Mass Persuasion is manipulation,
plain and simple, right?
serving vs. self-serving:
In our last post, we looked how Kate Smith repeated 65 messages during her 18-hour radio marathon, ending each one with the exact same five words: “Will you buy a bond?”
You learned that the key to repeating messages so that your prospects pay attention to them rather than ignore them is to create the belief that what you are doing is special. And the master key is that your messages themselves need to vary in their exact wording.
And before that, I showed you how you can use themes during a marathon to turn your prospects into zombies under your total control, and even gave you quotes from buyers to prove it:
- “We never left her that day. We stood by her side. I didn’t go out all day”
- “I was glad at the end of the day and her job was over and I didn’t have to listen to her anymore”
- “It was actually hounding you to get a bond. Possibly if the radio wasn’t on all day I would have let it go”
- “Usually I get tired of listening and I turn it off. It’s funny, whenever there is any commercial on, you turn it off, but then I had it on all afternoon. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I had to keep listening“
Given the fact that Mass Persuasion is truly powerful, and given the fact that you are a responsible person truly concerned about the welfare of your prospects rather than merely being interested in harvesting their bank accounts, you’re probably wondering this extremely important question:
What’s the difference between Mass Persuasion and propaganda?
Mass Persuasion is manipulation, plain and simple, right? Or not?
Let’s see if it is or not by looking at each of them:
Mass Persuasion takes advantage of any of the credibility factors to build trust for a hidden purpose (to make profits) that serves both you and your audience. For example, your audience benefits when they “Get this health information free and try out our health remedy (guaranteed to work or you pay nothing)” while you benefit from the profits from those who order and reorder (hidden purpose).
Propaganda takes advantage of the factor called “recognized authority” and the implied trust people place in those in positions of authority in order to put forth lies that build trust for a hidden purpose (such as gaining a solid military base in another region or to secure vital national resources) that does not serve your audience and may even harm both of you. Getting people to go to war is a great example.
The difference between the two is that Mass Persuasion makes sure your audience is tended to and taken care of, while propaganda is delighted to use them for cannon fodder.
Propaganda is manipulation. Mass Persuasion is not.
Not only is trust handled differently — Mass Persuasion works hard to build up credibility which leads to trust while propaganda merely says, “I’m the leader, trust me.” — but the communication is different:
Mass Persuasion vs. Propaganda:
two-way communication
The difference between Mass Persuasion and propaganda is this:
Mass Persuasion (1) involves a higher degree of social interaction and (2) it lets you as the persuader adapt to the flow of reactions of your audience you want to influence.
Kate Smith’s marathon broadcast did this by:
- using personal language (you, your, yours) to create intimacy (which we learned about earlier in the post on themes
- giving updates, reports on bond borders just coming in, and buyer comments with them (under the theme of competition), all of which brought a “real-time two-way communication” sense to the marathon, in radio, which is usually a one-way broadcast communication (one to many)
By using these, Kate Smith painted a more complete picture of herself, connected more deeply with her listeners, who in turn experienced their guilt, inadequacy, shame, and other emotions, then upon making their pledge, felt Smith was talking personally to them on the radio in giving pledge updates.
We’re fortunate today in our online world that most of our communication can be two-way, near real-time, and even one-to-one by responding directly to email and comments.
Mass Persuasion master tip:
Using persuasion effectively
Please read this very closely. It is the Golden Key to using Mass Persuasion instead of propaganda to get people to act during an event, especially a marathon:
Use personal language, a fact all copywriters and salespeople understand, to create intimacy, which creates a growing sense of personal social obligation to do what you as the seller asks.
Only use updates that can be viewed as gains or successes. Success stories create tremendous momentum. Recall any election where an update reports a candidate winning a state, province, or county. “And Jones moves closer to winning, as yet another county, this time Essex, goes into Jones’ Win column.”
WARNING: It can be tempting to throw your ethics out the window in the pursuit of higher profits and announce gains and successes that don’t exist. This is what unscrupulous leaders do (from totalitarian governments to lying investment fund managers like Bernard Madoff). Do not become a lying propagandist dictator — remain a truthful persuader.
You can see the power of using a marathon to deliver your repeated messages. Can you take it even higher? Yes, you can! Find out in our next post covering Mass Persuasion.
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