A couple of years ago I read an interesting book by Dr. Robert Cialdini. A Regents Professor at Arizona State University, Dr. Cialdini is a social psychologist..
I decided recently to re-read his book, “Influence: Science and Practice”. This work centers on influence triggers that help someone to say yes.
Like it or not we, in the real estate industry, are influence peddlers. We are trying to help people make good decisions. Yet many of us struggle with making decisions.
In particular we often hesitate when making big decisions. The assessment of buying or selling real estate is a major event. The process of choosing the best financing option is equally complex.
Even the process of who to work with can be difficult for homeowners. Which agent do I work with? How can I find a lender I trust?
Equally we have to make decisions within our business partner referral networks. Building these referral networks causes us to develop principles of influence.
What are the influence concepts that Dr. Cialdini identifies:
- Reciprocity
- Commitment and Consistency
- Social Proof
- Liking
- Authority
- Scarcity
Dr. Cialdini spent three years working with a variety of sales related organization in research for this 
book. He went through numerous sales trainings and shadowed sales practitioners evaluating the tolls used to influence people to saying yes.
The result of this research led him to identifying these six key influence tools. He points out that when we have the time and inclination to conduct a thorough analysis to reach a decision we will.
However, in today’s fast paced mode of living, we tend to use short cuts to make these decisions. Dr. Cialdini asserts the element of influence of: reciprocity, commitment and consistency, social proof, liking, authority and scarcity provide the shortcuts for decision making.
For those that are interested I am including a link to amazon where you can order the book, “Influence: Science and Practice”. You can also navigate to Dr. Cialdin’s web site by clicking Influenceatwork.com.
Stay tuned and come back as we provide more thoughts and opinions on each of these six factors of influence.
What are your thoughts on developing influence techniques as part of your sales process? Can you think of how you have utilized these principles?
Jay Williams
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Jay, this is a very intriguing post. I am always interested in helping the way I communicate with the people we work with. Thanks for writing about this.