How to Coach Yourself and Others Beware of Manipulation | Page 36

2) Does the speaker share my morals?
3) Does the speaker share my background?
4) Does the speaker look like me?
Of the four similarity factors, attitudes and morals are the most important.
Manipulators often instinctively know what Carnegie teaches: by becoming interested in other people,
they get them to like them faster than by spending all day trying to get them interested in them. Having
goodwill entails appearing friendly or concerned with the other person's best interest. Aristotle said,
"We consider as friends those who wish good things for us and who are pained when bad things
happen to us."
This caring and kindness means being sensitive and thoughtful. It means acting with consideration,
politeness, civility, and genuine concern for those around us. It is the foundation for all interactions and
creates a mood of reciprocity. Manipulators often win hearts and loyalty through genuine or feigned
compassion.
They invoke goodwill by focusing on positives and avoid appearing harsh or forceful when dealing in
areas where the other person is sensitive or vulnerable. Additionally, they make positive statements and
perform actions that show their victims that they have their best interest in mind.
One way of creating rapport is by utilizing methods of association to trigger and stimulate deep
reservoirs of emotion within their Victim’s minds. These triggers can include pleasant music, colors,
symbols, sounds, celebrities, etc. The Victim naturally associates each trigger to a specific feeling or
emotion based on past experience. Therefore, when these triggers are associated and coupled together
with a specific product, idea or service, than the Victim begins to associate these same feelings and
emotions to these stimuli as well, and the persuasive process runs it’s full course.
5. The law of social proof
We will do what the crowd does. We might not like to admit that, but it is true. Only 5 to 10 percent of
the population engages in behaviour contrary to the social norm.
We see this law operating in groups, in organizations, in meetings, and in day-to-day public life. In all
of these circumstances, there is a certain standard or norm. In churches, the moral code determines the
standard behaviour acceptable for the group. In organizations, the bylaws and years of tradition
establish a standard operating procedure. Because we want to fit into these groups and maintain our
membership with them, we conform our actions to the norm.
When we find ourselves in a foreign situation where we feel awkward or unsure of how to act, we look
for those social cues that will dictate our behaviour.
Manipulators will convince their victims that their views are supported by others, that “everybody
knows” or “nowadays, almost all the really important people that I know agree …” Because people
tend to think that “what’s right for others, cannot be bad for me”, manipulators will often refer to other
people who gained by taking the action they are asking their victim to make.
Also when it comes to making friends, the law of social proof comes in very handy: when somebody
tells you “others” have informed him how good you are, or that he accidently overhear d a
conversation in which two colleagues praised your qualities or were named as a specialist in some
field, than you will not only feel flattered, but you will also want to proof these “others” right and are
much more likely to give him what he wants from you.

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