A Look Back at TMRE 2009: Yes! Proven Ways for Market Researchers to Become More Persuasive
The Market Research Event 2010 is taking place this November 8-10, 2010 in San Diego, California. Every Friday leading up to the event, we'll be recapping one session from The Market Research Event 2009.
TMRE Keynote Session ' Yes! Proven Ways for Market Researchers to Become More Persuasive
Presenter: Dr. Noah Goldstein, Professor, UCLA Anderson School of Management and Co-Author of Yes!
The session first opened up with opening remarks from the managing Director of The Market Research Event, Kim Rivielle. Kim mentioned that this event first started off 15 years ago and it has grown into a very industry encompassing event since then.
'We are here to exchange stories'sometimes best practices and sometimes worst practices.'
After her opening remarks Kim introduced the Conference Chairwoman, Kelly Styring, who is a principal at Insight Farm. She went on to officially introduce this morning's featured speaker Dr. Noah Goldstein.
Dr. Noah Goldstein begins his presentation by stating that attendees will learn how to better persuade messaging through many scientific ways. Dr. Noah gives an example of how Tony Little recently saw much more success by changing this statement 'Operators are standing by, please call now' to 'If operators are busy, please call again'. The first statement leaves an impression that operators are just standing by twittering, not paying attention, and cleaning their fingernails as opposed to the second statement which leaves the impression that operators are taking phone call after phone call trying to answer questions and fill orders.
The second example explained how some studies show that up to 75% of hotel guests re-use their towels at least once if they see signs like this around the hotel. In the study, there were two different signs showed at the hotel. One sign mentioned 'Help save the environment by re-using towels' and the second sign mentioned '75% of people are re-using towels'. We always heard the term follow the herd but there is a strong persuasion figure in similarity. If people see similar people re-using towels in their room then there is a strong chance that they will also follow suit,
The best communicators recognize when they are not the best communicators. How do they do this? Testimonials are key!
What is optimal is to get other people to do the persuading for you, but there are many times that you will have to do it yourself. When you don't know people though, people question whether or not they can trust someone or believe what they say. Progressive for example, gives you quotes from their insurance company as well as many other companies. At times they do have the best quote but at other times they do not. Since implementing this innovation, Progressive has done fairly well contrary to popular belief.
'To immediately gain credibility in the eye of your audience, argue against your self interest.' (E.g mention a weakness in your case)
Common mistakes people often make is to:
- follow positive information with a negative qualifier, occasionally negating that positive information. Small weaknesses should be mentioned before your strongest qualifier in order to make up for it.
- focus on what the audience stands to gain from the opportunity they present. Companies should tell the people they are trying to persuade what they stand to lose if they don't take the opportunity they present.
Gifts and favors are most powerful when they are:
- significant and meaningful
- personalized
- unexpected