How to use per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion in ad­vert­ising

Per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion is a form of in­ter­per­son­al com­mu­nic­a­tion, just like verbal com­mu­nic­a­tion and nonverbal com­mu­nic­a­tion. The aim is to persuade the in­ter­locutor. When per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion is used correctly in marketing and ad­vert­ising, it can appeal to new target groups and compel customers to purchase a product or service based on their opinions, feelings, and desires.

What is the defin­i­tion of per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion?

Per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion derives its name from the Latin word ‘per­suadere’ and uses the art of per­sua­sion to com­mu­nic­at­ively influence a person’s thinking, behaviour, or attitudes. This result should illicit a par­tic­u­lar action or change an opinion.

Many people com­mu­nic­ate per­suas­ively in private con­ver­sa­tions without realising. Per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion is con­sciously used as a rhet­or­ic­al device in many other contexts, such as mass com­mu­nic­a­tion, ad­vert­ising, marketing, PR, sales pitches, and political com­mu­nic­a­tion. Per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion is be­ne­fi­cial when selling products online to sway visitors into buying your shop’s products.

What are examples of per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion?

Per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion uses a variety of rhet­or­ic­al tech­niques. The following examples il­lus­trate the concept of per­sua­sion:

• Foot-in-the-door technique: This technique gets its name from door-to-door sales. A person asks for a small favour, which the other person cannot refuse. This gets your ‘foot in the door’ and opens the dis­cus­sion for the actual, bigger favour. People will often agree to this to appear con­sist­ent.
• Door-in-the-face technique: This technique is the reverse form of the foot-in-the-door technique. A person begins with asking for a favour that is so big and out­rageous that it is sure to be refused. Then the person asks for the actual favour, which is sig­ni­fic­antly smaller. There is a good chance that the other person will agree to the smaller favour.

What are the goals of per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion?

Per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion primarily aims to influence the target group. The other goals of per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion include:

• Raise brand awareness: Per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion can be used to raise awareness of something, such as a product, idea, or topic.
• Change attitude or point of view: Per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion can be used to change the other person’s attitude or point of view about a par­tic­u­lar product, idea, or topic.
• In­flu­en­cing beliefs: Per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion can be used to influence beliefs on a par­tic­u­lar topic.
• Change behaviour: A customer’s behaviour can also be in­flu­enced and even changed with per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion.

Per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion in marketing and ad­vert­ising

Per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion in ad­vert­ising and marketing can leverage the interest of target groups or change their opinion on a product or brand, thereby pos­it­ively in­flu­en­cing the purchase decision. Per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion can be used for con­ver­sion rate op­tim­isa­tion. The rhet­or­ic­al tool can also increase existing customer’s loyalty to a brand and raise its profile. Per­suas­ive marketing and per­suas­ive ad­vert­ising assume that people often act more emo­tion­ally than ra­tion­ally. This leads customers to make their pur­chas­ing decisions based on feelings, pref­er­ences and beliefs that have been in­flu­enced by ad­vert­ising and marketing messages.

Per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion in marketing and ad­vert­ising is not only about in­flu­en­cing the actions of customers, but also their attitudes. The customer should feel like they have made the purchase decision them­selves. Most im­port­antly, they should feel like that they have made the right decision with the purchase. Instead of focusing on the benefits of a product, per­suas­ive ad­vert­ising tries to evoke an emotional response in customers by using their own feelings and emotions to build a positive as­so­ci­ation with the product.

The role that emotions play in a purchase decision and how they can be in­flu­enced is explored in neur­omar­ket­ing. Per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion is also fre­quently used in con­junc­tion with gender marketing. This involves tailoring per­suas­ive tech­niques to men or women when ap­pro­pri­ate.

Cat­egor­ies of per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion in ad­vert­ising and marketing

The per­suas­ive strategies, ethos (cred­ib­il­ity), logos (reason) and pathos (emotions), originate from ancient rhetoric theory. Per­suas­ive marketing utilises these strategies in marketing and ad­vert­ising tech­niques:

• Ethos: This category focuses on messages that are intended to convey cred­ib­il­ity and trust. This is similar to the halo effect in marketing. This usually involves an expert or well-known per­son­al­ity endorsing the product or brand. Customers consider the person to be trust­worthy and reliable due to their authority.
• Logos: Tech­niques in this category use logic, reason, and ra­tion­al­ity to persuade customers. This type of per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion is based on data, facts, and stat­ist­ics. The goal in this case is to appeal to the mind and convince customers that a product or service is something special.
• Pathos: Customers are addressed on an emotional level in this category. These can be positive and negative emotions, which are intended to stimulate an action. Examples of pathos tech­niques include puppies, a loving mother with her child, a desperate family, or a terrible illness.

What are per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion tech­niques in ad­vert­ising?

There are several different tech­niques that can be used when im­ple­ment­ing per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion in marketing and ad­vert­ising. These are often based on the principle of cognitive bias and aims to make customers believe the ad­vert­ising message and compel them to buy a product or use a service, similar to the decoy effect and the anchor effect. The most important per­suas­ive ad­vert­ising tech­niques are:

Carrot and stick

The principle of the carrot and stick technique assumes that people fun­da­ment­ally prefer rewards to pun­ish­ments. The carrot refers to the potential gain or advantage as­so­ci­ated with using a product, for example, the customer will have better skin after using the mois­tur­iser.

The stick refers to a potential loss or fear as­so­ci­ated with behaving a certain way and en­cour­ages customers to choose an al­tern­at­ive. For example, an ad­vert­ise­ment might highlight the increased like­li­hood of a burglary if customers do not purchase a par­tic­u­lar home alarm system. Anti-smoking campaigns are another example of the carrot and stick technique.

Principle of scarcity

The principle of scarcity assumes that people value things that are in limited supply or which not everyone can own. This instills a feeling of power and boosts self-esteem. Certain words and phrases, such as ‘exclusive offer’ or ‘limited avail­ab­il­ity’, can increase the perceived scarcity and evoke a sense of urgency. This pos­it­ively in­flu­ences the purchase decision by in­creas­ing customer demand, similar to the loss aversion principle.

One message per display

Using a single message can im­me­di­ately engage customers and convince them to read the rest of the ad. Drawing attention to the main benefit or feature of the product makes it easier for the customer base to see value in the product. In addition, the like­li­hood of closing a sale increases because the main message is stating that the product will improve customers’ lives.

Writing in the second person

Using ‘you’ and ‘your’ pronouns is another per­suas­ive ad­vert­ising technique. It connects with potential customers on a more personal level. It can be used to attract attention and help in­di­vidu­als envision a future where a product or service improves their lives.

Control

The need for control is a bio­lo­gic­al and psy­cho­lo­gic­al necessity, i.e., people need to feel that they are in control of their own lives. When customers read or see ad­vert­ise­ments, they should feel they have the choice between buying the ad­vert­ised product or a different product. However, if they feel they are being pressured into buying a product, they are likely to react badly and reject the message.

Call-to-value

While call-to-actions are crucial for getting potential customers to take the next step, they don’t always convince skeptical customers to act. A call-to-value can be useful in this case. This technique focuses on conveying the value or benefit of taking the next step to the user. Examples of call-to-value include ‘Subscribe to our news­let­ter and get exclusive expert tips’ or ‘Become a member and get instant access to our high-quality content and offers’.

Bandwagon effect

The bandwagon effect is also a popular per­suas­ive com­mu­nic­a­tion technique in marketing. This exploits the fact that people tend to follow the crowd rather than con­sid­er­ing their own opinion. The bandwagon effect leads to an already popular and trendy brand becoming even more popular. This can be re­in­forced by word-of-mouth marketing.