Risk & Business Magazine JGS Insurance Risk & Business Magazine Spring 2018 | Page 12

PRE-SUASION
Pre-Suasion
Selling Into The Ideal Moment
W
hat happens in
the brains of
consumers during the
milliseconds before
they make a purchase
decision? A lot, actually, and that precious
moment can become key real estate for
your next marketing or sales campaign.
In fact, most businesses are so focused
on the message they are trying to convey
that they forget to “set the table” in the
best possible way for their message to
resonate with consumers.
I researched this phenomenon extensively
in preparation for my new book, Pre-
Suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence
and Persuade, and my results just may
change the way you think about your
message and the context in which it is
delivered. The good news is that making
this simple change to break through the
clutter is usually fairly straightforward,
simple, and inexpensive.
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The theory behind my research is this:
if we focus our audience on a particular
idea or concept, they will prioritize all
subsequent information related to that
idea or concept. Once they are oriented
in the right direction, they will want to
learn more, value the information more,
and be more likely to take positive action.
Your website—essentially your
company’s “calling card”—is the first
place consumers go to learn about
your business. If you sell furniture, for
example, consider which landing page
image might have a more positive effect
on sofa sales: a photo of puffy clouds or
of pennies. In this example, our research
showed that the group viewing the clouds
prior to entering the site were more likely
to search and purchase furniture based
on comfort while the group viewing the
pennies focused primarily on price, and
therefore spent less on the site overall.
We found, essentially, that consumers
focused their attention on items that
were congruent with their very first
impression of the site—either the comfort
of soft clouds or the frugality of literally
“watching the pennies.”
In addition to altering behavior with
images, we found that words can have
a similar effect. Consider a research
study for introducing a new soft drink
to the market—admittedly not a simple
feat with the mega-cola companies
already dominating store shelves. We
tested consumers’ affinity for trying
new products by posing an introductory
question in two different ways. First,
we asked a group of consumers if they
would be interested in trying the new
product, positioned as a brand new soft
drink that had never before been on the
market. Those who responded positively
would submit contact information and a
free sample would be sent to them. This
approach scored a respectable 30 percent
conversion rate.
In the second approach, we asked a simple
question at the top of the marketing
material: “Are you an adventurous
person?” The ad went on to describe the
product and free sample offer in much
the same way as in the first approach.
But that simple challenge question
dramatically improved consumers’
responses: the conversion rate for this