In this episode Dean & I talk about the importance of your book title and how to amplify your success by using some of the ingrained human triggers talked about in Robert Cialdini's new book Pre-suasion.

By selecting a title that allows someone to identify themselves as a potential client, 'it sounds like this book could help me...' and using the title and subheading to plant the seed of the solution you can offer, you'll not only start to identify previously invisible leads, but also begin to predispose people to engage in a conversation with you.

'The Adult Acne Cure' and 'Email Mastery' both begin to offer the benefit of the solution rather than just an improved process.

One of the most successful campaigns we've seen moves people from the below Email Mastery ad, to the book, to an email conversation... All perfectly congruent with the message of mastering email and building value at each stage.

• Ad offering value.

• A landing page allowing them to complete the thought.

• Email: What business are you in?

• Email: Have you tried a 9-word email yet?

For more on engaging potential clients after they get a copy of your book, check out this episode of More Cheese Less Whiskers.

Links:

• Pre-suasion

• Influence

• Email Mastery

Ready to get started on your book?

The next step is to head over here

Transcript - Book More Show 017

Dean: Stuart Bell, welcome to The Book More Show.

Stuart: What’s happening?

Dean: It's very interesting because I've been reading the Robert Cialdini's new book called ...

Stuart: 'Pre-suasion'.

Dean: 'Pre-suasion', yes, yes. Here's the thing, I've always suspected and I've talked about how the value of having somebody ask for a book that implies that they are desirous of the outcome that the book promises. I use the example all the time of the Adult acne cure, as an example or a title of a book that somebody is really ... That that's what they want. We've talked on podcast before about this idea that the title of your book is really best if it conveys what you're prospect really wants. If by having and holding this book that they're essentially claiming that benefit for themselves.

I know you want to talk about Dave Ramsey's financial peace as the great example, right? If somebody is in turmoil financially, that's stressful and there's a lot of upheaval in their life and worry and all these negative feelings and you could just imagine somebody holding that book and getting the sense of peace because it says this. They've been thrown a life ring, a life jacket, that they can put this on and they're going to be on their way to that sense of financial peace. The same thing when somebody ask for the adult acne cure.

Now, what I learned from Robert Cialdini's book 'Pre-suasion' is now the documented, kind of experimental, case for why these things happen. Robert, for people who don't know, wrote the seminal book on social psychology called 'Influence' about 30 years ago and I have to say, any marketer that you know by name, if you were to ask them their most influential books, 'Influence' is definitely on the list because Robert spent a lot of years documenting what he calls the 6 weapons of influence. The book was written as a way of helping equip consumers, equip people to recognize when influence is being applied to them so that they understand why they have these feelings that they're compelled to take actions to, buy something that they may not want because…

Stuart: Can't help themselves.

Dean: Yeah, the weapons are so powerful they work regardless of whether they're invited or not, so being able to recognize them that was his hope that we would be able to defend ourselves against them but like any ... Like Gary Vaynerchuk says, "Marketers ruin everything." He of course claimed all of this as a way to understand-

Stuart: Secret weapons.

Dean: ... How influence really works and it's been a tremendous book and I've been ... I don't know how many times I've read that book. I know every single example in it, I've used every single one of the 6 weapons of influence which he, just to give kind of the 2 minute version of it and realize that a 90 minute book, a book, is really ticking a lot of these influence boxes right away, that one of the influence factors that he talks about is authority. There's no greater authority icon in our society than being the author of a book, right? Does he know the topic? Well, he wrote the book on it. We are so influenced, they were so conditioned that if it's in a book it's credible and it's disguised in authority. There's less porosity which is one of the things that he talks about. If I do something for you, if I do you a favor, you owe me a favor. That's the way society works. If I give you something of value, then I have ... That sets off this sense of you needing to balance the books here.

When you start a relationship with a prospect by giving them a book, you've given them a gift, you've given them advice, you've given them information and that's really a ... It sets off this chain of events that all of a sudden, everything is ticked in your favor because you're giving before getting. You're giving something to somebody. We use all the other elements in this too in that one of them is social proof where we show and share examples or what other people are doing and how we've been able to help other people with this. We use liking where the fact that you give somebody something and when they ask for it we're engaging in a dialog, that we're acting and sort of being in relationship with somebody, that triggers people to like us. We love to do business with people that we like.

There's all of those things that are kind of working in our favor. I would highly recommend first that people read that book 'Influence' and there's another example of a great book title but what Robert has done now 30 years later is has written a book about what he calls the 'Pre-suaders'. This is pretty fascinating because he really identified, "Well, why do these influence practices and these influence moments really work when we deploy them?" So often it's just what happens right before the influence moment that he calls it and so, I've read the book 3 times now and I'm still going back and highlighting and really letting the examples sink in because they're so phenomenal that they're almost unreal. I have to go back and continue to really grasp what they mean.

I'll give you a couple of examples. Setting the stage for something, we find that in one of the experiments they did in a wine store, and by the way when I was in Toronto I got to catch up with Gary Vanderchuck. I hadn't seen him in a while but he was speaking that event where I was in Toronto, so we got to spend about an hour together and I was sharing with him this example and he said, "That makes total sense." They went into a wine store, a wine retailer, and when they played french music in the background, just no mention of it, no set up for it. They just walk in and there's french music playing, that the sales of french wine went up disproportionately. When they played German music, the sales of German wine went up disproportionately.

You start to see that just what's setting that tone is effecting on a subconscious level to kind of set the stage for something.

Stuart: The subconscious triggers which is so ingrained in the rest of the social interaction in society to be able to understand what those are and be able to use them for good and just orchestrated process, that little bit more to set them up. It's almost like a magic trick.

Dean: Yes, absolutely. Then, they would do another experiment where they ... If you've ever been ... I don't know if they do this in London or the UK, where they're in the mall or on the street sometimes there will be survey takers where they'll come up with their clipboard and they'll ask if you have a couple of minutes to take part in the survey. Well, they did that and they would go up with that standard approach, "Hey, do you have a couple of minutes for a survey?" They would get 29% of the people who they approached to do the survey. Then, they switched their approach to instead of leading with the survey, they would go up to people and just say, "Hi, do you consider yourself a helpful person?" After people paused and said yes, then they would ask them about the survey and 77% of the people that they approached would take the survey.

Stuart: That's my favorite example because it's so easy to understand the difference in just the small approach change and layer and after layer of social commitment and learned pattern and persuasion that sets up all of that success and such an easy change for people to make.

Dean: Yeah.

Stuart: It's one of my favorite examples in the book.

Dean: Yeah, well that's the perfect precursor to commitment and consistency, which was another one of the influence factors that Robert talks about. That we feel this internal drive to actually consistently with the commitments that we've made. If we stay, we're a helpful person and then, immediately the first time we are presented with an opportunity to be helpful, we say no, we've completely dismounted what we just said. That's what I think is happening with a book, that when somebody writes a book like this, that we are ... Especially when you've got a title that indicates that you are moving towards something. When we say, "The Adult Acne Cure" the only people who are going to want a book like that are people who are seeking that benefit. When somebody ask for a book like that and we immediately ask them in a short personal email, "Hi Stewart. Welcome aboard. How often do you get break outs?" That's really a simple way to engage with people.

I'm so encouraged to see kind of the evidence, documented experimental evidence to back up why books are so important. Why it works so well and I think it's just a ... It just sets the stage so well. It's like, once somebody is kind of ... You get somebody's attention first by them asking for the book. You set the frame on how this is going to go. Then, what we say in the book itself can really set the tone for the way people experience the rest of the journey.

Stuart: Yeah, I think understanding there is a journey. The job of work of a book itself is to help identify those invisible prospects and then, there's the added value in the context for the follow up afterwards. Then, staging that, understanding that it's one step in the process is not the deal in end all. In the context we're talking about we're not really that interested in book sales and such. We are much more interested engaging an audience and leading towards an outcome beneficial to them.

Dean: Yeah, it's just ... IT's the equivalent of making sure somebody is interested in something. Somebody ask for a book called 'Financial Peace', there's a good chance that they are seeking financial peace, so that sets the tone for how we communicate with them. If they ask for a book called 'Return on Safety', turning workplace safety into a competitive advantage and bottom line profit. You can go that they're looking to take a different approach to work place safety. You start the conversation from a position of I'm already interested in this.

Stuart: That's the ... We've found, I've heard you talk about it before, both here and on the podcast. That frame of writing an email or writing a book with the mindset of imagine that the perfect prospect, the gold star prospect, was sat in front of you and you're just having a conversation and thinking about it in that helps all of this because it really narrows down the conversation. You know what you're trying to achieve, you know how specifically you can help them, and it just makes every stage before that much more straight forward and easy to link together. Much easier to create and then, the layer on top of it, some of the pre-suasion elements that kind of amplify that message and really help the people that you can help the most identify themselves and put that in a framework.

I can remember going to a ... Tony Robbins, the 3 day event.

Dean: UPW, unlimited power weekend.

Stuart: Thank you, perfect. 15 years ago they were in London.

Dean: Yes.

Stuart: The first evening is the fire walk and I can remember, so this is in London so pads are slightly more conservative crowd 15 years ago at least compared with an American crowd maybe. I arrived, ready for the Friday night, never knew that the fire work was coming up. At the beginning of the event there's lots of kind of standing up and making some noises and contact with other people. It might not be the most comfortable thing to do but, I can remember saying to myself, "I know in about 7 hours time, I'm going to be walking over some hot coals, so I'm just going to suspend any disbelief and I'm going to go all in." I didn't want to be the one there trying to be clever, not listening to what's being said and then ended up with burned feet.

Dean: Right, that's so funny.

Stuart: Yeah, I can actually remember having that conversation with myself. That as a set up has obviously kind of pre-suasion elements for the rest of the weekend where that kind of suspension of disbelief and their willingness to engage with what's going on is really the pair of the rest of the event. Also, a lot of people were looking at fire walk as a ... Trying to achieve one thing like breaking boundaries or barriers but really, the set of the pre-suasion element of it was really pretty powerful.

Dean: I agree. Now you look at that with these eyes that ... I just think that it sets the tone and even the imagery that seems so simple can make a difference. One of the experiments they did in the book was they took a retail furniture website and they overlayed in the background a picture of clouds on the background of the webpage and when they did that, inquiries and sales of the comfort featured furniture bed was higher and when they overlayed in the background on the same web page, instead of the clouds, coins, the sales and inquires of the economy, the least expensive things went up. It's like we often think that, "Well, that can't be me. That wouldn't apply." You know what I mean?

Stuart: Yeah.

Dean: When you…

Stuart: Everyone else would fall for that.

Dean: Everyone would fall for that but now you start to see the actual imagery makes such a difference. I think we've stumbled on, even just from an authority standpoint, saying to people on the back of a book, "Here's what to do next." Having those words of just setting that tone where that imprint is made before they're ever asked to anything or invited to do anything, that really sets the stage that you are an authority, you know what you're ... You're taking a leadership role for people and that kind of thing is just so powerful.

Stuart: Exactly.

Dean: I'm thrilled. I couldn't be anymore thrilled about the support that now I have the real scientific kind of understanding of why the things we've been doing have looked so well.

Stuart: It adds that extra credibility dimension to it as well, doesn't it? We know it works because it's case after case but for almost an independent study to back it up with even more examples on the back cover, the telling people what to do next part, I think you were on one of the More Cheese podcast with Jamie Smart a couple of weeks ago. He was saying ... Was it Jamie? It might have been John, anyway, someone was saying that on their site they had really gone overboard almost in the specifically here's what you need to do next in their communication and they'd seen a dramatic difference in uptake just because people's kind of innate desire to take the path of least resistance to want to have a clear path of what's next. How's having people behind the seen, it might be easier to assume that obviously they should do this next. That makes perfect sense.

Essentially, especially if you tell someone the instructions that you get on rides at Disney or whatever or theme parks, as people get closer and closer to the front of the ride there's always the little sign saying "Now do this. Now go there. This is what you'll experience next." Having people see it at every stage and one the books, to have that on the back cover, which is the place the majority of people will look as they're thumbing through it and have the content leading towards those exact same outcomes, really spelling it out to people, just far more effective.

Dean: Yeah, agree.

Stuart: Have it easy for people to create. I mean, we say it time and time again, people come and say, "I've got 5 chapters in and I'm sort of drew myself into a hole of where we're going with this." Having that very starting with the end in mind, knowing the single type of market, the type of people who you want to engage, what the outcome is, what you want them to do next, and then, almost just dot to dot filling in the blanks from the front cover to the back cover.

Dean: Just the fact that ... Just I think, if we can get as an outcome for listening to this episode, the thought that we're setting the stage for somebody, if we can encourage the idea of thinking through the book title as being the benefit that somebody is going to want. To get them thinking the thought that will be the most fertile ground to plant the next seed of here's what to do next, to start that relationship. That's why when we look at the way we use 90 minute book as an example even, the title, 'The 90 Minute Book', is enough that we're breaking down the barriers of people thinking that writing a book takes months and months and months and lots of hard work and it almost sounds unbelievable that you could create a book in 90 minutes enough so that when we do present that in Facebook ads, online, that we get 60 to 70% of people that come to the page can leave their name and their email address to get the book. Probably many of the people listening to this right now have gone through that process because they saw this book and it, at some level, was in the back of their mind that they would like to write a book and to start a conversation with, "Well, here's how to do it in 90 minutes." That's a conversation worth starting.

Stuart: Yeah, and it's not too clever, it does what it says on the tin. It helps people self select as an engaged audience. It does seem to be a bit of a move recently of trying to come up with clever one word titles. I think a lot of mostly what you see on Amazon is kind of condemned down to that but it is a very different job that it's trying to do the whole new purpose of doing this with a specific outcome of engaging customers or engaging people in a tribe. That's the different job of work on the title that might be eye catching.

Dean: I'll use Frank Curd as an example. He's a good friend, we've had a lot of conversations about this, about the 90 minute book and about this approach to small books and Frank almost exclusively uses these small books as a re generator now. You see all over Facebook right now is the book 'How To Get High Paying Consulting Clients Even If Nobody's Ever Heard Of You'. Now, that is answering the question. He's posing something that anybody who asks for a book like that is implicitly interested in 'How Do I Get High Paying Clients' and overcoming that thing of but people have never heard of me because people look at that. I often get that a lot that people say, "Well, yeah it's easy for you guys. People know who you are." All these things but I look at it and I point to our email mastery experience in success magazine. I mean, the majority of those people have no idea who I am. They were very interested in hearing about an amazing 9 word email that revives dead leads and sharing that whole process with them, that was enough to start the conversation and then, offer the rest of the ... The next step in the process of getting the email mastery book.

That sets the tone and I've said it again and again and again that the book is the gateway, it's like a portal, into a relationship. Somebody asks for the book, that's what gives you the opportunity now to ask them and say, "Hey, welcome aboard. What business are you in?" That's the message that we send to the email mastery people and always taking this incremental approach where we can say, "What business are you?" Then, no matter what they reply, the version of the response is somewhere in the some kind of acknowledgement of what business they were in and then asking them, "Have you tried the 9 word email yet?" Then, when they said they either have or have not, to be able to invite them onto a call where we can say, "Hey, I'm getting together with some people on Thursday to brainstorm some 9 word emails and subject lines. Would you like to join us?"

We look at all of those things. I mean, we've used successfully this book model in so many different industries. I mean, it would say there's very little overlap of all the books that we've done, hundreds of books, there's probably hundreds of different industries that we've been able to help people in.

Stuart: Yeah, and even in the same industry, the approach is that people have got all the audience that they're trying to engage or the people that they can best serve is so unique to each individual person. No 2 books are the same, even if they're listing the same industry. That's the benefit of the specificity, you can really dial in, pick who it is that is your perfect customer and how you can best serve mitigation and it's small books that answers that question. Absolutely knowing that it's the gateway, it's the first step in the conversation and whole name is to engage people. It's absolutely the most effective way to get some out there that blows everything else out of the water in terms of response rate. Especially when you look at the influence elements and the persuasion element of this is the beginning of a conversation makes perfect sense to this audience.

Dean: I think that this is a guiding thought for ... As people are brainstorming and thinking about their book title, that the best title kind of ... Path is one that talks about the destination more than the journey. That it talks about where they're going to land. Somebody is in financial turmoil and they're promised financial peace, that's really a great thing. If somebody is an entrepreneur that's working 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and they see a book called 'The 4 Hour Work Week', that sounds like less than what they're working right now, and that that would be a wonderful benefit to have. If somebody is thinking about writing a book and they see a title 'The 90 Minute Book', that's worth investigating.

Stuart: Yeah, a destination-

Dean: To think about the destination, what's the end result? 'The Adult Acne Cure', that's so ...

Stuart: The congruency  is really high, it's the benefit to them rather than the work involved. It's not the 10 minute a day skin care regime, it's the adult acne cure.

Dean: That's exactly right. Yes, that's exactly right. It's not about the author. I think that's part of the thing, is that a lot of .. One of the mistakes that people make often is shining the light on themselves, and making it-

Stuart: It’s about you, it's far too easy today. Which is ideally encapsulated in the email mastery example. It was an audience that didn't necessarily know you but the subject, the result, the benefits are ...

Dean: Everybody's got unconverted leads, why not start with the base line? Why not start where everybody is and then, be able to advance on that foundation. We've been doing this with high end financial advisors offering a 2016 social security benefits guide, which every ... No matter what level people are at, when they get to retirement, social security is going to form some amount of their overall financial picture and everybody is interested in how that is going to work for them specifically and it's the baseline now to start the conversation and you've got that one sliver of how social security fits into your overall financial picture. It's just getting a foundation to start a conversation.

Stuart: Yeah, we talk about it using the example of being at a party and you wouldn't necessarily be the person that was in the corner trying to share everything to everyone and telling them how they're doing it wrong but sharing one piece of useful advice that someone has kind of raise the question about to begin with is really seeming quite valuable and might start a conversation afterwards. Fantastic.

Dean: What did we learn today?

Stuart: I think, I would say the main thing that people should really take away is that the title's focus on the benefits of the titles because that leads into the rest of the conversation. It sets people thinking on the right path towards, "I've identified myself because I'm engaged in this particular subject." Then, leading towards the outcome, leading towards the here's what to do next, here's the information that backs that up in a useful way that starts the relationship. The title is thing that captures the attention in the first place.

Dean: That's it. I love it.

Stuart: Sound perfect.

Dean: I can't wait to see what people come up with title wise. I think that just spurs that ... Maybe makes that all click together that people have an understanding of what the actual role of the title of their book in setting the stage for the grander ... The grander experience or journey that we're going to have with somebody.

Stuart: Yeah, There’s a comment section on the website, so head over to 90minutebooks.com/podcast/17, so feel free to leave some comments in there, we'll feedback. If anyone wants to reach out to use and ask more specific questions then, just shoot an email to support at 90minutesbooks and we'll more than happy to feedback on people's ideas and I'm excited to see what comes next.

Dean: Love it.

Stuart: Okay, thanks Dean. Catch you next time.

Dean: Thanks Stuart, yep.