effective persuasion happens when your audience understands
clearly what you are telling them and asking them. It happens when you provide
satisfaction to their personal needs, wants, and desires. Keep your messages
transparent, and allowing your audience not to feel like you are trying to sell
them something. Instead, make them feel important, satisfy their every need
when you can. Persuasion will never occur unless you have a well thought out
plan, that includes understanding exactly what you want and what you want your
audience to do. Effectively transferring that message into a persuasive writing
can easily be managed through the use of key audience information. Use what you
know about your audience to relate to them, let them relate to you. Remember to
break-the-ice and be personable, you are a stranger, utilize a common theme
that can easily be understood, accepted, and repeated, repeat, repeat, repeat.
For more information about persuasive writing or to start
your persuasive campaign
Contact:
Outstory Public Relations
Advice
That’s Precise
Phone: 704-904-0682
Website: outstoryprgroup.com
Email: shawn@outstoryprgroup.com
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