Common Ground
What’s the most important commonality between all the various methods of marketing and advertising? Persuasion. We want our message to persuade someone to do something.
Robert Scialdini, writing for Scientific American, brings 30 years of experience in identifying the key elements of persuasion:
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- Reciprocation: I do something for you, you feel indebted, you do something for me. In the example he quotes, the Disabled American Veterans organization increased its response ratio from 18 percent to 35 percent by adding free return mail labels.
- Consistency: Though it should read more like “creating a cognitive dissonance situation.” Basically, this is getting you to commit publicly to a course of action (supporting a cause, voting for someone, etc.). Personally, I used that one when I created my first campaign for UNESCO in which the headline read: “See if you can read this aloud, ‘I dont care anything about dying children.’ Few people can.”
- Social validation: If many individuals have decided in favor of a particular idea, we are more likely to follow, because we perceive the idea to be more correct, more valid. Fresh breath is a form of social validation. So are silky smooth hair, unblemished skin and a BMW 3 series.
- Liking: I like you. I feel an affinity. I’ll buy your product.
- Authority: That guy knows what he’s talking about. I should follow?
- Scarcity: If I don’t get this right away, who knows if it will be available tomorrow? If it’s not, I’ll lose out on a great deal. Think about the microwave pasta maker (full disclosure: I bought one).
If you look at the three large marketing subdivisions, every one of them uses one or a combination of these six elements:
The Direct Marketer
A direct marketer, for example, might include those nifty personalized return labels and hit you with a “limited time” offer or use an authority figure in the ad. For example, 5 Hour Energy used a doctor-like spokesperson to highlight that different medical research pointed to the product not having any adverse effects. At DMG, we used well-known actor Andres Garcia as an authority figure to tell potential buyers that cable companies were lying to them, that the signal does not go out when it rains.
A business-to-business marketer might send you a relevant white paper written by an authority in the field as a way to get in the door. But B2B might also create seminars held at luxury hotels and hosted by well-known experts as marketing tools.
Where the various advertising disciplines diverge is in the structure and value of their transactions.
