“I can handle this. Handle is my middle name. Actually, handle is the middle of my first name. [Insert canned laughter]”
– Chandler Bing, Friends
You probably know from Cialdini’s Influence about the power of social proof. That’s why shows like Friends insert canned laughter. We laugh more when we hear other people laughing, even if we know it’s fake.
But:
It turns out to be more tricky than that.
Some scientists in Australia tested this out. They wanted to see if WHO is laughing matters. And the answer is yes.
I won’t burden you with the details of the experiment. In a nutshell, the study subjects (university students) had to listen to audio recordings of a standup comic, with canned laughter and without. But there was a twist:
One group of students was told that the canned laughter was other students from the same university.
A second group of students was told that the canned laughter was sympathizers of Australia’s far-right One Nation party, which apparently would like to build a wall with Mexico, and have Mexico pay for it.
And the results?
When the canned laughter was present, group one laughed four times more than without the canned laughter. Makes sense. Other people like them found the material funny. So Cialdini was right, and so was Friends.
But no such thing happened in group two. The students didn’t laugh any more with the canned laughter than they did without it. How could they? Obviously the comic isn’t very good if those horrible xenophobes find him so funny.
I’m telling you about this because it applies to direct marketing as well.
Just like the producers of corny sitcoms, marketers know about the power of social proof. That’s why we stick tons of testimonials into our sales letters.
And testimonials are good. But:
Testimonials are much better if they come from people like the prospect. (At least that’s what Dan Kennedy says, but he should know.) You want to find testimonials that have the same gender… same race… same age… same ideas about building the wall… as your prospect does.
And what if you don’t have any testimonials like that?
Well, then you can just sweep your arm over your offer and say something like,
“I write a daily email newsletter. Many successful marketers and copywriters find it very valuable. Click here to subscribe.”