The biggest enemy of persuasion is your ego.
No matter how good of an idea you’ve got, part of you wants to be recognized for having or recognizing the good idea.
So when you’re persuading somebody, either to buy your product or watch your movie recommendation, part of you is doing so you’ll be recognized as the “guy with the good idea.”
This feels good as it is programmed as an instinct from our hunter gatherer days. In ancient tribal life, those that were socially recognized got more food, had more sex, and had more power. So the desire to be recognized as something special is as deeply programmed into us as the desire for food, sex, and safety.
However, when we’re persuading, this can be deadly. Why? Because more often than not, the person we’re persuading has their own ideas. And by accepting out ideas, we’re implicitly asking them to ditch their own.
On a deep level, we’re asking them to ditch their own ego, and recognize ours.
Ain’t gonna happen.
It’s about as likely as going out to dinner with a starving buddy and asking him to sit there and watch you eat pizza while they voluntarily starve.
What’s the solution?
Get your ego OUT of the picture.
Construct your persuasive message so they not only choose YOUR idea, but they do so in a way that boosts THEIR ego, not yours. Do this and they’ll be salivating for that buy button, or to do whatever it is you’re suggesting.
How do you do this?
You’ve got to be covert. You’ve got to present just enough information so they make the decision (that you want them to make) on their own, so they feel it’s THEIR decision, not yours.
Nobody likes to be told what to do.
You can do this through stories, metaphors, meandering thoughts on the subject.
This is especially true when you handle objections. We have objections for everything, and our egos are deeply tied to them.
So when you overcome their objections, if are too “in their face” it will backfire.
But if you’re careful, and can anticipate their objections and overcome them covertly (so they think they’re changing their minds for their own reasons) it will be much more successful.
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