We always return a favor.
Our built-in drive to reciprocate something we’ve received is extremely strong – we feel uncomfortable until we have “paid it back.” This means that if you do something to help someone, they will feel a sense of obligation toward you. That explains why the best way to sell is often not to sell at all, but to genuinely try to help the customer. It also explains why we tend to favor brands we perceive as meaningful.
A researcher who wanted to test this mechanism sent Christmas cards to hundreds of complete strangers and, unsurprisingly, received a large number of Christmas greetings in return. The drive to reciprocate can be used in many ways in your customer interactions. By giving a potential customer a simple gift, you create a need to reciprocate in the customer, which you can benefit from when it’s time to close the deal.
Many people take advantage of this, for example by sending out inexpensive gifts, like promotional pens or cards, accompanied by a payment slip, order form or web link. The same technique can be used if you want many people to participate in a survey – by including a gift or a voucher, participation increases significantly. In one experiment, including $5 in the same envelope as a questionnaire resulted in twice as many responses as a promise of $50 after the questionnaire had been completed and returned.
When you request a free sample of a new product or accept an offer to use an app for free for a month before deciding – it’s the same mechanism that makes this feel okay. And when you agree to leave your email address in exchange for a white paper, you are subject to the same automatic thinking model. Or to increase the effect, make the e-mail field non-mandatory with a friendly “please fill in”. Tests have shown that nearly everyone leaves their mail address anyhow, and since they got the asset as a “free gift” they are more inclined to share it and link to the downloaded asset.
Another way to influence reciprocity is to create the illusion of making a concession. We perceive concessions as abstract gifts. By first asking for something large or complex (more than you actually need) and then asking for something smaller or simpler, the likelihood of getting a “yes” increases by 300% compared to asking for the smaller request right away. Translated into sales terms, this means you’ll likely sell more if you start by presenting the luxury model and then let the customer trade down in price, rather than leading with the cheapest option and hoping they’ll trade up.
Even internally within an organization, reciprocity can be useful. If you give employees – for example your salespeople – gifts that are not tied to their job or performance, you create a need to reciprocate that reduces the risk of them leaving to join a competitor.
If you want to discuss persuation and communication, you are always welcome to contact ulf@sfinxconsulting.se
