Analyzing Character by Arthur Newcomb (best ereader for epub .txt) 📕

becomes, the more it crowds all other thoughts and feelings from the mind, the more powerful and irresistible becomes the desire. It is the task of the persuader, therefore, to stimulate the imagination to the painting of such mental pictures. This we well know, but what we wish to know further is what are the most powerful desires in the particular human mind with which we are dealing. Obviously, the automobile salesman who vividly pictures to the timid person the thrills of speeding around curves would be as far wrong as if he were picturing the sedate, quiet luxury of his car to a speed maniac. What he wants to know and what we all want to know in substance is how to tell, at a glance, which is the timid, sedate person and which the speed maniac.

DECISION AND ACTION

Perhaps the most delicate and most difficult process among all the four steps of persuasion is inducing decision and action. When one reflects upon the multitudinous important decisions made and actions taken every hour, it hardly seems possible that it can be so difficult to induce our fellow-men to make the short step from hesitant desire to definite decision. The truth is, of course, that in the making of almost any important decision there is a stern conflict between conflicting desires. Take, for example, a man buying an automobile. Under the skilful persuasive power of the salesman, he has vividly pictured to himself enjoying possession. But this is not his only mental picture. Perhaps he has a picture of his old age, in which he might enjoy the income from the money which would go into an automobile. There are also in his mind mental pictures of half a dozen to a dozen or more other makes of automobiles. In addition to these, there may be a mental picture of a motor boat, a little cottage by the sea, a new set of furniture for his house, new fittings for his store, an increased advertising appropriation, a new insurance policy, a trip to California and return, and goodness only knows how many other objects of desire. It is no wonder he hesitates and that he must be very skilfully and deftly brought to the point of decision.

WAYS OF INDUCING DECISION AND ACTION

For this reason, experience has shown that many people, perhaps the majority of people, can be induced to decide whether they will have red rubber or gray rubber tires on an automobile they contemplate purchasing far more easily than they can be induced to decide definitely that they will purchase the car. Having decided upon the tires, however, they can be asked to decide upon other minor points, including the terms upon which they intend to pay for the car, and thus eventually go through the entire process of purchasing the car without ever giving their delicate mental mechanism the severe shock and strain of deciding to purchase it at all. As a general rule, such people are surprised and delighted to find that they have made the decision so easily and with so little pain and distress.

But this method will not work with all people. There are some natures so positive, so aggressive, so fond of taking the initiative, so determined to make their own decisions without interference that the wise salesman or persuader apparently permits them to have their own way, at the same time skilfully guiding them in the way he wishes them to go by means of indirect suggestion.

INDUCING A POSITIVE NATURE TO PERSUADE HIMSELF

The story is told of an old-time, domineering railroad official, formerly an army colonel, a great lover of horses, who was intensely prejudiced against the automobile. During the days when carriages were favorite conveyances of the wealthy, this man kept a magnificent stable and boasted that no driver ever passed him on the road. With the coming in of automobiles, he became accustomed to seeing the gasoline-drinking machines flash by. They came up behind him with a honk. They rushed by with a roar and they disappeared in the distance in a cloud of dust. He saw the chauffeurs gripping their steering wheels and glaring intensely along the road.

"Humph!" he scorned, "those fellows work harder than an engineer for their rattlety-bang speed. I had rather sit back and get some pleasure out of riding, as I do behind my bays."

Then one morning he noticed a car slip by him slowly, noiselessly, easily, and with so little evidence of effort that the old man felt that by urging his horses to just a little faster pace he might have kept ahead. The next morning, the same thing happened again. It was the same car, and this time the old man tightened his reins a little and sent his horses speeding ahead. At first he gained a little on the car, but eventually it pulled slowly and easily away from him. The third morning, there was another little brush of speed on the boulevard. By this time the old railroad man had noticed how luxurious the car was, how smoothly it rolled, how deeply upholstered were the seats, how lustrous and satiny the finish.

Finally, one morning, one of the old man's horses cast a shoe and the courteous young driver of the automobile, coming along, kindly offered to take the colonel on downtown. The offer was accepted, the team sent to a horseshoer's in care of the coachman, and the colonel and his new friend drove off still slowly, still quietly, and yet, one by one, they passed other carriages on the road. Finally a trolley car was overtaken and left behind.

"See," said the young man modestly, "just the pressure of a finger on the throttle."

"Oh, do you call that a throttle?" asked the railroader. The word was a familiar one to him, and being distinctly of the mechanical type, he was easily interested in machinery. For the remainder of the journey the young man talked quietly, but interestingly of the mechanism of the car, emphasizing the need of skill, steadiness of eye, steadiness of hand, coolness of nerve necessary to drive it. The colonel was deeply interested and, just as the young man deposited him at his destination, he said, "It is possible your horses may not be ready to come for you this evening. If so, I should be delighted to call for you as I go out your way at about the same time you go." The colonel graciously accepted the invitation and at four o'clock of that same afternoon he was again seated along-side the driver of the car. After they had drawn out of the congested streets onto the wide boulevard, the young man again deftly turned the conversation to the mechanism of the car and the skill necessary for driving it. This was too much for the colonel.

"Pshaw! I do not believe it takes so much skill. With what I know about it, I believe I could drive the car."

After some hesitation, the young man finally permitted the railroad official to take the wheel. At first the colonel drove somewhat clumsily, but this only increased his determination, and within an hour he was sending the car along at a good clip. When finally they drove up to the colonel's country home, the young man scarcely needed to invite his passenger to accompany him to the city on the following morning. Before the end of the week, the old man had purchased a magnificent high-powered car. So skilfully did the young man handle his campaign that his customer did not learn he was an automobile salesman until just a few hours before the deal was consummated.

HANDLING THE INDECISIVE

If there are positive natures which must be permitted to feel that the decision is all their own, there are weak, indecisive natures, also, who are rather grateful than otherwise for having important decisions taken off of their hands. For such people, a direct, positive suggestion is perhaps the most powerful and effective means of securing decision and action. One of the favorite methods of dealing with them is to press a fountain pen into their fingers with the definitely worded command, "Sign your name right here, please."

People are also brought to decide and act by being impressed with the fact that delay may make it altogether too late or may possibly postpone part of the advantage to be gained or may permit some one else to get ahead. Decision oftentimes is also induced by a direct or indirect compliment to the individual's decisiveness, positiveness, and ability to take action when he sees that action is necessary. A very successful salesman often used this method: "You say rightly that you want to think it over. That shows that you are a wise man, because a man who acts without thinking is foolish. On the other hand, the man who thinks without acting is a mere dreamer, and I know you do not belong to that class. You have had the evidence. You have weighed it. You have formed your conclusions, and now, because you are a man of decision and action, you are ready to sign the contract."

NEED FOR CHARACTER ANALYSIS

Here, again, the reader has already seen that we are dealing with generalities. We have, as yet, no way of determining definitely and quickly whether the individual with whom we are dealing will respond best to that treatment which secures his decision upon minor points, or that which permits him to make his own decision guided only by indirect suggestions, or that which makes the decision for him, or that which compliments him upon his decisiveness, or any one of many other methods of closing. And so it is necessary to study humanity to learn to know just what will gain favorable attention of each one individually, just which one of a thousand possible motives to appeal to in order to arouse interest, just what kind of a desire to stimulate in order to intensify it to that point where it becomes irresistible, just what method of closing to use in order to bring about decision and action.

In succeeding chapters of this part of the book, we shall give some attention to these problems.

CHAPTER II SECURING FAVORABLE ATTENTION

You would find it an interesting study in human nature to stand in front of different shop windows and record the types of people whose favorable attention is drawn by each. Select, for example, a book-store window, a jewelry display, a window full of tools and instruments, an offering of meats and groceries, and a traction engine. You will find a description of various types in the first few chapters of this book. Suppose you took fifty, one hundred, one hundred and fifty, two hundred observations before each display and then analyzed the records to find the percentage of each type whose favorable attention was called to each window.

Our own observations, taken in New York City, produced the following results:

Display Phys.
Frail   Fat   Bone &  
Muscle   Impractical   Professional   Vain   Mechanical   Total Bookstore 30 10 12 15 20 6 7 100 Jewelry 15 20 3 12 19 35 6 100 Tools & Instruments   8 12 30 6 14 4 26 100 Meats & Groceries 6 42 8 8 13 11 12 100 Traction Engine 8 16 31 9 7 3 26 100

THE PHYSICALLY FRAIL

These results show that the individual of the physically frail type, as described in Chapter 2 of this book, is chiefly interested in books, in beauty, ideas and ideals, elegance, and luxuries. His favorable attention is caught by that which is beautiful. If the thing offered him has in it or about it any elements of beauty, elegance, luxury, or idealism, this should first be presented, even if the true value of the article lies in its utility. In the same way, this individual will respond most quickly with his favorable attention to that which is intellectual, educational, literary, scientific, or philosophic, unless he is also of the strictly financial type which is sometimes, though not often, true of the physically frail. Then his attention may be readily secured by an apt quotation from a price list.

Because the physically frail man does not like manual labor and cannot do it