Cialdini’s 7 principles of influence.
Why only two rooms left at my favourite hotel? I’d better book quickly! That’s what booking.com hopes you’re thinking the moment you see scarcity. Scarcity is one of Cialdini’s seven principles of influence. I can well imagine this doesn’t mean much to you yet. Yet you’ve probably come across it regularly.
Timeless principles
Why do people comply with requests from others? That’s the question at the centre of the career of researcher and former professor Robert Cialdini. His career already began in 1967, and after 17 years he managed to define the first answers to this question. This is how Cialdini’s first six principles of influence came about, which were described in the book ‘Influence’.
Although Cialdini has officially already retired, he still keeps working on the central question of his career. A new book appeared in 2016 called ‘Pre-Suasion‘. Cialdini himself says the following about this book: “unlike ‘Influence’, which mainly covered how to best construct a message to bring about agreement, ‘Pre-suasion’ describes the process of gaining permission with a message before it’s sent.”
This is how Cialdini’s seven principles of influence came about. All revolving around that one question. Nowadays, you can find these principles in many different forms. There are probably thousands of webshops, for example, that all approach the principles in a different way, or precisely the same way. And all that based on a book that came out more than 30 years ago.
From reciprocity to unity
Before we dive a bit deeper into the various principles, let me first briefly explain them. This way you’ll at least know which seven principles there are and what they involve.
Reciprocity: the mechanism of giving, receiving and giving back again.
Social proof: if others are doing it too, it must be good.
Consistency: if you say ‘yes’ once, you might as well say ‘yes’ again.
Authority: if someone with status says it, it must surely be true.
Liking: I like this person, so I’ll go along with it.
Scarcity: it’ll be gone soon, so I’d better buy it quickly.
Unity: someone like me agrees with it, so I will too.
Despite the fact that six of Cialdini’s seven principles of influence are at least 30 years old, they’re still regularly deployed by marketers today. And not without reason. Booking.com is an excellent example of this. As consumers, we’re all influenced by the scarcity they create by indicating that only two rooms are still available. Unconsciously, this causes a bit of panic. What if that nice hotel is already fully booked tomorrow? Let’s dive a bit deeper into the material and really figure out how it works.
1. Reciprocity
Reciprocity, a fancy word for mutual exchange, is the ritual of giving, receiving and giving back again. A ritual that isn’t literally discussed, but is felt. Marketers mainly focus on the ‘giving back’ part. But the ‘receiving’ part also plays an important role.
We all know the saying: ‘don’t look a gift horse in the mouth’. And that’s often how it feels when you get something for free. Maybe you don’t have any use for it at all, but it’s free and it’s given to you. Once the receiving has happened, there’s a feeling of necessity to give or do something back. That’s what the whole principle of reciprocity is based on. The unconscious urge to do something in return.
But how is this then applied concretely by marketers? For example, by offering a free e-book, carrying out a first introductory conversation for free, or through a personal discount code. We all know very well that we’re not the only ones who get to see this offer, but the feeling that we need to do something in return still dominates.
2. Social proof
Social proof has everything to do with herd behaviour. Are a lot of people doing it? Then I’ll do it too. In hotels, for example, this is applied to get people to use their towel more than once. They indicate that 95% of guests use a towel two or three times. And if 95% of guests do this, why wouldn’t you?
With the principle of social proof, it’s mainly about a quantity or a high percentage of people showing certain behaviour. The more people do this, the sooner you’re inclined to do it too. All to belong to the group.
So you have the example of a hotel using a high percentage to indicate that many people use the towel 2 times or more. But we see this principle come back much more often. For example, various webshops regularly indicate that X number of people bought this product before you too. This makes the product interesting and trustworthy, or at least that’s what you think.
3. Consistency
According to Cialdini’s principles of influence, consistency is a good way to get people to say ‘yes’ to things they might actually not want. Once you say ‘yes’, there’s a greater chance you’ll keep saying ‘yes’. Imagine you’re doing a fun quiz online and you’ve already filled in ‘yes’ five times in a row. At the end of the quiz comes the question of whether you want to give your email address to subscribe to the newsletter. The chance that you’ll actually do this is considerably greater because you’ve already answered ‘yes’ multiple times.
4. Authority
If Frans Bauer says this takeaway Chinese restaurant is the best in the Netherlands, then it must be true. In this example, Frans Bauer is the authority because all of the Netherlands knows how crazy he is about takeaway Chinese food. Okay, this example might not be ideal, but you get the picture I’m trying to sketch. Authority is about deploying people, institutions and successful organisations to lend authority to your message.
Applying this principle is relatively simple. Just mentioning a well-known name can already make people more likely to click. Have you written a book and has it been reviewed positively by a well-known author? Then you’ll want that on the cover so potential buyers see it. Because if someone with status says something, it must be true, right?
5. Liking
The feeling of affection or approval, that’s liking. Liking is easily evoked, for example, by deploying dogs or cats. Or by displaying behaviour that people generally find pleasant. Do people like you? Then they’ll be more inclined to make a purchase from you. We simply say ‘yes’ faster when we like someone.
But how can you apply this to your webshop or website? Think, for example, of your ‘about us’ page. Try to present your colleagues in a human way. Let them tell a bit about their hobbies and interests. Or try to make a joke every now and then in your website texts. Bol.com, for example, does this really well by making puns in their social media posts. This creates a human and ‘likeable’ impression.
6. Scarcity
By now we all pretty much know the principle of scarcity: it’ll be gone soon, so I need to buy it quickly now. You see this come back in a lot of places. A supermarket, for example, uses the principle with “while stocks last” promotions. This gives you the idea that you should take it now, otherwise you might be too late.
By stating in your webshop that, for example, a certain type of parasol is almost sold out, you create scarcity. Or place a timer on the product page indicating that the promotion is only valid for 3 more minutes. All these examples create an unconscious panic and the urge to quickly move to conversion.
7. Unity
The most recent addition to Cialdini’s principles of influence is therefore unity. Cialdini describes unity as a qualitative principle. The principle of unity means you agree with something because someone who resembles you also does. When you’re part of a certain group, it’s easy to go along with that group.
Incidentally, people also unconsciously identify with people they don’t necessarily know. For example, you quickly feel a bond with other Dutch people who happen to also be on holiday exactly where you are. It works the same way with mothers: you feel connected to other mothers, even though you don’t know each other.
But how do we further apply the principle of unity? Make sure your visitor becomes part of a group. Give, for example, a certain group of people “early access” to test your product. Or use specific jargon that fits your target audience. By creating a feeling of unity, people stick around faster and move to repeat conversion faster.
Manipulation or innocent marketing?
By using Cialdini’s principles of influence, you’re actually manipulating the visitors on your website. You’re playing into unconscious triggers and thereby making sure your visitors do exactly what you want them to do. Is this really as innocent as you think?
It’s possible you weren’t fully aware of everything that unconsciously happens to you when you’re in the buying process. Now that you’ve read this blog and can pick out the various principles yourself from webshops, what do you think of it? Are we going a bit too far by playing on the subconscious?
When you’re calmly browsing through various holidays, you’re not just influenced by a notification of scarcity. As you go deeper into the customer journey, you do become more susceptible to it. So in my opinion, it’s simply innocent marketing, as long as it stays that way. What’s your opinion?