they call a veracity study they ask
people what are the professions you
trust the most what are the professions
you trust the least the top of the list
doesn’t change much from year to year is
usually doctor nurse pharmacist the
bottom of the list doesn’t change much
either down there you’ll find
advertising practitioner politician and
bringing up the rear used-car salesman
for the last 30 years I’ve been an
advertising practitioner I’ve worked
with a lot of politicians and a lot of
car companies I think that makes me the
least trusted man in America you should
believe nothing I tell you I’m in the
persuasion business but aren’t we all
maybe you’re in sales and marketing
maybe you’re trying to get your boss to
give you a raise I’m up here trying to
sell you an idea we’re all trying to
convince somebody of something and
frankly it’s not going that well because
we’re doing it wrong
see for generations we have been trained
to persuade people the same way an
attorney might in the courtroom I’d
present you with a series of
interconnected arguments that if you
follow those arguments you reach with me
an unassailable conclusion it just
doesn’t work we’re trying to make this
complicated persuasion effort in an ad D
world the average human has an attention
span of eight seconds average goldfish
nine seconds above average goldfish ten
seconds and look let’s be honest the
only reason it works in the courtroom is
because the jurors will be arrested if
they leave they have to stay and listen
to the whole thing we have to find
another way to do this so what if we
took what we knew about persuasion we
took all the books and the buzzwords and
seminars keynote speakers stripped it
all away and just got it down to the
bare basics well when you look at
successful persuasive arguments from the
beginning of time to now you find two
things in common
two things that work with any product
and you service two things that work at
any country in any language two things
that work with any demographic group
women seniors Latinos even Millennials
corporate America is freaking out about
how to talk to Millennials these two
things work with Millennials the two
things are hope and fear are there two
more basic motivators than hope and fear
if it weren’t for fear none of us would
even be here back in the prehistoric
days ugh the caveman in ting the woolly
mammoth right if you heard the
saber-toothed tiger growl he felt fear
he ran away
fear was a big part of his survival and
hope were the only animals on the planet
that hope we hope for nice weather we
hope for a better world for our children
we are built for hope hope and fear now
marketers are smart they’ve been using
hope and fear to sell us things for a
long long time but now who is using hope
and who’s using fear and how you can use
them is what I want to talk about I’m
gonna guess a lot of you came here
tonight in a pickup the makers of pickup
trucks have been using fear to sell us
trucks for 40 years and maybe you’ve
seen the commercials right they go
something like this they go our truck
has more torque and we see a guy and
he’s in the truck he’s got the trailer
with a thing on it we don’t know what it
is he’s hauling up a mountain to go do
important truck stuff right so here’s
what the psychological message they’re
trying to deliver to us finely honed
over 40 years of advertising they’re
saying if you don’t have enough torque
you can’t do your job you can’t do your
job you can’t take care of your family
if you can’t take care of your family
you’re not much of a man if you don’t
have enough torque you’re gonna be
living in a box under overpass that’s
ridiculous
or is it the number one best-selling
vehicle in America last year was a
pickup also the number two best-selling
via
number three best-selling vehicle you
have to get to number four before you
get your first car Ford is sold 800,000
pickup trucks last year best-selling car
less than half that that’s a lot of
torque and a lot of fear now when it
comes to hope nobody sells hope better
than health care folks especially the
pharmaceutical people and I’m really
fascinated by this because the
pharmaceutical people made a conscious
decision along the way to sell hope
instead of fear they could sold fear
they could have said hey look you take
this pill or you’re gonna get sick and
dying right very powerful message and
perfectly legitimate but instead they
decided to sell hope so what they say
now is take this pill and you’ll have a
better life a better life in a pill
I will ask my doctor about that and I’m
so excited about that I’m so interested
in that I will ignore the second half of
the commercial with all the side effects
anal leakage
I may be having some right now and a
fatal event my favorite side-effect
death I’m still interested in your
product even though you just told me it
might kill me that’s the power of hope
this really came home to me working on a
weight-loss surgery client we talked to
people who were interested in weight
loss surgery and it was fascinating what
they didn’t say they didn’t say how many
pounds they wanted to lose they talked
about the things in their life they
wanted to do they wanted to be able to
fly on an airplane without a seat belt
extender wanted a ride on a roller
coaster with their kids I’m gonna be
able to cross their legs so we changed
how we talked about it we stopped
talking about the number of pounds and
we started to talk about these small
specific things that would make their
life better because that’s what hope is
all about now what happens if you put
hope and fear together well let’s ask
the ASPCA maybe you’ve seen these
commercials with the sad Sarah McLachlan
song right you’ve got the dogs in the
cats and they’re in the cages and it’s
and it’s sad and you feel fear for the
animals but then they do something
really really interesting they make a
change they say only you can bring hope
to these animals so now it’s gone from I
want to help these animals to hey maybe
I’m gonna do a little something for
myself too so for $20 a month I can help
these animals and I can be the hero of
the story who doesn’t want to be a hero
they might as well be selling capes with
big red SS on the back now
hope and fear don’t work by themselves
hoping if you require input from you
they require action hope without action
is just a wish and fear without action
is just me curled up in the fetal
position under my coffee table but the
action can’t be by my product I mean
that’s selfish to expect that the action
has to be something that makes someone’s
life better Apple doesn’t want you to
buy a new phone
match.com doesn’t want you to download
their dating app they want you to go on
more second dates the product is just a
conduit to getting you to something that
makes your life better my favorite in
this category is Prevention magazine you
know Prevention magazine you see that
the grocery store it’s at the checkout
it’s a little magazine right next to the
cash register it’s filled with stories
about cancer
death heart attack disease real story
from Prevention magazine you open the
magazine there’s a picture of a couple
in there they’re in bed it’s late at
night the wife is wide awake and very
very stressed the headline says my
husband wants to have sex all the time
but he has a heart condition that makes
doing it deadly who reads this magazine
well a lot of people do they’re selling
fear but more than that when you buy
that magazine they’re validating your
fear it’s like they’re saying it’s okay
it’s okay to be afraid we’re afraid to
but in the magazine
maybe there’s a recipe that talks about
if you eat this kale you won’t get this
terrible disease so buying the magazine
is not the action but helping me take
this action that helps me a swage that
fear and lead a better life is what it’s
all about now hope if you ought to be
simple right we’ve all we’ve all heard
all the phrases hope springs eternal we
have nothing to fear but fear itself
hopes you’d be good fear is bad right
doesn’t work that way a little bit of
fear is a good thing too much hope is a
bad thing maybe you’ve gotten an email
from a friend of mine he’s a he’s a
Nigerian prince
needs just a little bit of help getting
twenty million dollars out of the First
National Bank of Nigeria if you just
send him your social security number the
little numbers off the bottom of your
check he’s selling hope that scams been
around for decades because he trades on
hope we all hope our ship has come in
it’s pennies from heaven and let’s talk
evil dictators for a minute we all know
one edy I mean Hugo Chavez these are
people who dealt in fear but they rose
to power on the wings of Hope 1930s
Germany they were crushed by the
depression and in Germany it was
probably even worse because they were in
a bad economic situation after World War
one Hitler comes along and says hey vote
for me and I’ll find a way to get you
out of this economic crisis he had no
business acumen he had no record there’s
no reason to believe him he was a failed
art student who had been in jail but he
was selling hope to the hopeless and
it’s a very powerful thing but can also
be a very dangerous thing I’ve worked in
politics for a long time and every level
from City Council to for presidential
races hope and fear are the only things
we sell and a lot of people think well
you know hope should belong to this
party and fear should belong to that
party I’m here to tell you both parties
sell hope and fear equally let’s just
say for example we were going to do an
ad for a very conservative candidate
might go something like this the world
is a dangerous place filled with evil
terrorists who want to destroy your life
vote for me and I’ll protect you right
fear-based message probably not unlike
something you’ve heard let’s go to the
other side of the aisle maybe it sounds
like this the world is a dangerous place
filled with greedy corporations that
want to destroy your life vote for me
and I’ll protect you I teach two words
we move from one end of the political
spectrum to the other end of the
political spectrum talk to two
completely different groups
with equal effectiveness that’s the
flexibility of fear now we all know how
to use hope and fear we all know how to
use it instinctively we’ve done it our
whole lives growing up my mother dealt a
lot of beer don’t run with those
scissors you’ll put your eye out and if
you eat a tuna fish sandwich and get in
the pool you’re on your own and when we
were potty training our daughter we sold
a lot of hope every day if you’ll use
the body we can get the My Little Pony
underwear she’s still wearing it she’s
29 but there are times in life when we
really should be using hope and fear and
it leaves us some of the most important
times like in a job interview how many
times have you seen people in a job
interview read their resumes back I’m a
self-starter and I’m really good at
Excel it’s like who cares so is
everybody else you’ve got to understand
the person on the other side of that
desk you’ve got to understand their
hopes and fears well this person fit in
on my team well they helped me meet my
goals will they be a good hire so
instead of talking about your awesome
excel skills maybe you should be talking
about how much you enjoy working on a
team how much you like the corporate
culture how glad you are when somebody
reaches their goals make that person
understand that by hiring you it’ll make
their life better that’s how you use
hope and fear now if I haven’t done a
good enough job explaining how you can
use hope and fear and any persuasive
situation that means it’s time to talk
about small kitchen appliances
let’s say you need a new blender $35 you
can get a blender perfectly nice blender
that will meet all your blending needs
or you could spend $500 and buy a
Vitamix people are lining up to buy $500
Vitamix is why because they don’t think
of them as blenders they think of them
you put the food in the Vitamix and you
mix it up and you drink it and you’re
healthier right and if and if it’s
something that makes you healthier it
gives us permission to spend more money
on it a lot more money so if they can
take a small kitchen appliance and they
can wrap it in hope and fear and sell it
for 500 bucks what can you do thank you [Applause]