In chapter 3 of Influence, Robert Cialdini tells the interesting story of a transcendental meditation event he went to.
Cialdini was at the event to study the recruiting methods of the TM organization. He was sitting in the audience with a friend, a professor of statistics and symbolic logic.
The TM presentation started out talking about inner peace and better sleep. But it got progressively weirder and more outlandish. Cialdini says that, by the end, the TM gurus were promising to teach you how to fly through walls.
Eventually, Cialdini’s rational and scientific friend couldn’t take it any more. He stood up, spoke to the whole room, and “gently but surely demolished the presentation.” He showed how the presentation was illogical, contradictory, and groundless.
The TM gurus on stage fell silent. They hung their heads and admitted that Cialdini’s friend raised really good points, and they would have to look deeply into this.
So whaddya think happened? If you’ve read my recent posts about Frank Abagnale and Uri Geller, you probably know exactly what happened:
Once the TM presentation ended, people in the audience rushed to the back of the room. They handed over their money to sign up for TM bootcamps and workshops.
Did they not hear Cialdini’s friend dismantle the whole TM gimmick? Or were they just too dumb to understand what he was saying?
Nope. Neither. They heard him, and they understood perfectly what he was saying. That’s why they were so eager to jump aboard the slow-moving TM train.
“Well, I wasn’t going to put down any money tonight,” said one future TM’er when pressed later by Cialdini. “I’m really quite broke right now. I was going to wait until the next meeting. But when your buddy started talking, I knew I’d better give them my money now, or I’d go home and start thinking about what he said and never sign up.”
I read this story a few days ago. And I was thinking about how you could use this quirk of human nature for intentional marketing. And then, yesterday, I ran across the term limited hangout.
Limited hangout is apparently a term used by politicians’ aides and CIA operatives. It’s when you cover up the full extent of a scandal or secret by an early reveal of some of the damaging stuff. By letting it hang out. Not all of it, of course.
An example of this was Richard Nixon and company’s attempt to cover up how high Watergate went. They were planning to do a “modified limited hangout” and release a report with a lot of damaging information. Of course not implicating the president.
It didn’t work for Nixon. Too little, too late. But apparently limited hangout has worked in lots of other cases.
The thing is, everybody who writes about limited hangout says it is an example of misdirection… or gullibility… or short attention spans.
Perhaps. But perhaps the effectiveness of the limited hangout technique is just what Cialdini writes about.
When we believe something, then information to the contrary actually drives us towards that something. I will leave it at that, and let you use this dangerous material as you see fit.
And on that note:
I’m not sure if you have a strong desire to hear from me again on similar persuasion topics. If you do, I have to tell you that I often write about borderline immoral tactics. Plus there’s no guarantee that any of them will work for you. If that doesn’t deter you, here’s how you can make sure to hear more of my ideas.