Influence: The Psychology Of Persuasion Book Summary

Book Summary

15 min

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Brief Summary

As humans, we tend to rely on shortcuts that help make our decisions easier. But, by learning the six psychological principles of reciprocation, scarcity, consistency, social proof, liking, and authority, we can have a deeper insight into how we handle persuasion on an everyday basis and get to the root of our decisions.

About the Author

Robert B. Cialdini is the Regents Professor Emeritus of Psychology and Marketing at Arizona State University and worked as the visitor professor of marketing, business, and psychology at Stanford University as well as University of Santa Cruz. He graduated from the University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee. He earned a Ph.D in Social Psychology at the University of North Carolina in 1970. He Is best known for his book Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion. The book was based on his three “undercover” years applying for and training at user car dealership, fund-raising organizations, and telemarketing firms to observe real-life persuasion situations. The book was a bestseller on The New York Times Bestseller List.

Topics

Marketing & Sales Psychology

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Key Insights

Are you aware that you’ve actually been manipulated your whole life?

It may not seem like it, but people are always using the power of persuasion to get what they want and make the scales tip in their favor.

So, how can you learn this superpower and start persuading people for your benefit?

With Robert B. Cialdini’s book, “Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion” you will learn the psychology of persuasion and understand how it has been present in your work relationships, customer relationships, and every other relationship you’ve engaged in throughout your entire life.

“Often we don’t realize that our attitude toward something has been influenced by the number of times we have been exposed to it in the past.”- Robert B. Cialdini

You will learn to understand why people simply comply with other people’s requests, such as to make a purchase or to take on an extra shift at work.

Cialdini will teach you how to reap the rewards of persuasion and start living the good life!

Shortcuts Can Manipulate Us

Turkey mothers are very loving and nurturing. They are protective of their chicks. But, it all comes down to one thing. If a turkey makes a “cheep-cheep” sound, the mother will fawn over it. But, if it doesn’t a mother turkey will ignore or even kill her young. The “cheep-cheep” is a persuasive sound.

It is also a shortcut for the mother turkey to recognize her baby chicks. The “cheep-cheep” does its job by triggering the mother turkey’s maternal instincts.

Now, as humans, we aren’t going to ignore our children for not making a specific sound. But, we do have similar shortcuts in our world.

Shortcuts help us to make quick and easy decisions in a world that is full of too many! It becomes a defense mechanism to keep us balanced and focused on what’s important.

For example, as humans, we are usually willing to do someone a favor if they provide us with a reason. Say, your mom asks you to take out the trash before you leave the house for school because she didn’t have time to do it before she left for work. Would you deny her? Probably not. You would understand how that makes sense. And, who wants trash laying around the house?

By statistics, if your mother gave you no reason to take out the trash, there would be only a 60% chance that you would actually do it.

And, if she gave you a reason that didn’t make sense there’s a 93% chance that you would still do it for her. Our mental shortcut says any reason is a good enough reason!

An example of a shortcut we see in business all the time is that quality equals price. People assume that because an item is priced higher than others in its market, it’s a higher quality. But, that’s not always true. And, businesses will up the price on low-selling items to deceive you into thinking they’re high-quality.

That’s why we must learn how to protect ourselves from these practices and be more aware of our...