PSYCHOLOGY

Resisting the Hard Sell

by Kevin Evers
FROM THE OCTOBER 2016 ISSUE

he nefarious side of persuasion has

been a subject of philosophical inquiry
since Aristotle, who warned his fellow

Greeks about the dangers of being blinded by a

persons charisma and character. He implored
his listeners to focus solely on the facts of an
argument to avoid being emotionally
manipulated.

More than 2,000 years later, that advice is still

sound. But lets be honest: Were terrible pupils.
No matter how hard we try to remain objective,
we get seduced by clever advertising campaigns,
ashy presentations, high-powered promises,
and gregarious sales reps, colleagues, partners,
and job candidates who make bad ideas sound
great.

OWEN DAVEY

There is hope, however. Although most books

and research on persuasion are geared toward

helping people become better advocates, they can also serve the reverse purpose: teaching
readers how to avoid being manipulated. If we take the time to understand the tricks of the trade
and why were so susceptible to them, we can learn to better protect ourselves.

The rst step is to admit our weaknesses, which is easier said than done. Jonah Berger, a
marketing professor at Wharton and the author of Invisible Inuence, a popular business read this
past summer, claims that most of us are in denial about our own shortcomings, particularly when
it comes to social inuence. Were keenly aware when our colleagues and friends are led by
others, but we still believe that were shepherds in crowds of sheep.

This is due to what Berger calls the illusion of dierence. We dont see that were wearing the
same Brooks Brothers button-down as a coworker because the shirts are dierent colors. We
dont recognize that were following our bosss lead because our ideas seem slightly more
nuanced. In other words, minor dierences can blind us to glaring similarities and lead us to
think that our ideas are wholly our own when theyre not.

Berger oers advice on avoiding the groupthink that plagues so many organizations. Individuals
should speak up with challenges and questionsand, we can infer, managers should be open to
such pushback. Better yet, he suggests collecting employee input via secret ballot since we cant
be inuenced by things that we cant see or hear. Although most of his ideas and examples arent
revelatory, his book is an entertaining reminder that the ght against bad persuasion must start
from within.

Literary theorist Stanley Fish takes a similar stance in his recent book, Winning Arguments. He
concedes that none of us will ever become completely rational beings, free of weaknesses and
biases. And the world will always be full of skilled persuaders who use their talents for less than
honorable purposes. (The stories he cites range from the fall of Adam and Eve to the rise of
Donald Trump.) Yet he also seems to suggest that more humility might help us more readily
recognize when were being sheep.

The next step, of course, is to learn how the other side operates. Robert Cialdini is perhaps the
foremost expert on eective persuasion, and the advice outlined in his 2001 HBR article,
Harnessing the Science of Persuasionwhich called on readers to boost their inuence by
employing the principles of liking, reciprocity, social proof, consistency, authority, and scarcity
has become foundational in the eld.

Cialdinis latest book, Pre-Suasion, builds on that work, arguing that the best persuaders arent
merely eloquent charmers with well- crafted, nely tuned arguments; theyre also creative
preparers who focus on nding the best ways to launch their oers and ideas. He calls this pre-

suasion: the ability to convince us of the importance and desirability of something before we
even hear the facts.

The book provides a vast catalogue of research and techniques, many of them marketing related:
Hearing German music can make us more apt to buy expensive German wine; being asked if
were adventurous can increase our willingness to try new soft drinks; seeing an embedded photo
of clouds can persuade us to prefer softness and comfort over price when browsing a website
for high-end furniture.

Those examples may make pre-suasion seem a bit like hypnosis. But again, awareness is key. If
we recognize the mind games being used to ensnare us, perhaps we can avoid the trap. And
theres something to be learned from the more granular examples. For instance, Cialdini recalls a
story about a consultant who was having a tough time persuading clients to agree to his prices. In
the past, he had tried to explain the cost of each line item during negotiations, but that never
worked. Then during one presentation, he decided to try a new approach. Right before
mentioning his $75,000 fee, he joked, As you can tell, Im not going to be able to charge you a
million dollars for this. Everyone in the room laughed. But no one pushed back on his actual
oer. Why? He had conditioned his audience to believe that his services werent exorbitantly
priced by taking advantage of what psychologists call the focusing illusionour habit of
concentrating on a single aspect of an argument or experience (in this case, the million dollars).
Smarter clients would have seen through the trick and followed up with their normal pricenegotiation process.

More generally, Cialdini warns that when confronted with any persuasive argumenteven one
with which we instinctively agreewe must spend as much time considering the possibility of
failure as we do dreaming of the odds for success.

He also sounds a reassuring note when he acknowledges that persuasion is more art than science.
Were not likely to be conned by someone who tries to follow a manual or a list of bullet points. In
fact, he says, we can usually spot peddlers of bad ideas who use pre-suasive techniques because
they draw outsize attention to their weaknesses.

Of course, theres no fail-safe way to prevent ourselves from getting duped, manipulated, and
persuaded to do things that we later regret; on that, all three authors agree. But if we remind
ourselves of how awed and fallible we are as thinkers, while also better attuning ourselves to the

artful techniques used by master manipulators, then we have a chance of increasing our gooddecision percentage (if only by a few points) without closing ourselves o to new ideas and
views.
A version of this article appeared in the October 2016 issue (pp.122123) of Harvard Business Review.

Kevin Evers is an assistant editor at Harvard Business Review.

This article is about PSYCHOLOGY

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