Covert Influence...
Tapping into Human Desires and Emotions
(Part 3 of a multi-part series)
Kevin Hogan
Page 2
Ask for Time and You'll Get Money...How Much More?
Had I simply asked if the person would ever be willing to
volunteer time to helping homeless Vets, then follow it up
with a request for a dollar figure....I didn't know I'd have
increased my receipts in donations by 1/2...or a whole lot
more.
Hidden Influence is at work even online...
Ask people at a website if they would be willing to donate
their time then ask how much they would donate to
the Lung Association, the average donation was $36
for those who were simply asked (not agreed) to donate
their time. The other half of the people were NOT asked
to donate their time. Just the factual statement about the
organization and problem.
How much was the average here?
$24.
The difference between those numbers is easily...enough
to sink an organization (or a corporation) or make it
a stellar success and cause business to thrive.
One little question.
That's it.
One question.
"Because time consumption is associated with emotional
experiences, thinking about donating time reminds people of the
happiness achieved through helping others," write authors Wendy
Liu (UCLA) and Jennifer Aaker (Stanford).
They explain that the effect cannot be explained by guilt about
not donating time, since people first asked to donate time agree
to donate more money and more time than other groups.
But one study does not a science make.
In the next study, researchers introduced undergraduates to the
work of HopeLab, a nonprofit organization that serves children
with chronic illnesses. The average donation level was nearly
five times higher for participants who were first asked about
donating their time to the organization.
Additionally, the
numbers of people who volunteered their time and the number of
people who actually followed up and did volunteer work were both
higher in that group.
5 X (5 times higher) is waaaaaaaaaaay beyond "statistically significant". That's the
stuff of great success vs. short term survival only.
A third study replicated the findings from
the first two studies and also explored the feelings that arose
when people thought about donating time.
"We argue that thinking about time activates goals of well-
being and beliefs involving personal happiness. In contrast,
thinking about money suppresses such emotional goals and instead
activates goals of economic utility and beliefs about attainment
of such goals," the authors explain.
Do you ever ask someone for money?
What is the corollary between time and money here for what
you sell and market?
Oh yes...there is a lot more that we can get from looking at
the donation seeking process and seeking donations is the same
process that occurs in any other sales transaction.
Who's the beneficiary when you sell your product or service?
(If you don't know, your sales are indeed terrible.)
Let's forget the beneficiary, the employees at the office,
the ability to hire more people, the ability to not have to fire
people, the ability to sustain or increase YOUR income....
you get the idea....
What emotions do you need to tap into with Covert Influence?
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5 X (5 times higher) is waaaaaaaaaaay beyond "statistically significant". That's the
stuff of great success vs. short term survival only.
