Oh, how refreshing it is…I see inbox gifts of Cialdini-linked marketing. And there’s my friend Jeanette Smith of the jeanettethewriter.com leading the charge. It became all too clear to me watching my monitor… I was taking a master’s class in applying Cialdini’s marketing principles. Cialdini’s strategy? Was it her planned Houdini to skyrocket her conversions?
Here’s how you can follow her lead using 7 of Cialdini’s principles.
Who is Cialdini?
Dr. Cialdini published a book in 1984 called Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion. This book revolutionized the marketing industry. Influence’s ideas later were put into a system of Presuasive marketing. And this system skyrockets each chance your web visitors click on your buy/hire now buttons.
Who is Jeanette Smith?
Smith is a copyeditor, author of Modern Mer (a book on everything mermaiding and its community), and soon-to-be a self editing course creator.
She is a cozy influencer on Instagram and LinkedIn. And she’s guaranteed to teach you something about copy editing, content writing, scuba, mermaiding, and cats if you follow her with regularity.
A Selection of Cialdini’s 7 Principles: Influence + Presuasion Powers?
In Influence, Cialdini defended the public so they wouldn’t be tricked into buying something they didn’t need. Instead, his book armed marketers with 7 principles that can be used to get someone to buy anything.
Yep, it backfired. And yet it created a profound change in marketing strategy.
Here are seven principles discovered in Jeanette the Writer’s funnel.
Reciprocity
Buyers feel obligated to purchase from someone who has already delivered something of value to them. According to Cialdini, it’s not anything of value that triggers reciprocity. It has to be of special value to the receiver. Value has to be in equal sentiment as the purchase buy-in for the next step in your funnel.
For example, Jonathan Boyd’s Breakthrough Guitar has a lead generator mini-course in exchange for your email address. That course being several modules long makes the email address trade-off worth it.
But as Breakthrough Guitar emails invade your inbox, you begin to rethink the exchange.
Liking
Buyers tend to trust people who they can tell like them.
Copywriting course creator, Eddie Shleyner founder of Very Good Copy has used LinkedIn commenting strategy to convey Cialdini’s liking principle to perfection. His generosity in answering comments with tact, value, and humility are models for all social media marketers.
Time spent answering = liking. See below.
Unity
Buyers buy from people who they feel match their identity. And identify as themselves. The close affiliation with a group identity creates a kinship. And that kinship blossoms into an inclusion. Once you feel included, you’re often going to participate.
Plus, you tend to protect your own.
Social Proof
Prospects look to others’ opinions to ease them into buying. Groups many times influence the buyer behavior to purchase. Newsflash! People think the group is smarter than themselves. So additions like ‘most popular item’ next to the egg rolls on the Chinese menu persuade purchase.
Authority
Expert opinions move audiences toward buying. People who have experience speak to those who don’t have the experience offered but want it.
Attention
Is a presuasive skill that aligns buyers with influencers, products, and services that share similar goals. This is based on the belief that what grabs our attention translates into importance. It has too! Our ego justifies that. And people lean toward those things that resolve tension or are most relevant to their needs or desires.
Smith’s Application of Cialdini in Course Marketing
Unity in Social Media Post
The Plotter or Pantser post is an excellent example of the use of unity. People identify as one or the other. A pantser translates into you when you’re writing by the seat of your pants. Plotter means you write from structure, like an outline, character sketches, etc.
Jeanette confesses she’s been both a plotter and a pantser. That positioning puts her right in the center using unity to her advantage.
Reciprocity in Lead Gen’s Small Problem Solving
The free mini course exchange for the email address is strategic application of reciprocity. Smith sets up value in self editing a book with a number of tools. As Smith confesses of this exchange on her landing page, “That’s kinda how this works…”
First, the Reverse Editing/Editing checklist video mini-course helps those who skipped the outline in their novel to write it after the fact. It also offers a editing checklist to appeal to the plotter in us all.
Convenience=Caring
The Lead Generator: A case study in liking
Another lead generator, Smith’s syncs well is the Developing Editing Quiz. The entry point for this quiz is a hotlinked question on her LinkedIn profile, what kind of editing are you best at?
Quizzes are great lead generators that solve small problems. In this case, Smith isn’t solving a problem she charges money to resolve.
Instead, she’s addressing a challenge of budgeting vs. DIY for developing editing. This is a service she needs to happen in order for her to perform her own paid service of copy editing. Brilliant funnel design.
So, in essence her lead generator is readying her prospect for the next step in her funnel.
Lead Generator Enhancement: Salute to Commitment
The free mini course exchange for the email address is not only strategic application of reciprocity. It’s also an example of over delivery. The prospect inside the head conversation? Wow! If this is her free stuff, I can’t imagine the value in her paid versions.
And this is accomplished with many complementary additions to the lead generator. In this case, Smith includes a spreadsheet available in both Google doc and Microsoft Excel formats. This translates to convenience. Convenience = Over delivery.
Over delivery = Commitment
Over delivery = Cialdini’s definition of commitment + liking
The video tutorial along with the spreadsheet is so thorough it gives a taste of the teaching style forthcoming in the future self-editing course. Once again, over delivery comes in attention to detail.
And if someone likes you, they’re going to go above and beyond. It’s a natural consequence unfolding.
Attention-grabbing Lead Generator Nods to Authority
People often connect the quality of something with its authority. As you can see, Smith’s website has a slow motion capture of her tossing a manuscript into the air. This is a quality personal photograph. Also, the graphics in the lead generator are eye pleasing.
Sleek design = attractiveness = matches authority = association with authority
Smith’s Email Campaign
Smith has a tri-subject newsletter, words.scuba.cats. She uses this and other accompanying emails that come along with the lead generator to keep her audience engaged. Smith asks personal and work-related questions in her emails outside of her newsletter.
This careful questioning insertion gives her opportunities for feedback to create what her audience wants.
Email Marketing Foundations
Smith’s emails combine much of Cialdini into their content. Such things as liking through disclosure, authority with tip sharing, nods to unity, and reciprocity are sprinkled within each email.
Email Liking
Smith gives her audience the opportunity to engage with her emails by hitting the reply button. The gift of response, exclusivity, attention = liking.
Disclosure and Cialdini Marketing Foundations
In one email titled, I never know what to put here, Smith is candid and honest about her dream of being a successful author. She goes far and identifies the statistical odds against her. She reveals dollar amounts to show her break even points with self-publishing.
This ingenious move sets her up as an authority within her industry as an author and author’s helpmate. It also reveals herself in a spotlight of unity. That’s because her email audience is future authors.
She shares the insider experience of writing her mermaid book with each subscriber. This authoring experience also gives her a platform to do for others and get feedback from the audience she in time will sell her courses to.
Foundations Set for Funnel growth
Social Proof
As Smith begins to gather feedback from her email, she is setting the groundwork for social proof. Soon, the audience will be offered chances to take the self editing course in return for feedback on how to make it better.
Commitment and Consistency
Each time Smith delivers on her deadline of her email newsletter, Words.Scuba.Cats, something unnoticed to the subscriber happens. She is building onto her commitment, her promise of value.
It’s a commitment she lavished on her prospects through over delivery of her current lead-generators. Commitment to one’s audience and consistent value in email form are setting the formation of trust in a future working relationship.
Parting Words from Jeanette Smith’s Funnel
As you build your course and begin marketing it, roadmap it out. Where do you naturally see unity, social proof, commitment, consistency, etc. fitting into your marketing plan?
Let’s review how Jeanette applied marketing theory to her social media and email marketing.
Smith’s Marketing Under the Microscope
- Authority-
Smith’s author insider experience gives her a spot of authority as someone who can help you skip mistakes.
- Unity-
Smith’s association as a plotter and panster allows her to be seen as sharer in group identity.
- Reciprocity-
Lead Generators full of convenience and value set up future purchases of her self-editing course.
- Liking-
Opportunities to 1:1 interaction show Smith likes her followers. Time = Generosity = Liking.
- Social Proof-
8k LinkedIn followers show outsiders Smith is an authority. Numbers show followers/subscribers they are giving their attention to someone/something of importance.
Remember the mindset? The group is smarter than the individual.
- Commitment-
Lead Generators that overdeliver in value and convenience show dedication and care to one’s email list.
- Consistency-
Words.Scuba.Cats gives Smith the opportunity to show she can be consistent in hitting her own deadlines.
Final Words
Take Cialdini’s findings to another level and forget them. Be kind. Be of service. Under promise. Over deliver. When your actions match his findings in Influence and Presuasion without any manipulation, then you have arrived as a marketer.
That’s because you as the course marketer, and they as your students, are answering the call to be the best version of themselves.
And I believe that’s where Jeanettte is coming from. Seth Godin explained in his book, This is Marketing. It’s almost best to study these strategies, put them into your way of marketing, and forget them.
Because in the end, Cialdini’s research has revealed that efficient marketing = being a caring human being.
Godin in This is Marketing:
Marketers don’t just make noise; they make the world better and show that truly powerful marketing is grounded in generosity, empathy, and emotional labor.
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