Even if the differences are enormous, we are often led to confuse deception with persuasion . However, while the deceiver is motivated by the intention to pass something false as true , the one who is able to persuade others is simply able to convince someone of the goodness of a point of view, an idea or, why not, of a product already valid in itself. In a nutshell, the reason why persuasion is viewed with so much diffidence today lies in a misunderstanding: persuading does not mean making people believe false , boasting non-existent qualities or “cheating” someone but, on the contrary, it means reducing the distrust , knowing how to “shorten distances” eovercome the psychological obstacles between me and my interlocutor . So let’s find out some simple and effective tricks to be able to convince without deceit!
# 1 CHOOSE A COMFORTABLE ENVIRONMENT
Certainly it will not always be possible to choose the ideal place to face a discussion, an interview or a negotiation. Sometimes, however, this possibility arises, and knowing how to identify a relaxed and reassuring environment can make the difference from the beginning: your goal is to push the interlocutor to lower his defenses and not to perceive yourself as an enemy. For example, while a conference room or an office, being habitual workplaces, reinforces mistrust and puts a distance, a bar or a park brings together and creates complicity .
# 2 GIVE THE ILLUSION THAT A COMMITMENT HAS ALREADY BEEN MADE …
In the construction of sentences it is essential to be able to implicitly arouse actions and feelings . Taking it for granted that something will be done creates a kind of short circuit that leaves the other person feeling like they have made a commitment , even if it never actually happened. A phrase like ” after he has signed the contract we will go and have a nice coffee!” it creates the illusion of an agreement already formalized and makes one more inclined to “respect” the commitment (not) made .
# 3… AND MAKE THE OTHER PERSON REALLY COMMIT!
However, those in front of us do not always feel “obliged” to fulfill a commitment they have not really made. It is at this point that we need to exploit a simple psychological principle: that of coherence . Human actions are influenced by habitual behaviors and past experiences, precisely because we always try to remain consistent with ourselves and to respect what we say with facts . Affirming one thing and doing another creates what in the jargon is called cognitive dissonance , the sense of guilt generated by the gap between the image we want to give and the one that actually results from our inconsistent actions.
# 4 GET SAY YES WITH BANAL QUESTIONS
A quick way to elicit a sense of coherence is to get the other person to answer affirmatively, making him less likely to take back his word with negative answers. It is therefore useful to ask “preparatory” questions with an almost obvious outcome : “have you ever read a book?”, “Do you care about the well-being of your family?”, “Would you like to save some money?”, These are classic questions that are practically impossible to answer “no”. Receiving “yes” in the course of a conversation is very important, because it lowers the defenses and increases the chances that even more demanding requests will be accepted later .
# 5 THE “ESCA” TECHNIQUE
Those of the bait and the “door in the face” are very common techniques in the field of sales , and with some precautions they can be adapted to any communication environment . In the door in the face technique, an exaggerated first request is “fired” so as to make our real target appear much more attractive, while the bait technique is used to choose the most expensive product between two options, usually presenting a third product with the same price as the more expensive of the previous two but with lower features. It is evident that the principle behind both techniques is to disguise the real goal by comparing it to something less convenient., a principle that can easily be bent to any persuasive communication process.
