Who Owns Your Brain?

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Advertisers are very clever in how they leverage human nature.

Two aspects of influence are scarcity, and commitment and consistency.

Scarcity is well known.

All else equal, the scarcer something is, the more we want it.

An experiment demonstrated this very well.

Some guy set up a cookie experiment.

The had a jar of cookies, and he asked people to eat a cookie, and then fill out a questionnaire about the cookie.

The thing that made the most difference, as far as "cookie satisfaction," was how many cookies were in the jar.

When the jar was full (no scarcity) the cookies were so-so.

When the jar was nearly empty (scarcity) the cookies tasted much better.

Advertisers use this all the time.

This is a common rule in relationships.

If you are too available, they'll lose interest.

If you are scarce, you'll increase interest.

Another law of influence is commitment and consistency.

We keep doing what we keep doing.

If you say something publicly, you'll be much more likely to follow through.

Here's how advertisers used to leverage this back in the days of heavy TV ads during Christmastime.

They'd blast ads for a kids toy.

So much that plenty of kids would make their parents promise to give it to them.

(Carefully embedded in the ad was the idea that kids should get their parents to promise).

Then when shopping time came, the toys vanished.

Parents scrambled.

No toys.

The ads kept coming.

So the parents had to buy a replacement toy.

Kids were upset.

Parents felt like they'd broken promises to their kids.

Two months later, suddenly the toys were available.

Hey daddy! They have those toys now! You promised!

The company, through advertising and clever use of known triggers of influence, managed to sell TWICE as many toys.

Nobody was the wiser.

This is easy to see once you know how to look.

Most people don't.

Which means most people are easy marks.

For the TONS of clever advertising and marketing.

Not only of big companies.

But politicians and even entire belief systems.

It's very easy to get swept up in common thinking.

But generally speaking, there's usually somebody (or some entity) behind the scenes.

Somebody's always got an angle.

How to defend yourself?

Learn to think carefully.

Critically.

Ask yourself why you're doing things.

Or better yet, choose to do things based on YOUR conscious choice.

This takes time.

This takes planning.

These takes strength of thinking.

Because if YOU don't use your brain, somebody else will.

Learn More:

http://mindpersuasion.com/nlp/