Consider this.

To pitch a prospective client for her ad agency, Amanda Zolten knew she a had to take a risk.  But the client’s product—kitty litter—posed a unique challenge.  Lucy Belle, Ms. Zolten’s cat, furnished the answer.  Before she and her team met with six of the company’s executives, Ms. Zolten buried Lucy Belle’s mess in a box of the company’s litter and pushed it under the conference-room table.  No one noticed until Ms. Zolten pointed it out — and the fact that no one had smelled it.

All’s well that ends well and this story ends in a reward for Zolten:  The coveted Heroic Failure award from her agency!  Her bosses are worried that the ad agency is getting too conservative and want to encourage risk taking with this award.  And, they gave this to Zolten without knowing whether she got the account!  Everyone’s taking a chance in this transaction.

So, where’s the persuasion, Steve?

In a crowded and excited conference room with agency and clients all buzzed up about potential business the fact that no one noticed a used kitty litter box hidden from view may not mean what everyone thinks it means.  We tend to think that we are aware, thoughtful, and intentional in our lives while much of the time we are running on habit, cues, and expectations.  Thus, normal human nature would take Zolten’s story and see her clever tactic without realizing that since that odor is so far out of habit, cue, and expectation no one noticed it.  If you had instead asked everyone in the room to give the air a good sniff and tell me what you smell, I think Zolten’s story would have ended differently.

Anyone with a good background in marketing knows that people wildly overestimate the power of their senses which is why Coke and Pepsi, for example, can make billions of dollars on their two brands that most consumers most of the time cannot distinguish.  A prior post on my experience with milk demonstrate the effect.  This is not to say that senses like taste or smell or touch have no effect, but rather people’s awareness of taste or smell or touch is incredibly variable and subject to all manner of situational influences that have little to do with the stimulus intensity and more to do with the limitations of human nature and cognition.

Now, if this doesn’t occur to the potential client, then Zolten may have run a subtle persuasion play based on the difference between human conceit (gee, I’m thoughtful!) and human nature (gee, this is a sharp conference room!).  Kudos Zolten.

And, if this doesn’t occur to her bosses, then kudos again, Zolten.

But, if it doesn’t occur to anyone, there’s no persuasion here.  Just confusion.  And the potential for future disaster.

There’s a Difference between Persuasion, and Smoke and Mirrors; With Persuasion the Illusion Lingers.

Newt Gingrich won the South Carolina Republican primary in a walk, beating second place Mitt Romney by 10 points. Social conservative voters picked a man with three marriages and admitted adulteries. The persuasion gravity of a politician’s Woman Problem has no hold today on Mr. Gingrich.

Perhaps, this persuasion gravity does not hold in South Carolina.

Perhaps, Gingrich did Inoculate enough on this issue, at least with South Carolina voters.

Perhaps, three marriages and adulteries are not a Woman Problem. You need to get caught close to the act rather than years later. As the flamboyant Edwin Edwards of Louisiana observed, voters would not turn against him unless he got caught in bed with a dead woman or a live boy.

Perhaps, you can resist persuasion gravity in one primary, but no more.

There Are No Laws of Persuasion.

A valued network pointed me to a story about the Pentagon’s new love: Social Media. Consider.

The American intelligence and defense communities have become enthralled by the possibilities of social media. They’re looking to use the networks to forecast political unrest, spread friendly messages, spot emerging terror groups — and even predict the next natural disaster . . . A new project from U.S. Special Operations Command, on the other hand, looks to create something brand new: a “user-generated social media radio application powered by the human voice, available on the PC, Mac, Android, iPhone, and Nokia smart phones, that lets users share their thoughts and experiences.” And this voice-activated SOCOM network is being billed explicitly as a tool for “military information support operations” — shaping public attitudes.

Now. Let’s look at social media from a financial and investor perspective. How’s it going with Google+?

NEW YORK (TheStreet) — When it comes to web sites and apps, active users totals issued by companies are often hard to interpret, unreliable or just plain jacked up.

The writer then details the lack of details about Google+ and its success or failure. He notes that none of the social media monsters can produce a reliable metric of communication and persuasion impact. He cautions caution to investors about Google and by implication all other social media. So, I guess, if it’s your money, you might want to think about it, but if it is taxpayer money, you don’t?

And, we know the numbers don’t add up with Google+ along with the other gang of suspects. As noted recently, 80% of these IPO are trading below their opening day price. There is not as much there as some people thought and bought.

If You Cannot Count It, You Cannot Change It!

What’s the count? Sure you can count the number of devices and network links and data packets and on and on with measures of technology and reach, but what about counts on Changing the Other Guys and how They think, feel, or act?

Warfighting is different from persuasion even though both seek to Change the Other Guy. With warfighting, a new technology that reaches the Other Guy almost certainly also Changes the Other Guy. Bang! With persuasion, a new technology may reach without Change. Hello!

Realize the trap here. People are looking at devices and content for their persuasion when the maven realizes that persuasion produces its effect through function. An iGizmo is what it is, but has no inherent persuasion function. Just having it does not win hearts and minds.

Count the Change. Please.

All Bad Persuasion Is Sincere.

Persuasion Is Strategic Or It Is Not.

The persuasion standard for handling the politician’s Woman Problem remains Bill Clinton. He inoculated himself in the 1992 primaries and made it all the way to 1998 and the Blue Dress before reality overwhelmed his formidible, but ultimately limited, persuasion play on this deadly topic. Currently, Newt Gingrich faces a kind of Woman Problem with his marriages and adulteries, but Gingrich has chose not to Inoculate. Instead he’s blaming the media.

CNN moderator John King asked Newt Gingrich if he would like to address his ex-wife’s report earlier in the evening on ABC that he had asked for an “open marriage.” His answer: “No.” He then went on to denounce CNN and John King at length with barely restrained anger. He denied his ex-wife’s charge and offered only brass-knuckle contrition. Talking about how everyone in the audience had known personal pain, he concluded: “To take an ex-wife and make it two days before the primary a significant question for a presidential campaign is as close to despicable as anything I can imagine.”

You know you’ve got a Woman Problem and it is likely to make headlines so what can you do? Gingrich, like Cain, waited for the headline, then denied it and added a media attack. Clinton, by contrast, used his knowledge to get ahead of the headline and Inoculate before it appeared.

Prior to the eruption of the Woman Problem, Gingrich was surging in South Carolina polls, pushing hard at front-running Mitt Romney. More importantly, Gingrich knew the details of his Woman Problem. If Gingrich’s persuasion tactic of deny and blame works, then he should finish the SC primary close to Romney (5%). If past history and persuasion theory is any guide, however, there’s a good chance Gingrich will finish well behind Romney and at least one other candidate in this primary, then suspend his campaign in February to collaborate with Herman Cain on an outsider insurgency to stop Romney.

The Rules! There’s a Difference between Persuasion, and Smoke and Mirrors; With Persuasion the Illusion Lingers. Of course, There Are No Laws of Persuasion, so maybe Gingrich is onto something new! We’ll see soon.

Pressure proves both the persuasion and the persuader.