PERSUASION, THE KEY EVERYTHING

Wikipedia says PERSUASION is the influence of beliefs, attitudes, intentions, motivations, or behaviors. They go on to say that it’s a process aimed at changing a person's (or a group's) attitude or behavior toward some event, idea, object, or other person(s), by using written or spoken words to convey information, feelings, or reasoning, or a combination thereof.

That’s pretty good. Persuasion certainly is one of the several way in which you use communication. You often communicate with the intention of persuading an individual or a group of people. With this aim in mind, you might all want to get better at persuading huh.

Think about how important it is to be able to get others to do what you want and immediately a few benefits for learning to speak more persuasive should spring to mind. You’ll make more money. That’s clearly good. You’ll be a more substantial resource when you are helping others. That’s good too. And of course, you’ll get your way more often. These are obvious reasons to sharpen your persuasion skills.

Now the question is HOW. What specific communication techniques will help a person become more persuasive and how can they be practiced and learned? Well, some of the basic techniques have names. Here are a few: The Magic Opening technique. The Magic Word. Embedded Commands. The Suppose Ploy. The Any Good Reason Question.

These are persuasive communication techniques you can put to good use when you wish to get people to things for you. Things like: Buy from you. Come in on a Saturday to help you paint the bathroom. Drive more slowly when on the freeway at night. Or vote for you in the upcoming election.

Of course, there are many more opportunities to wield persuasion more effectively. You can probably think of several from your life right now.

Persuasion, specifically outlining how to use the techniques listed above, will be the subject of our CHALK TALK in December 2012 meeting of the Master-Mind Alliance.