Influence Tactics

¶ … Tactics It's been my experience that combining multiple forms of persuasion are the most effective. All of these forms of persuasion work best when they are presented in a positive context and quickly answering the "what's in it for me?" question for those being influenced. A large part of any successful influence effort is making the entire discussion positive, centered on those one is trying to influence. An example of deciding to go and visit relatives in Los Angeles is a case in point.

The majority of my family doesn't particularly like air travel with a few afraid of flying. Given the distance to Los Angeles, this made influencing them all the more challenging. Conversely, there are many attractions and things to do in Los Angeles and Orange County, and my entire family loves Disneyland. With a family friend attending UCLA and my aunt and uncle having moved there because they fell in love with the climate and found good jobs, the challenge was set.

Influencing the oldest members of the group (my family) proved to be the easiest, as their affinity for seeing relatives and their nephew, who is the latest success story of our extended family, was powerful. I started out explaining how we could see our relatives, go tour the UCLA campus while also visiting Westwood, Santa Monica and its many beaches. Using the influence of family ties to see my cousin, the beaches of Santa Monica and also visit Universal Studios worked well for the oldest people I attempted to influence.

I continually stressed what was in it for them and that nearly won them over. Combining the inspirational appeals of seeing something new while visiting with relatives and underscoring it with legitimating collation, these combined approaches to influence showed signs of getting the decision to visit moving towards action. Dissenters to the decision immediately brought up the cost of flights, fear of flying and the fact that there would be no time to visit any other attractions.

Those dissenting to the idea of visiting Los Angeles also said that the timeframes to get there and back, given the seasonal travel, was not realistic. To counter these claims, rational persuasion of how close Disneyland is to Los Angeles, exchange of going to Santa Monica for Disneyland, and inspirational appeals were all used.

These factors combined with a legitimizing coalition of older members of the family who had by this point decided that visiting their relatives, recently moved to Los Angeles, while also visiting their nephew, was in the plans for Thanksgiving. The dissenting members of the family insisted on the cost and time. Having researched programs for going to Disneyland and how to get tickets at a discount, the cost and time of getting to their favorite destination made the debate less pointed, more of a discussion.

Getting everyone in my family to agree to spend at least two days at Disneyland was a challenge.