Connect Emotionally

In business world, we like to think that business professionals use reason to make their decisions, yet if scratch below the surface, we will find the emotion at play. Good persuaders should be aware of the primacy of emotions and are responsible to those emotions. You, a persuader, need to show that your commitment to a goal is not only just in your mind but in your heart. Without this demonstration of feeling, people might wonder if you are passionate about what you are saying. 

More importantly, you may need to have a strong and precise of the audience’s emotions, and adjust the tone of your argument accordingly. You come up with strong and forceful point, however, you should whisper with the smooth and soft tone. On the other hand, if you act too emotional, it will make your argument lack of credibility. Thus, it is crucial that you are able to match your emotional eagerness to the audiences’ abilities to receive the messages (Conger, 1998).  


Leave me a comment of what you guys think toward this topic, I would love to hear from you guys

This clip will give you more information about the persuasion and the emotion.

References

Conger, J. A (1998). The necessary art of persuasion. Retrieved from http://www.annbadillo.com/leadership/files/necessary_art_persuasion_jay_conger.pdf 

Petertemplelive. (2011, October 8). Persuasive presentation: Why you absolutely have to believe in your message [Video file]. Retrieved from http://youtu.be/tnY8UUaA75E

Reducing Resistance

You can diminish resistance by addressing What if? questions and establishing creditability. Assume that you are writing the letter to the CEO to ask him or her to budget your department. You might need to address the What if? scenarios.  For instance, you might need to ask yourself what if the CEO says that it is not necessary to budget your department. You might need to prepare facts to support you points. You should counter the resistance with finesse, and be focused on your objective. Hence, always ask yourself what if? …

In addition, in order to be persuasive, you need to have creditable and reasonable points. More importantly, you might need to establish your expertise, refer your social work background, or show your talents, to make your points more believable (Guffey, Rhodes, & Rogin, 2011, p. 279).

 Put yourself in yourself in someone else shoes!!!

References

Guffey, M.E., Rhodes, K., & Rogin, P. (2011) Business communication: Process and product (6^th Canadian ed.). Toronto, ON: Nelson.

Torriii. (2010).  Put yourself in someone else’s shoes. [Photograph]. Retrieved from http://www.flickr.com/photos/vickkii/4950827319/in/photostream

Building Interest

Now it comes to the question that what will you use in order to gain audience's interest? Here are the tools that will help to answer the question. 

·         Facts, statistics

·         Expert opinion

·         Specific details

·         Direct benefits

·         Examples

·         Indirect benefits

Presenting both direct and indirect benefits is important. For example, if you were working for the public charity and you asked the audiences for donation, you would need to introduce to the audiences both direct and indirect benefits. Direct benefit would be the promote donor’s names, and indirect benefits would be an appreciated feeling of helping the charity, as well as society (Guffey, Rhodes, & Rogin, 2011, p. 278). 

Let say, if someone told you about the benefits of their product, what supporting point do you expect them to have in order to prove their point? 

References

Guffey, M.E., Rhodes, K., & Rogin, P. (2011) Business communication: Process and product (6^th Canadian ed.). Toronto, ON: Nelson.

Persuasion and the Tone

Tone is very important in terms of gaining compliance and attention from audiences. Using the tone that indicates the audience benefits becomes the significant tool that will help you to hold their obedience. Please note that threatening sound does not help you to be a successful persuader. 

Guffey, Rhodes, and Rogin (2011), the authors of book titled Business communication: Process and product, suggested that the following techniques would help the persuaders to improve the tone of requests. 

· Avoid sounding preachy or parental.  People don’t want to be lectured or instructed in demeaning manner. No one likes to be treated lie a child.

· Don’t pull rank. Effective persuasion doesn’t result for the status or authority. People want to be recognized as individuals of worth. Pulling rank may secure compliance but not buy-in.

· Avoid making threats. People may comply when threatened, but their compliance may disappear over time. For example, many drivers follow the speed limit only when a patrol car is near. Threats also may result in retaliation, reduced productivity, and low morale.

· Soften your words when persuading upward. When you must persuade someone who has more clout than you, use words such as suggest and recommend. Craft sentence that begin with it might be a good idea to … make suggestions without threatening authority.

· Be enthusiastic. Convey your passion for an idea through your body language, voice and words. When you enthusiastically request something to be done, people feel more confident that they can do it.

· Be positive and likable. If people feel positively toward you and perceive you as a friend, they are more likely to agree with you. Use sincere compliments and praise. Describe what a positive impact others have had. Offer to reciprocate if you are asking a favor (p. 275).

 Watch this clip, it can help improve your persuasive skills

Reference

Guffey, M.E., Rhodes, K., & Rogin, P. (2011) Business communication: Process and product (6^th Canadian ed.). Toronto, ON: Nelson.

Marketingincltd. (2009, April 3). Magic Words of Persuasion [Video file]. Retrieved from http://youtu.be/wfbH3r-A7mw 

Less is More

Let’s say if you were a business owner, and you wanted to persuade a bank to finance your business. You would need to be clear about your objective. Evaluate your business assets and capital, and find the creditable reason and argument, which you will present to the bank. Do not ask for a loan worth $200,000, whereas your business capital is worth only $10,000. 

According to Santos, Leve and Pratkanis1994’s experiment, it was concluded that “the less is more”. Santos, Leve and Pratkanis conducted an experiment by getting a panhandler beggar to ask passersby for money. In the control conditions, when they asked "Can you spare any change?" 44 percent of passersby complied. When they asked "Can you spare a quarter?" the compliance rate increased to 64 percent. When they asked "Can you spare 17 cents?" about 75 percent of people made a contribution” (Jones & Motluk, n.d).

References

Jones, D., & Motluk, A. (n.d). The power of persuasion: Eight ways to get exactly what you want. Retrieved form http://www.mindpowernews.com/PersuasionScience.htm  

Marketing Fitness. (2011). Less is more? [Photograph]. Retrieved from http://fitnesswebsitedesigning.com/less-is-more/

Effective Persuasion Techniques

Before writing or presenting persuasive message, you may need to spend some time to think about receivers’ perspectives. Receivers will tend to ignore what you are offering them, if you only focus on the important strategies.  According to the book titled Business communication: Process and product, these techniques will help you to be more persuasive. 

·         Establish credibility.

In terms of receiver perspectives, it is important that you are creditable enough to hold their attention. You may need to support your point by research and expert opinion.

·         Make a reasonable and precise request.

An effective persuasion needs to be trustful and reasonable. Ask yourself, would you lend someone a loan worth $200,000, while their business assets were worth only $10,000, if you were a manger of the bank? Please keep in mind that be focused on the reasonable objective.  

·         Tie fact to the benefits.

Using the statistics, facts, printed resources, and examples to support and help audiences to understand you points. However, facts, number or graphs do not change their attitudes, it is important to summarize and converts those facts into benefits for the audiences.

·         Recognize the power of loss.

Presenting the advantages of your suggestion is important. Though, pointing consequences, which will occur if he or she does not agree, is also a good tool to motivate their actions. The threat of losing something that one has, such as money, time, and reputation, seems important to them, and thus they will likely to do what you suggest in order to prevent the loss.  

·         Expect and overcome resistance.

You, a persuader, need to overcome the conflicts that will occur. The conflict might be contrasting beliefs, opinions, and perception. Recognize the weaknesses of your points and encounter those weaknesses by facts and statistics.

·         Share solution and compromise.

 Persuasion’s procedure may require flexible and acceptable solution.  You might ask for audiences’ points of view in order to make the solution clear and avoid mistakes. Furthermore, asking the audiences to share their thoughts is a significant tool to make them appreciated that they are parts of the solution, and therefore they “buy in” and become more eager to implement the solution (Guffey, Rhodes, & Rogin, 2011, p. 274). 

Try this clip!!!

References

Guffey, M.E., Rhodes, K., & Rogin, P. (2011) Business communication: Process and product (6^th Canadian ed.). Toronto, ON: Nelson.

Anti1347. (2010, December 4). Persuasion techniques to get anyone’s attention fast [Video file]. Retrieved from http://youtu.be/w-6MPbTLnbY 

What is Persuasion?

Persuasion is inducing one or more people to willingly and knowingly do something for you that they had not initially planned or even wanted to do for your purpose. Persuasion is getting people interested in doing as you suggest when they are originally not particularly interested in that.

Persuasion works by influencing the other person to change. They are going to do something that they did not initially want to do, and they are going to do it because of you. You, as the persuader, are an agent of change (Ciccarelli, Harrigan, & Fritzley, 2010, p. 390).

In business perspective, persuasion is the art of convicting customers about your products or services for the purpose of selling through marketing communication.

References
Ciccarelli, S.K., Harrigan, T. & Fritzley, V.H. (2010). Psychology. Toronto: Pearson.

Brian Tracy, (2012).  How to Persuade and Influence People to Achieve Personal Power[Photograph]. Retrieved from http://www.briantracy.com/blog/personal-success/how-to-persuade-and-influence-people-to-achieve-personal-power/

 

Formatting Press Releases

• A good press release should be easy to read, clear and simple. It should be written in universally accepted font.
• It is important that a press release to be formatted for maximum consistency in transmitting across multiple computer platforms.
• Usually, companies delivering press releases by email. Therefore, it is crucial to avoid using bold and italicized and colored text, as it is unpredictable how that same text will appear on someone else's monitor.

According to Colorado State University, a press release must consists of these 5 basic elements:  

1)       Title

2)       Headline

3)       Body

4)       Contact Information

5)       Ending
 

Title

•    A press release should always begin with the title words, FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, or simply, PRESS RELEASE. This specifies to the media that the announcement they are receiving is a press release, and that it can be published immediately. It also eliminates the need for a cover letter.

Headline

• The headline, separated by one space, should follow the title of a press release. If at all possible, it should contain no more than ten words.
• The first letter of each key word should be capitalized. Articles, conjunctions, and prepositions should be capitalized only when they occur at the beginning or end of your headline.

Body

• The body of a press release should contain all the information the media outlet is being asked to publish.
• It should be separated from the headline by one space, as should each of its paragraphs.
• A press release should begin with a lead paragraph and conclude with a boilerplate.
• A disclaimer should follow whenever an opportunity exists for information to be misconstrued.

Contact Information

• The sender's contact information should always follow the body of a press release, separated by one space. This information should never be placed at the top of the page.
• The top of a press release is premium copy space and should be reserved for attention grabbing copy such as a headline and lead paragraph. It should never be used for incidental information.
• When a press release, delivered by E-mail, pops up on a computer monitor, the headline and lead paragraph should display prominently. The reader shouldn't have to scroll down in order to find these elements. 
• If a member of the media wishes to contact the source of a press release, they know to look for that information at the end of the document.

Ending

• The end of the press release should be stated with one of these three universally accepted characters, which are -30- ,   ###      , End.
• If your press release is delivered by any other method than E-mail and exceeds one page in length, the word More should appear at the bottom of all but the last page
  (Colorado State University. n,d).

References

Colorado State University. (n,d). Formatting press releases. Retrieved from http://writing.colostate.edu/guides/documents/business_writing/business_press_releases/formatting.cfm 

Google’s press release [Photograph]. (1998) Retrieved June 26, 2012, from:  Guffey, M.E., Rhodes, K., & Rogin, P. (2011) Business communication: Process and product (6^th Canadian ed.). Toronto, ON: Nelson.

 

Press Peleases VS Advertorials

A press release enables a PR (Public Relation) department to release information of the company in the form of a specially prepared brief or precis for immediate publication in a responsible medium. Press releases do not attract charges for insertion for publication (i.e they are not viewed as advertisements) because they contain issues of import viewed as newsworthy by the publication involved.

Company cannot directly purchase or procure the publication of press releases from the media.  Press releases are effective free publicity. If your company does not have the internal expertise to produce the press releases, it might need to use external specialist, such as PR Company, to produce an effective press release.  

Advertorials are slightly different in that they are paid advertisements, again in appropriate media, which by their appearance give the impression of being third-party write-ups about the company seeking to market its image and standing. Such advertorials are produced either internal expertise or by external specialist PR companies, only in the second case will buyers need to be concerned about acquiring value for-money services (Beauchamp, 1995).

This picture is an example of a press release 

References

Beauchamp, M. (1995). Procuring persuasive PR. Purchasing & Supply Management, 34-34. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/224994684?accountid=3455 

Marketing words. (2000). CNN’s press release: Industry watch [Photograph]. Retrieved from http://www.marketingwords.com/portfolio.html

Characteristic of Good Persuasive Press Releases

          Assume that you are running a business, and you would like to make an announcement to your customers about your new products or services, you want to make them interested in what you are telling them and want what you are selling. Guffey, Rhodes, and Rogin (2011), the authors of the book titled Business communication: Process and product, suggested that the following techniques would help you to develop a persuasive press release.  

• Open with an attention- getting lead or summary of the important facts.
• Include answers to the five Ws and H (what, when, where, who, why and how) in the article, but not all in the first sentence.
• Know what your market target  (audience)
• Appeal to the audience of target media. Emphasize reader benefits written in the style of the focus publication on newscast
• Present the most important information early, followed by supporting information. Don’t put your best ideas last because they may be the chopped off or ignored
• Make the release visually appealing. Limit the text to one or two double-spaced pages with attractive formatting.
• Look and sound credible- no type, no imaginative spelling or punctuation, no factual errors (p. 301).

Please note: It is important that a good persuasive press release needs to spotlight receiver benefits.

Uhhh... Should I need to pay attention to it???

 

Reference

Guffey, M.E., Rhodes, K., & Rogin, P. (2011) Business communication: Process and product (6^th Canadian ed.). Toronto, ON: Nelson.   

Business education. (n.d). Factors affecting or influencing consumer behavior [Photograph]. Retrieved from http://forbstudents.blogspot.ca/2009/08/factors-affecting-consumer-behavior_14.html

What is a Press Release?

 According to The Free Dictionary by FARLEX, a press release is an announcement of an event, performance, or other newsworthy item that is issued to the press (Press release, n.d)

Press (news) releases announce information about your company to the media. Press release enable you to make announcement about your new products or services, new manager of your organization, award given or received, joint ventures, donations, etc (Guffey, Rhodes, & Rogin, 2011, p. 301).

References

Press release (n.d.). The Free Dictionary. Retrieved from http://www.thefreedictionary.com/press+release 

Guffey, M.E., Rhodes, K., & Rogin, P. (2011) Business communication: Process and product (6^th Canadian ed.). Toronto, ON: Nelson.