Twigger warning:
This post is about billionaire businessman, master persuader, and father of five D. Trump. Because while working on some secret stuff today, I had the feeling that Trump uses repetition as a persuasive tool.
But it was just a hunch. And then I found a transcript of the third presidential debate between Trump and H. Clinton. In the first few seconds, Trump said the following:
Something happened recently where Justice Ginsburg made some very, very inappropriate statements toward me and toward a tremendous number of people, many, many millions of people that I represent. And she was forced to apologize and apologize she did.
But these were statements that should never, ever have been made. We need a Supreme Court that in my opinion, is going to uphold the Second Amendment and all amendments, but the Second Amendment, which is under absolute siege.
I believe if my opponent should win this race, which I truly don’t think will happen, we will have a Second Amendment, which will be a very, very small replica of what it is right now. But I feel that it’s absolutely important that we uphold because of the fact that it is under such trauma.
By my count, this short snippet features:
– 6 instances of words repeated for effect
– 2 instances of phrases repeated for effect
– 4 instances of ideas repeated for effect
So I think my hunch about Trump and repetition was spot on.
(I only found out later that I was not the first to spot Trump’s use of repetition. Far from it. It turns out Scott Adams wrote about it in his book Win Bigly, all the way back in 2017. According to Adams, repetition is the key pillar of Trump’s persuasive power, along with simplicity and images.)
Now maybe you don’t like Trump. Even so, you might still be able to learn something from the man. Because you too can use repetition at different levels of your persuasive message. Words. Phrases. Ideas. Across space and time.
It’s worth trying. Because repetition creates belief… it increases desire… and it makes sure your message actually reaches your prospect.
If that sounds familiar, it’s because I wrote about it in another post a few months ago. But it’s a very valuable lesson… and worth repeating.
And here’s something I repeat at the end of each of my posts:
I have an email newsletter. It’s the best. Really. If you’d like to try it out, you can sign up here.