You Can Easily Get People to Take Action by
I was eating lunch with a friend the other day, and he sneezed.
“Ah-choo!”
Instead of replying with “Bless You!” like I normally do, I was only able to reply with “Bless…”, because I was interrupted when something sharp pierced my gums. It was a bone.
My friend gave me a weird look, and then I finished by saying, “You.”
This all happened in about 3 seconds, but I realized something. It’s about that “weird look” he gave me.
What I realized is that people HATE when things are unfinished. We’re so used to some things happening a certain way that when it’s incomplete, it drives us nuts.
As bloggers and internet marketers, we can take advantage of this innate desire to complete things.
How?
By giving people exactly what they want – but not all of it. Then, require an action in order to access the rest.
It might sound a bit “scammy” when you read it like that, but when you think about it, isn’t this what many of us are doing already? And it’s the ones who are really good at it who are raking in the dough. It’s just good marketing.
Here are some specific examples:
- Requiring people to enter their name and email address before sending them a free report or eBook.
- Giving away awesome content on your blog, and then recommending a paid course or eBook on top of that.
- Reviewing a product, which forces people to get that product for themselves (preferably through an affiliate link) in order to experience it on their own.
- Splitting content into parts to create buzz and excitement about the next parts. (Come back next time when I…)
- Leaving the last few words off of a blog post title in order to get people to take action and read further. (There are many ways to work a blog post title in order to get people to take action and read. This post is just one example.)
And lastly, we have questions. Similar to “unfinished items”, people hate unanswered questions too.
With the series finale of LOST coming up, why do you think so many people keep watching episode after episode?
Because there are so many questions left unanswered that people cannot stand being left unanswered!
We know there are Polar Bears on the island, but in order to find out why we have to take action by continuing to watch – and millions do, myself included.
So the next time you’re wanting any kind of action from your audience, think about how you can tap into this need and desire for completeness.
Can you think of any other examples of how bloggers and internet entrepreneurs utilize this desire?
Posted on : May 14th, 2010
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35 Comments (Click Here to Leave a Comment Below)
One of the usual way to attract action is to offer discount.
When a prospect decided to leave a recommended product site without any purchase, usually the site will offer discount in order to attract the prospect to take action to buy.
Another tactic is to offer your users or prospects free trial. Because it is Free, people will normally do not mind trying out.
Cheers
You know Seth Godin talked about that in a recent book I read of his – can’t remember which one, was it ‘Free Gift’, think so… anyways- he said that Nordstroms offered something where if people bought $100 worth of stuff they’d get a $25 gift card to use in the store for a short period of time (Like maybe 7 days after the purchase). He then said that most of the time, people would buy $300 worth of stuff and then immediately go back in to use their $75… often spending far more than $75 and getting another ‘Free gift’ – which only perpetuated the cycle. Point being that if you offer somebody something for free, that is tied into connecting with your brand even more it is 100′s of times as successful as a normal freebie gift. Just wanted to share
The uncompleted tweet definitely worked for me. I had click over to see the end.:-) I hate Lost though, they lost me in season 2 because I knew there will always be unanswered questions… Lesson from that would be, make sure you deliver on the answer or else they won’t come back.
What James said got my neurons firing.
I guess we shouldn’t discount the fact that, like he mentioned in his “LOST” viewing experience, that those tactics COULD always potentially backfire, dependent upon the audience. More often times than not, leaving those Cliffhangers apparently work for shows like Lost or Grey’s Anatomy, but they may not work for other things.
Point in case…..know your audience!
“Leaving the last few words off of a blog post title in order to get people to take action and read further. (There are many ways to work a blog post title in order to get people to take action and read. This post is just one example.)”
….just had to chime in here, Pat….
For articles, I’ve learned that simple ‘question marks’ (stating your title as a question) can be an invaluable tool to:
1) Get people to read ALL of your content in hopes of receiving an answer at the end (of course, your credibility may be affected slightly if you don’t ACTUALLY provide those answers)
2) Subtly encourage responses and comments. Readers may take that title, as a question, to heart….and, they may immediately interact and engage with your content (even BEFORE reading it, they may feel inclined to respond)….
….sprinkle in a bit of controversy there, and I’ve found this approach to be a winning combination.
Here is an interesting example of one I wrote that garnered a few interesting comments, and it’s really quite timely and relevant to the audience that it is intended for:
(Had a link here, but it doesn’t seem to allow me to post it)
lol – that was a GOOD one, like James, I HAD to click on the tweet.
It’s a brilliant concept, and I haven’t thought about it much. But now a lot of things become obvious – very obvious. The scheme where give and give valuable stuff to people (hook ‘em) once you have them- you end with a big secret that can only be solved by signing up and/or buying the product.
Can easily have that scammy factor if not done a genuine way
Wow!
Really short but great.
This is exactly how humans work, they might not really want to get it, but when you give them a taste of it, they will want it to the extent of going any length just to get it.
Thanks a lot for the great post,
-Onibalusi
Great way to put it pat. Its probably the philosophy that all the big marketers use.
PS looking forward to the podcast and the Mic setup looks amazing!!
As a content consumer, I hate every one of these tactics. If I have to enter an email address to get a free report or eBook, I either refuse, give a fake one, or give my junk mail one.
Jay and Sterling pulled this off superbly I think, with their last two podcasts. The first one left me extremely curious, and all too eager to check out the trafficattractionformula. Genius! By the time the second podcast came out, I was beyond ecstatic to hear it, and in my opinion…it was a heck of an episode, really got the mind working.
SUSPENSE! Definitely has to be the biggest marketing tool out there. We use it online and off on a daily basis. It can be used to cause a specific action OR inaction.
I am kinda sad that Lost is ending, and am trying to get into Happy Town…..
I’ve never heard of using that tactic: “Leaving the last few words off of a blog post title ” I actually love it. How funny. As long as the last few words aren’t the keywords!
Your first point: Requiring people to enter their name and email… is something I almost never do. If I have to sign up for it just to get an ebook, I usually don’t (except in your case). Your Ebook Guide is Killer! Loved it!
This works SO well, thanks Pat!
This is classic.
Most people don’t even think of this, but it’s so true.
I know I hadn’t given it a thought as it relates to blogging.
I see quite a few bullet points in sales letters using this technique. An example might be…
“How I Used _______ To Get Onto The Front Page Of Digg In 25 Minutes”
… and you want to scream “WHAT DID YOU USE?!!!!! WHERE IS THE ORDER BUTTON?!”
Hi Pat!
There are some great ideas here. I am currently writing a 5 part series on Financial Independence. I decided to spread it out over 2 weeks. Inside the 2 weeks, I will periodically refer to other pieces of the series in order to help show how things tie together.
I think it’s a great idea. I may even go out on a limb and say that if we expect to be professional bloggers and reap the rewards we want, we have to get our readers involved. And, I think the readers like it to – after all it’s builds excitement. As long as we over deliver the perceived value, everyone’s happy.
Thanks for sharing and have a great weekend everyone. Mike
Another perspective on signing up to get a free ebook – I do use a special email address when I sign up so that all the newsletters I’m getting don’t fill up my regular email inbox, but I feel it’s a fair exchange to sign up for a newsletter in order to get an ebook. I don’t expect someone who’s providing beneficial info to just give it all away while getting nothing in return. The author puts a lot of work into a good ebook, so they deserve something back, and I believe that giving the author the chance to advertise other products or services to me is a reasonable deal, at least for a time.
If the free ebook turns out to be just generic info used as a means to convey heavy promotion for paid products or services, or if they send daily newsletters that are nothing but advertising for something they want to sell me, then I will likely cancel my subscription in a fairly short time. But if I got something useful out of the ebook and if they aren’t flooding my inbox then I’ll give them a chance to advertise to me for a while. If the free ebook was good, chances are something they have for sale is also going to be useful to me, if not now then maybe down the road a bit. I may only skim through newsletters until that something useful shows up or until I’m ready to purchase it, so I’m not wasting a lot of time reading.
Some authors also continue to provide at least a bit of useful info for free in each newsletter so I not only keep those newsletter subscriptions active, I continue to read through them. So far I’ve found Pat Flynn’s newsletter to be a keeper worth reading each time.
Tactics like this aren’t scummy at all, at least I don’t think so. I’m just starting to get the hang of getting my audience to interact with me and I think it makes for a richer experience. I think this was a great post and that validated a lot of thoughts that I had already. Great post!!
This post is going to be another “bullet-point” on my ideas list. But, I really think this article should have said
Made you look!
I really liked this – I am trying to learn more and more about the whole ‘seduction’ side of getting people to act on certain things, you know tempting them with anything from a left off word to a freebie prize.
Great stuff Pat!
Good post, Pat. I remember listening to a report once on NPR, I think, about a tourist who went around France and engaged a lot of locals with the phrase, “J’ai un problème” which translates into “I have a problem.” He didn’t speak French well and needed help often. He reasoned that the French were problems solvers and it worked. People bent over backwards to help him.
Good post, Pat. A lot of newbies are suffering from info overload simply by just reading and trying to learn something new and not taking action. Providing quality content are a good way to establish long-lasting relationship, not just in blogs, but also to build and sustain your subscribers list.
Keep on coming up great posts, Pat!
Thanks.
Gary David
http://www.privatelabelunlimited.com
http://www.PLRContentRiches.com
[...] You Can Easily Get People to Take Action over at Smart Passive Income [...]
I think we can also spark desire in our readers by talking about an upcoming post. We can tweet about it or write a wall post in our fan page in facebook.
[...] lot of people I’ve created what I like to think of as strong connections with online such as Pat, Tamar and one of my best friends, Diggy. They write in similar industries and I happily link to [...]
Hi Pat,
Great post and ideas! I really like to idea of leaving readers “hanging” to come back for more…kind of like the when a TV episode has a two part to it…the first one always leaves the viewer hanging so they have to come back to find out what happens.
In addition to all the great suggestion, Cialdini in the book “Influence” discuses the weapons of influence: Reciprocation, Consistency, Social Proof, Liking, Authority and Scarcity.
By combing your tips with the weapons of influence will great tremendous amounts of action from readers.
Thanks for the great post…again
Very great tip. Keep the suspense and the urgency and the time limit. I once read about a circus story where they took a break for 15 minutes. And in that 15 minutes they started selling peanuts. The announcer said that the peanuts are only available during that 15 minutes and it is offered at a discount. So there was this urgency created and the discount so people bought the peanuts. This is a really great story that we can learn from.
Well played, Pat!
The title of this post really is intriguing and makes a great point.
I’m reminded of movie trailers. A good movie trailer will show enough to wet your appetite, but will leave some questions un-answered and maybe show a few shots that almost, but not quite, reveal something dramatic.
I never quite thought of this before, but you’re absolutely right. People have an innate sense to finish what is incomplete if they already know what “supposed to” come next. I really like your personal example because it illustrates your point very well.
I’ll definitely have to go over my materials and see if I can incorporate your advice somehow while not shortchanging my subscribers in any way. Thanks for another great article Pat!
[...] lot of people I’ve created what I like to think of as strong connections with online such as Pat, Tamar and one of my best friends, Diggy. They write in similar industries and I happily link to [...]
Just came over here from ViperChill and you have a ton of advice on here. I have a feeling I’m going to be reading for a while.
I use this idea for my page breaks. Instead of just using the “click here” kind of links, I build a custom “read more” link for every post. I try to use just enough of the first paragraph to whet the readers appetite, (sometimes I’ll even add a new sentence to help with the curiosity factor) and then craft something along the lines of “Learn more about fuzzy red widgets”. Oh yeah, I try to use an anchor keyword in the link too.
[...] a lot of people I’ve created what I like to think of as strong connections with online such as Pat [3], Tamar [4] and one of my best friends, Diggy [5]. They write in similar industries and I [...]
[...] a previous post, Pat explained why an incomplete headline will help you get more traffic to your blog and this post is a follow up to expand on that idea. In the age of social media and [...]