Part 1-How to Persuade Someone to Do Something For You

What's Persuasion?

Persuasion is the act of persuading (or attempting to persuade) to induce belief or action. It is the process of guiding someone towards the adoption of an idea, attitude, or action by rational and symbolic means.

The 3 Powerful Principles Of Persuasion

1. Reciprocation:People will feel obligated to respond to positive behavior received with positive behavior in return. In another word, people will return the positive favors that they received to that same person.

Example: This could be the easiest principle to learn how to persuade someone to do something for us. Just help the people with a lot of good favors in needy or desperate situations and once your opportunity comes, ask for a favor. They'll be grateful to return the favor if they can really afford to do it. Just because you know that this principle works, it doesn't mean that you should have any hidden intentions to help someone. What I'm trying to say here is that you should help someone sincerely without expecting anything in return from him or her and earn yourself good karma.

2. Commitment and Consistency: The principle of commitment is linked to the desire to be, or at least appear to be, consistent. Once a freely chosen position has been taken by an individual, a tendency to act in line with that commitment will guide further actions.

Example: This principle is a bit tricky but quite powerful to use it effectively. Here's how to do it. Trap someone with a series of questions that require "YES" as the answers. Here's an example.

Question 1: Mr.XYZ, do you have a family?

Question 2: Mr.XYZ, do you care for your family members?

Question 3: Mr.XYZ, are you AWARE of the recent SWINE flu outbreak?

Question 4: Mr.XYZ, would you like to know how to protect your family members from SWINE flu with our FREE health tips?

Now, I want you to analyze the questions that I've written above. If you asked those questions to a family man, I bet that all the answers are "YES" and consistent. The last question leads us to an opportunity to share our expertise to the customer and if done right, we can recommend a particular product of ours. Now do you see how we can apply the consistency principle to learn how to persuade someone to do something for us?

3. Social Proof: The principle of social proof states that beliefs, attitudes and actions of similar others are used as standards for one's own beliefs, attitudes and behavior (Festinger 1954). In another word, we use other people's actions and notions to model it for our self. According to many research and studies, the willingness to comply with a request is increased when supported by the belief or evidence that similar peers comply with it as well.

Example: If you want to know how to persuade someone to stop smoking with this principle, presenting pictures, advertisements and videos showing hundreds of people who have stopped smoking may prove effective to persuade that person to quit smoking. This will make the person to think," if other smokers just like me can do it, of course I can do it too".