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Summary: Great for marketers, consumers ... even parents!
Review: The persuasive skills this guy shares will make you a more effective marketer, sales person, or negotiator. It will also help you recognize when you're being manipulated by one of the above, so it's a must read for everyone. For your own purposes, whether you're selling a product or negotiating bed time with your kids, you'll find the ammunition you need to come out ahead... and do it ethically. Plus, you'll see what those who might not be as ethical might try to pull on you, and how to counter it. Gotta get this book!
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Summary: Useful and interesting.
Review: *Influence: the Psychology of Persuasion* is one of the most useful books I have read in a long time. Its author, Robert Cialdini, a psychology professor at Arizona State University, applies his technical background to the task of explaining in everyday terms a subject that impacts all of us: persuasion, and the psychological principles that make it work. Sales professionals are a natural audience for this book; they will find in it the explicit theory and scientific research behind what they have already been doing for years by instinct and trial-and-error. For the rest of us, this book is a powerful defense against those manipulators who seek to exploit our psychological vulnerabilities to get us to comply with their desires. Cialdini's basic theoretical perspective is that, to deal with a complex world, our brains have automatized responses to various phenomena. In the long-run and in general, these mental mechanisms are practical tools, enabling us to live in society harmoniously and to make decisions quickly and with minimal effort. In specific cases, however, they can misfire, leading to bad decisions. Hence our vulnerability to people who know how these mechanisms work when we do not. After introducing his subject, the author tackles six of these "weapons of influence" in six chapters. He first explains what they are and how they are used, utilizing personal anecdotes, scientific studies and vivid real life examples to make his case. Much of this is fascinating stuff. For example, according to Cialdini, some of the very techniques advertisers and salespeople use today were used during the Korean War to seduce American POWs into collaborating with their Chinese captors. And the Hare Krishna Society, its fundraising efforts in the 1960s frought with public relations problems, owed its dramatic turnaround in the 1970s to the adoption of solicitation tactics based on shrewd psychology. Cialdini then rounds off each chapter by suggesting what we can do to defend ourselves. He is not a behavioral determinist; half of not falling prey to our unconscious responses is simply being aware that they exist and then taking action to circumvent them or to leverage them in our favor. For the record, I must state that this book is not perfect. Cialdini sometimes interprets human psychology in ways that I do not believe are warranted given the studies he cites. But endnotes and an ample bibliography are included for readers who are interested in doing further research. Taken with a grain of salt, I believe *Influence* is a worthy read--whether you are a sales professional, or someone who is unwilling to be an easy mark for one.
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Summary: Now it all makes sense!
Review: Excellent, this book ties all the marketing I've ever learned into a tight little bundle. Offers incredible insight into why we are influenced, persuaded, conditioned to react to sales and marketing pitches. Invaluable for understanding why the consuming public reacts to various marketing tools. As you read and understand "why", you cannot help but apply these tenets to the projects you are now involved with. I loved it!
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Summary: Buy "Influence-science and practice" instead
Review: Dont buy this book:"Influence- the psychology persuasion". Buy "Influence-science and practice" instead as they are the same book !! It seems that the latter is more up-to-date. P.
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Summary: Like Fire, this book is Friend and Foe
Review: My brother, once again, put me on a great book that I wouldn't have glanced at otherwise, Robert Cialdini's INFLUENCE, THE PSYCHOLOGY OF PERSUASION. Cialdini is mostly interested in the way marketers use psychological persuasion to sell products. He writes of 6 definite techniques in which sellers can make buyers comply. In each technique he explains a classic example of how that technique is used. He demonstrates how the Chinese Prison Camp officials were able to coax anti-American statements from American POW's during the Korean War, why 30 eye witnesses did nothing to stop the beating and murder of a woman in New York City, and how Jim Jones was able to persuade his followers to mass suicide. Scary, but they are the same phenomenon that helps Bubba sell you a car. The book works on both edges of the sword. While Cialdini's focus is to make consumers better informed about the way they are sold products, the quote on the front suggests that its the most important book for marketers in 10 years. Meaning that the information will not only help consumers steer clear from phony salesmen, but that phony salesmen will be even better prepared to be phony if they read the book before you. If you're Machiavellian, you'll enjoy your new powers of persuasion. If you're more virtuous, you enjoy the ability to thwart the powers of these characters. Either way, I suggest you be the first one on your block to read it.
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Summary: I loved it!
Review: This is one of the most profound and influential (excuse the pun) books I've ever read. My wife and I fought over it! I am a Public Speaking Coach focused on high tech executives. I have a background in sales and marketing. I have found this book to be a gold mine of information for all of these areas. I have reccomended the book to everyone that I know. I intend to add it to the Bibliography section of my website.
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Summary: One the few books that changes the way you look at the world
Review: I read this book as lark. I am very impressed my cialdini's research. You will never treat an encounter with a sales professionals the same way. He took a 3 year sabbatical to study how "compliance professionals" (salespeople) work their trade. He observed people in many different trades, car sales, vacuum sales, door-to-door, waiters, clothing sales professionals. From his observations, he distilled six techniques. Moreover, his theories are not just theories, but they are backed up by research, his own and other. This is one of the few books that will change the way you look at the world.
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Summary: Marvelous
Review: Robert "Babyface" Cialdini's much awaited follow-up to "It's an Uzi, Dummy!" contains many helpful tips at winning others to your way of thinking. Excellent.
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Summary: Extremely Interesting book
Review: I was assigned a book report to do for my psychology college course one day. After looking around for a interesting novel i happened to find this one. Then the general search brought me upon Robery Cialdinis book The psychology of persuasion. After recieveing the book, i begain to thus read it. Through out the whole novel, i was just noding my head, replaying in my mind instinces of such events happenening to me. I work in retail, and i use the same rules as described in the book, but just never knew why. now i know. It works people. Read this book and you will at least be aware of others actions. Protect yourself, and your wallet, it is the least you can do
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Summary: I almost feel too greedy to share such powerful knowledge
Review: I really feel like telling the world that this book was awful, simply because I do not want anyone else to read it and gain such amazing knowledge. Possessing the invaluable insight in this book makes me feel powerful just knowing that others do not have it. But since the greatness of this book was passed along to me, I feel that it is only right to make a good review of it and possibly influence some lucky person to read it too. I actually first read the textbook version in college and I must admit that it was undoubtedly the only required reading in college that was actually of any value to me, except for the fact that if I didn't read all those other books I probably would have failed out. The truth is that this book made the class so worthwhile and the class actually made my whole 4 year univeristy experience complete. It was the last class I took before I graduated and without it I sincerely would not have been able to look back on my college experience and pick out any one class that stood out in my mind as totally fulfilling in every way. That class will always stand alone, and don't get me wrong, the book IS the class (with all due respect to my professor). I actually did the reading assignments before the lecture! Of course reading everything after-the-fact never stopped me from getting good grades, so why start doing it for my last class? Well this time I actually looked forward to reading what was next. Many times I had to stop myself from reading ahead just so I could concentrate on the lesson at hand. Actually if you find my review to be worthless and decide NOT to buy it, I will still be satisfied. Not everyone needs to know what is in this book.
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