The Work as a marketing tool?

[Jack]

I'm not sure if this is relevant here, but I imagine it might be interesting to this forum. I follow mailing lists, forums and blogs for discussions of marketing and sales. I discovered that the best advertising copywriters tend to do a lot of study about psychology, about how people think and how emotions can sway logic.

Here is a recent example of that kind of thinking. Single or double opt-in refers to ways that an email list can be set up. There is a common thought among many email marketers that double opt-in is best. Double opt-in is a more expensive service from email list providers. The author is a guest writer at the blog of a noted expert in advertising writing including the use of promotional email.

This article seems to me to be an example of some astute study of human nature for commercial gain.

_http://www.makepeacetotalpackage.com/daniel-levis/is-confirmed-opt-in-crucifying-your-e-mail-marketing-profits.html

(article follows) ----
Is Confirmed Opt-in Crucifying
Your E-mail Marketing Profits?

Dear Web Business-Builder,

It’s human nature to cling to our beliefs as if they are part of our very identity.

Our beliefs are sacred to us. We are irresistibly drawn to people who validate them …

We are ready to defend them against anyone who challenges them …

And distance ourselves from anyone who criticizes them.

Therefore – as a persuader – prevailing beliefs give you three virtually unguarded pathways to the inner sanctum of the human mind …

1. If you validate the existing beliefs of your target audience … you gain precious rapport and liking from the people you wish to sell to.
2. If you challenge the existing beliefs of your target audience … (As I have with the above headline) you rally them in defense of their accepted dogma — thus drawing vital attention to your sales message …
3. And if you condemn the beliefs of your target market’s enemies … you instantly bond with your target audience like super glue.

Few people examine
their beliefs objectively …

If you’ve ever done so, then you know that many of your beliefs are the result of your simply accepting someone else’s truth at face value — without ever testing that truth for yourself.

We all do this …

Instead of rationally coming to our own conclusions, we tend to shortcut our decision process by looking around us. If we see enough other people believing something, we tend to believe it too.

Just one problem with this: pluralistic ignorance.

When everybody is looking to the next guy to do the thinking and the testing for them, the blind can begin leading the blind. And an erroneous conclusion can easily morph into accepted fact.

Dr. Robert Cialdini, in his bestselling book, Influence, The Psychology of Persuasion, gives a shocking example of pluralistic ignorance in action when he relates the tragic tale of Catherine Genovese — a young woman senselessly butchered outside of her apartment while 38 of her neighbors looked on through their living room windows.

Instead of reacting objectively at the evidence before them — the terrible cries of a young woman being savagely beaten, stabbed, and murdered in cold blood before their very eyes — they looked at what their neighbors were doing.

Since each eye-witness to the killing saw lights going on and off in their neighbor’s living rooms across the courtyard, they all assumed that somebody else had already called the police. And no one did.

In a recent mastermind (panel discussion of business issues), a good friend of mine asked:

"Are any of you guys doing single opt-in? This was something I never put much thought into before (I just assumed double opt in was better for no other reason than I never thought about it).

But this post by (name) (link to another marketer's article) makes a helluva case against confirmed opt in. And I’m really inclined to stop using it now."

So I read Jason’s post, and I realized that my friend was right. I too had drunk the double opt-in Kool-Aid without ever testing it.

As a matter of fact, NOBODY in the group had tested it. And these were all serious marketers, selling marketing how-to stuff.

Jason’s blog post basically says that double opt-in is costing you a fortune in lost sales because it puts an unnecessary roadblock in front of perfectly good leads, preventing them from ever seeing your sales message.
Could it be true? Is double opt-in
murdering your profits?

Is requiring your prospects to confirm their subscription after opting in to your mailing list at your website flushing perfectly good profits down the drain?

After all, a healthy percentage of those prospects will NEVER confirm, and you will NEVER e-mail them again — despite your having invested considerable time, money and energy convincing them to opt-in.

E-mail marketing gurus and e-mail service providers have very successfully convinced most of us that double opt-in is the best way to have a clean list … to avoid SPAM complaints … and to ensure we are marketing only to people who are really interested in what we’re selling.

And by implication … that if you do single opt-in you are a spam-splashing, marketing moron, who deserves to be shunned by decent, self-respecting online marketers. Do they have a vested interest in having us believe this? Certainly the service providers do.

I needed to test …

(Article continues with description of how the scientific method was used to conduct an experiment using a matched pair of email systems, in which single vs. double opt in was the experimental variable...)



ADMIN NOTE: Changed thread title to better reflect the topic

 

[Beau]

Jack, I fail to see the connection between what you posted and the Work as Gurdjieff defines it. Essentially, what is being talked about here is ways of getting people to buy something they don't need, want, or desire. Yes, advertising is, and has always been, a study of human nature and the human mind. But it has mostly, if not always, been done for nefarious reasons i.e. to fool people. I don't really understand why you think it's such a positive avenue of discussion or why you think it would be beneficial, with respect to the aims of this forum, other than to understand how they do things. I don't think we're here to "sway people".

 

[Hildegarda]

Essentially, what is being talked about here is ways of getting people to buy something they don't need, want, or desire. Yes, advertising is, and has always been, a study of human nature and the human mind. But it has mostly, if not always, been done for nefarious reasons i.e. to fool people.

I agree -- this is common sense pop-psychology, salesman style; and especially the beginning is straight out of Dale Carnegie.

You may be confusing the hierarchy of ideas here, so to say. One can argue that some aspect of psychological knowledge it can be, and is, a tool of the Work. But the opposite isn't true: Work isn't a tool for psychological knowledge that drives an entirely different goal, as Heimdallr pointed out.

 

[go2]

Jack, I think this is an interesting question. Perhaps the answer depends on who is asking?

The aim of the Work is to awaken a sleeping woman or man. The aim of marketing is to take advantage of a sleeping woman or man. It seems to me, Hildegarda is right, this question confuses levels. The Work understands and encompasses psychology, but try as it might, psychology will never understand or encompass the Work. I know a little of this question from my personal life. In the eighties the Work found me, and I thought it sounded like a good idea for self-improvement. I would be more successful at attaining the American Dream. The old man who talked with me for sometime, laughed when I asked this same question. He knew the Personality did not know Essence. He spoke to Essence and I did not understand that this seed would awaken a conscience which haunted every attempt of Personality to take advantage of the psychological insights. The simple tool of self observation had condemned Personality to see its nefarious motivations and manipulations. The Work protects itself. The old man knew Essence would sit as the unmovable and incorruptible judge of my life. He knew the price of the Work is a life to get a life. This is the price which must be paid in advance. When the price is paid, marketing will mean nothing.

Since I don’t always recognize myself these days, I welcome comments on my comment to check my instrument.

 

[Renaissance]

My initial impression of this thread, particularly to the thread title was..."um, huh? err...no, marketing and the Work don't jive." However, after a second reading I got the impression that Jack was just trying to point out how lies can only get accepted through the utilization of truths. If so, or if not, perhaps Jack can clarify his reasoning and elaborate on his thoughts.

 

[Laura]

Re: Confirmed Opt-in as Confirmation of Belief

Jack, you are not making sense here. As I wrote in response to your posts on another thread:

Some days, medical symptoms limit how much thinking I can do. Today is one of those days. Continuing these discussions on a daily basis is very important to me. I hope I can make some progress today. But I am not sure how much I will be able to do today. If I make less sense than usual today, please go easy on me. If I feel I am not clear headed enough to make much progress, I will come back tomorrow.

I will tell a little more about the cult and see if this is enough for anyone to guess which cult it is. Tomorrow I'll reveal the name.

Jack, this doesn't make much sense. First you say that you will not be making much less sense today and then you continue to post. That is not external consideration. In fact, you are not even considering yourself.

Then, you begin your post as though it is a guessing game for the other readers. Again, that is not external consideration.

There is an almost frenetic, "racing thoughts" flavor to your posting that suggests to me that you might want to consider professional, psychological counseling, not a forum such as this which is really not set up to provide the kind of counseling you may need. You have made it very clear that you were brought up in a cult, that you were very wounded by this, that there are issues about your parents, your health, and frankly, we just aren't equipped or qualified to deal with your issues here.

I hope that you will make the choice to at least consult a qualified counselor for a professional opinion as an adjunct to your own research into the topic.

 

[Jack]

The subject line for this thread was poorly chosen. If it won't break searches, I'd like to change it to a more accurate title: perhaps "psychology in sales writing - is this article psychopathic, or just in poor taste?"

What stood out to me about the article was that the author referred to a terrible, appalling tragedy, but he didn't discuss how it was terrible, appalling, or tragic. Instead, he compared of a vicious, brutal murder that could have been prevented, to an unfortunate loss of profitability from choosing the wrong sales strategy. At best, that's in poor taste. But I wonder if the problem is worse than just poor taste.

It's true that both the murder and the loss of profits might have come from blind adherence to groupthink. But the author seemed to me to be callously indifferent to the human tragedy, except as a way to get excitement built up in readers. It seems that he implied a person's death, and a few lost sales, are merely equal inconveniences. It felt to me that the article was manipulative, trying to build and then exploit a sense of fearful anxiety. In this way, a factual discussion of sales techniques was turned into an adrenaline rush.

The owner of the blog does not seem to me to be psychopathic. But this particular guest article did seem to me to be to be psychopathic in that way. I wanted to find out if other people had the same impression. I also don't know if there is reason to be worried about the author from just one article, or if this is a "just a bad day" kind of mistake I should overlook.

Once he got the adrenaline-rush part out of the way, he did have an interesting comparison about sales techniques. At this time, I do need to learn about sales techniques in business. Mailing lists can be a useful tool to help and serve people, some of whom buy and some who merely like the free education. I am eager to learn more about the ethical use of business e-mail lists. But I don't want to learn about sales from a psychopath.

Rather than leading with my own interpretation, I wanted to see what others had to say. Perhaps that approach was too indirect to be useful to other people. For this forum, would it have been better to have put something like, "This seems worrisome to me because..." in my first post on the thread?

I apologize for the confusion. Now that I can more clearly say my concerns, is this an appropriate topic for this site? (Perhaps for the "Psychopaths at Work" forum?) Or is it not relevant? I don't mind deleting the thread if it doesn't help further the purposes of the site.

 

[henry]

Rather than leading with my own interpretation, I wanted to see what others had to say.

Framed this way, it comes across as if you were testing the members of the forum, that you did not want to disclose your own view until you heard what others had to say.

If you were not certain about your own interpretation, you could have written it out and asked for feedback. That would have been a more direct way of communicating.

If you were convinced of your own interpretation and wanted to test the rest of us, that is manipulative behaviour that is not acceptable here. Be direct.

Perhaps that approach was too indirect to be useful to other people. For this forum, would it have been better to have put something like, "This seems worrisome to me because..." in my first post on the thread?

Well, it sounds like you were more concerned with what would be useful to Jack -- i.e. testing the waters before speaking, either out of ignorance or arrogance.

I apologize for the confusion. Now that I can more clearly say my concerns, is this an appropriate topic for this site? (Perhaps for the "Psychopaths at Work" forum?) Or is it not relevant? I don't mind deleting the thread if it doesn't help further the purposes of the site.

I think the article is useful, and the interchange will help others to see how not to post. :)

 

[Buddy]

Since each eye-witness to the killing saw lights going on and off in their neighbor’s living rooms across the courtyard, they all assumed that somebody else had already called the police. And no one did.

Did you read Cialdini's book to see what the evidence was for the assumption that 'someone else' called the police? Maybe noone wanted to. We don't know anything about the murderers, the neighborhood, the victim...nothing. I have had the experience that in a situation where noone knew if anyone called the police, then many people wound up calling. So without reading Cialdini's book, isn't the article reader demonstrating the pluralistic ignorance that the writer is talking about? I don't know, I'm just wondering.

My overall impression is that the murder example was not the most logical one to use, considering the subject matter, but considering the subject matter it was likely chosen for the shock value to induce emotion.

It did work after all. Look at the impression it has made on you, Jack :)

The subject line for this thread was poorly chosen. If it won't break searches, I'd like to change it to a more accurate title: perhaps "psychology in sales writing - is this article psychopathic, or just in poor taste?"

I don't think it's either. I think the article simply accomplished exactly what the writer intended it to accomplish.

I apologize for the confusion. Now that I can more clearly say my concerns, is this an appropriate topic for this site? (Perhaps for the "Psychopaths at Work" forum?) Or is it not relevant? I don't mind deleting the thread if it doesn't help further the purposes of the site.

I think the article is useful, and the interchange will help others to see how not to post. :)

I agree. I don't really see the article as a topic, but I could be missing something.

 

[Jack]

Framed this way, it comes across as if you were testing the members of the forum, that you did not want to disclose your own view until you heard what others had to say.

If you were not certain about your own interpretation, you could have written it out and asked for feedback. That would have been a more direct way of communicating.

If you were convinced of your own interpretation and wanted to test the rest of us, that is manipulative behaviour that is not acceptable here. Be direct.

It was ignorant, rather than manipulative behavior. My goal was to compare my reactions and interpretations with how others saw the article. I thought that waiting to see what others thought would be a polite way to not pollute their interpretations with my own ideas. I meant it in the sense of "you go first" at a door, leaving room for me to discover what others thought.

Most of my life has been around people who are indirect and manipulative. Being direct is not something I avoid, but it's also something I'm not used to. I have to work hard at it because it's contrary to responses conditioned in many painful circumstances that taught me that directness was not acceptable, and would be punished. I see that it would be best here to simply state my own perception and ask how others see the situation, in the most direct way possible.

As I mention in another post I'm accepting the suggestion that I practice the breath and meditation exercises on my own for a few days, then return to the forum.

I had previously heard of Cialdini's book, but haven't read it yet.

If this thread needs to be locked or deleted to declutter the forum, I'll respect that.