It's essentially a guidebook to hacking people. Folks who enjoy behavioral economics books like Nudge, motivation analysis books like Switch or neurological economics like Thinking Fast & Slow will LOVE Influence.
Breathless praise aside, Cialdini identifies key principles of persuasion such as social proof, reciprocity, subservience to authority figures, desire to act in a consistent manner and perceived scarcity. Once you understand these biases it's very easy to start noticing them in everything from advertising to politics to web design. Sure you might perform a bunch of multivariate testing to figure out what the right text is on your signup page but (a) if you don't know what human decision heuristic you're trying to appeal to and (b) don't understand why the best performing designs work the way they do, then you're really just a statistician when you should be an anthropologist.
Kind of generic, but totally a fun read for someone who maybe hasn't gone through courses in psychology and sociology. Plus, it's a quick & easy read - perfect light reading to bring along on a trip. =)
I can't believe that I'm only reading this book now. It explains a lot of things that I've done in the past, but didn't quite know why. A powerful toolbox of psychology strategies to influence others and block the influence of people who use these strategies on you.
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