On how to persuade people, the fundraiser way...
So, I was on a course on communication yesterday. As I’m a charity fundraiser, my course was all about how to communicate with people until they give you money, but as I sat there it occurred to me that I probably ought to be trying to learn more about how to communicate with people the rest of the time too.
And then I thought the rest of you might be interested in it, particularly the stuff about persuading people and bringing them over to your point of view, as I know a lot of you guys are activist types.
1) Don’t overwhelm with facts. This is definitely my flaw in all online debates. If in doubt, I find a lot of numbers and throw them at the screen. I think this ought to work, but apparently, it actually doesn’t. There have been various studies suggesting that people tend to make an emotional decision first and then look to facts to support that viewpoint. And a quote for you - ‘logic makes people think, emotion makes them act’. So you need a narrative first that clicks with people and then use your facts sparingly to back that up.
2) A positive narrative has more impact than a negative narrative. There are also studies which show that the bigger and nastier and more overwhelming a problem, the more likely it is that someone will ignore it. Telling anyone that the world is awful is statistically unlikely to get people to stand up and fight and more likely to make them feel a bit crappy and decide to give up on everything and have cake. You need to provide a positive narrative - the normal charity narrative is ‘there is this bad thing. We did the good thing. Now we are on the way to happy ever after’.
3) Give people a call to action. Generally, 90% of people out there would like to make the world a better place but aren’t quite sure how. This, randomly, is why clicktivism and the like tends to be very successful - it’s a very clearly defined and attainable call to action. And while clicktivism isn’t necessarily hugely successful in terms of impact per person, there are some examples of how it’s achieved an awful lot just through weight of numbers. In financial terms, 10 people giving £100 each are doing a lot more than 10,000 giving £1 each in terms of the cost to each donor. But the £1 donors can sometimes produce more money just through weight of numbers. See - ice bucket challenge, the advertisers pulling out from the Daily Mail etc. So if you can find a call to action every time you engage with someone, even if it’s little, it’s not a bad thing.
4) No one starts out a major donor. I think this is the same with activism in all its forms. Pretty much no one goes from ‘blindly unexamined privilege and voting for Teresa May’ to ‘manning the barricades’ after one fierce argument on facebook followed up by solitary googling. In fundraising we talk about the donor journey - from suspect (doesn’t really know much about the cause, might be open to hearing it exists) to prospect (isn’t donating, but is interested in finding out more, knows about what we do and supports us in theory) to donor (is donating, usually small and affordable amounts that won’t affect them hugely, may or may not talk about the cause to their friends, but understands our cause and supports us) to major donor (gives significant amounts that may impact on their own finances. Has made a commitment, has made us a priority) to advocate (gives significant amounts of time and money, reaches out to many people in their community on our behalf, has made us a major priority and is a leading figure in the cause). The thing we remember is that we need all of those people in our community - people at every stage of the donor journey. This means that when people fall back or drop off the journey (as is normal) others can step up. And some people will never progress that far and that’s OK - they are all contributing. I think that’s needed in activism too. Some people need to spend time as a prospect - not going on Black Lives Matter marches, but wearing a safety pin. Some people need to settle at donor - they might give some of their time and money to a cause, by donating food to a food bank to combat poverty, for example, but they won’t push. And that’s also OK. I think there is a tendency in social justice movements to constantly shame people for not doing enough and that is actually super counterproductive. Yes, some people may be inspired by that and fight on to do more, but that isn’t a normal human response.
5) Don’t argue to the death. Make a point and leave people to think about it. Changing someone’s mind is a slow process and normally occurs over a number of encounters. Another reason why internet dog piles are so useless - overwhelming conversation over a short period of time isn’t helpful. A drip drip approach is much more likely to work.
6) Listen as well as talk. If you can’t find anything to agree with in what someone says, you’re probably not the right person to be talking to them. Leave them be and find someone else to engage. Unless you have common ground you are very unlikely to get anywhere.
7) Use examples and case studies. Use personal stories. People respond much more to them than they do to numbers - it’s called ‘the identifiable victim effect’. But you need to make these stories relatable. One of the case studies we looked at was a woman suffering from very complex mental health problems. The case study barely mentioned them. It just talked about how the charity had helped her reconnect with her children. It didn’t ask us to look at her as a patient. It asked us to identify with her as a mother and I think that’s really important. It’s also why I think campaigns like the LGBT campaign for equal marriage rights has been so successful - ultimately, most people can identify with a narrative that says “I met someone I really love and wants to get married” and it’s very hard to argue against that without looking like a horrible person. It’s a really common (if not universal) story. It’s far harder if you start off by saying “these people are totally different to you, but you have to support them anyway”. People don’t emotionally engage with the alien and if they aren’t emotionally engaged, they are far less likely to act. I also don’t think it’s true - everyone has a human story. Focus on that.
8) Bring the issue as close to home as possible. Remind people that you aren’t talking about aliens - an Oxfam campaign about women farmers took off massively after they found a young female farmer in the Hebrides to act as the face for their campaign in Scotland. She went to the Scottish parliament with Oxfam reps and brought in £8million of funding for women farmers worldwide. A young woman from Bangladesh would have been unlikely to have that impact. If you’re talking about racism to people in the UK, don’t just talk about police brutality in South Central LA. Talk about the Met police, for example. And, again, remember that no one will do anything to support the Other.
9) Assess your audience and objective. And there’s nothing wrong with going for a quick win. The WWF know this. That’s why they put pictures of the panda everywhere. No one cares if a bug goes extinct. This is also my massive flaw in argument. I become enraged by simplification and try and explain, at length, complex and contradictory and messy nuance. But it’s far less persuasive. Sometimes you need to give a streamlined message.
10) Put your audience in the story. Sometimes you can be broad with this - one campaign tagline was ‘calling all former children’. It sounds silly, but it works. Remind them ‘this could happen to you’. Humans care, but humans are ultimately selfish. You need to harness this to your advantage.
And this stuff works everywhere - if you’re talking about Black Lives Matter, or Jeremy Corbyn, or Scottish Independence. Because really, it’s about persuasion. And people’s brains work the same all over. Obviously, sometimes you might get into a fight that isn’t about persuading - it’s about stigmatising certain kinds of behaviour, certain lines of speech - and I get that. Sometimes it’s just that you’re hurt and angry and fed up and want to let people know. I get that too. But we need to be honest about what is genuinely effective and what isn’t. I don’t promise that any of this will work. But I can say this is the stuff that has science behind it. And I like science.
And then I thought the rest of you might be interested in it, particularly the stuff about persuading people and bringing them over to your point of view, as I know a lot of you guys are activist types.
1) Don’t overwhelm with facts. This is definitely my flaw in all online debates. If in doubt, I find a lot of numbers and throw them at the screen. I think this ought to work, but apparently, it actually doesn’t. There have been various studies suggesting that people tend to make an emotional decision first and then look to facts to support that viewpoint. And a quote for you - ‘logic makes people think, emotion makes them act’. So you need a narrative first that clicks with people and then use your facts sparingly to back that up.
2) A positive narrative has more impact than a negative narrative. There are also studies which show that the bigger and nastier and more overwhelming a problem, the more likely it is that someone will ignore it. Telling anyone that the world is awful is statistically unlikely to get people to stand up and fight and more likely to make them feel a bit crappy and decide to give up on everything and have cake. You need to provide a positive narrative - the normal charity narrative is ‘there is this bad thing. We did the good thing. Now we are on the way to happy ever after’.
3) Give people a call to action. Generally, 90% of people out there would like to make the world a better place but aren’t quite sure how. This, randomly, is why clicktivism and the like tends to be very successful - it’s a very clearly defined and attainable call to action. And while clicktivism isn’t necessarily hugely successful in terms of impact per person, there are some examples of how it’s achieved an awful lot just through weight of numbers. In financial terms, 10 people giving £100 each are doing a lot more than 10,000 giving £1 each in terms of the cost to each donor. But the £1 donors can sometimes produce more money just through weight of numbers. See - ice bucket challenge, the advertisers pulling out from the Daily Mail etc. So if you can find a call to action every time you engage with someone, even if it’s little, it’s not a bad thing.
4) No one starts out a major donor. I think this is the same with activism in all its forms. Pretty much no one goes from ‘blindly unexamined privilege and voting for Teresa May’ to ‘manning the barricades’ after one fierce argument on facebook followed up by solitary googling. In fundraising we talk about the donor journey - from suspect (doesn’t really know much about the cause, might be open to hearing it exists) to prospect (isn’t donating, but is interested in finding out more, knows about what we do and supports us in theory) to donor (is donating, usually small and affordable amounts that won’t affect them hugely, may or may not talk about the cause to their friends, but understands our cause and supports us) to major donor (gives significant amounts that may impact on their own finances. Has made a commitment, has made us a priority) to advocate (gives significant amounts of time and money, reaches out to many people in their community on our behalf, has made us a major priority and is a leading figure in the cause). The thing we remember is that we need all of those people in our community - people at every stage of the donor journey. This means that when people fall back or drop off the journey (as is normal) others can step up. And some people will never progress that far and that’s OK - they are all contributing. I think that’s needed in activism too. Some people need to spend time as a prospect - not going on Black Lives Matter marches, but wearing a safety pin. Some people need to settle at donor - they might give some of their time and money to a cause, by donating food to a food bank to combat poverty, for example, but they won’t push. And that’s also OK. I think there is a tendency in social justice movements to constantly shame people for not doing enough and that is actually super counterproductive. Yes, some people may be inspired by that and fight on to do more, but that isn’t a normal human response.
5) Don’t argue to the death. Make a point and leave people to think about it. Changing someone’s mind is a slow process and normally occurs over a number of encounters. Another reason why internet dog piles are so useless - overwhelming conversation over a short period of time isn’t helpful. A drip drip approach is much more likely to work.
6) Listen as well as talk. If you can’t find anything to agree with in what someone says, you’re probably not the right person to be talking to them. Leave them be and find someone else to engage. Unless you have common ground you are very unlikely to get anywhere.
7) Use examples and case studies. Use personal stories. People respond much more to them than they do to numbers - it’s called ‘the identifiable victim effect’. But you need to make these stories relatable. One of the case studies we looked at was a woman suffering from very complex mental health problems. The case study barely mentioned them. It just talked about how the charity had helped her reconnect with her children. It didn’t ask us to look at her as a patient. It asked us to identify with her as a mother and I think that’s really important. It’s also why I think campaigns like the LGBT campaign for equal marriage rights has been so successful - ultimately, most people can identify with a narrative that says “I met someone I really love and wants to get married” and it’s very hard to argue against that without looking like a horrible person. It’s a really common (if not universal) story. It’s far harder if you start off by saying “these people are totally different to you, but you have to support them anyway”. People don’t emotionally engage with the alien and if they aren’t emotionally engaged, they are far less likely to act. I also don’t think it’s true - everyone has a human story. Focus on that.
8) Bring the issue as close to home as possible. Remind people that you aren’t talking about aliens - an Oxfam campaign about women farmers took off massively after they found a young female farmer in the Hebrides to act as the face for their campaign in Scotland. She went to the Scottish parliament with Oxfam reps and brought in £8million of funding for women farmers worldwide. A young woman from Bangladesh would have been unlikely to have that impact. If you’re talking about racism to people in the UK, don’t just talk about police brutality in South Central LA. Talk about the Met police, for example. And, again, remember that no one will do anything to support the Other.
9) Assess your audience and objective. And there’s nothing wrong with going for a quick win. The WWF know this. That’s why they put pictures of the panda everywhere. No one cares if a bug goes extinct. This is also my massive flaw in argument. I become enraged by simplification and try and explain, at length, complex and contradictory and messy nuance. But it’s far less persuasive. Sometimes you need to give a streamlined message.
10) Put your audience in the story. Sometimes you can be broad with this - one campaign tagline was ‘calling all former children’. It sounds silly, but it works. Remind them ‘this could happen to you’. Humans care, but humans are ultimately selfish. You need to harness this to your advantage.
And this stuff works everywhere - if you’re talking about Black Lives Matter, or Jeremy Corbyn, or Scottish Independence. Because really, it’s about persuasion. And people’s brains work the same all over. Obviously, sometimes you might get into a fight that isn’t about persuading - it’s about stigmatising certain kinds of behaviour, certain lines of speech - and I get that. Sometimes it’s just that you’re hurt and angry and fed up and want to let people know. I get that too. But we need to be honest about what is genuinely effective and what isn’t. I don’t promise that any of this will work. But I can say this is the stuff that has science behind it. And I like science.