The issue: In Cialdini’s book Influence he talks about the issue of commitment and consistency and how it affects us in our daily lives.
Major strength: Cialdini’s major strength in this chapter is the example of the toy companies. I found this example to be an example that I could relate to and it really showed how commitment and consistency affect us in our daily lives. Toy companies have found a great way to help spike their profits after the holiday season and this just shows how we are victims of many marketing strategies. I had never thought of this working but it makes total and complete sense. Companies make children get really excited about something so their parents commit to saying they can have it for Christmas. Companies then undersupply the stores of that item so parents buy something else. They then run more adds about the toy after Christmas and have children tell their parents that they made a promise so parents feel obligated to buy the toy after Christmas, spiking the sales of the toy company. This example shows that if companies can get us to commit to something then the majority of the time we will follow through on that commitment and buy the item. This theory is a well-proven fact and is used in many marketing campaigns around the world. It is also used a lot with politics. If a politician can get someone to say they will do something then they are more likely to complete that action then they were before they said they would do it.
Major weakness: The major weakness in this section is the example about the Chinese and their POW tactics. They used different methods in order to get the Americans to talk badly about their country and to extract information out of them. I believe that their tactics of using the consistency theory and commitment were genius but I believe there are a lot of factors in this example that didn’t work. It is hard to imagine that this is a great example because of all the other factors that are happening when an American is captured by another country. I believe that as human beings we are going to try to save ourselves in order to stay alive so we are more likely to comply with the people that are holding our fate. I do not believe this was a great example to show how commitment and the consistency theory work.
Underlying assumption: The underlying assumption in this chapter is that if a human commits to something then they are more likely to follow through with that commitment more then if they do not say they will do something. Another assumption is that as humans once we commit to one thing we tend to consistently commit to allowing other things happen. This is called a foot in the door technique and it has been proven to work very well. This is shown in the example where the people committed to displaying a small sign in their yard that read, “Be a safe driver”. Two weeks later they were asked to display a massive “Drive safe” sign in their yard and they all said that was fine as well. The people who had been asked right away to display the massive sign all turned them down. The reason why the people who displayed the small sign did not turn them down was because they had already complied and didn’t see the harm in adding a larger sign. This foot in the door tactic is a large tactic used to get people to comply with things that they most likely are not going to be okay with if they are asked to do it right from the start. If one starts out small then eventually they are more likely to comply with the larger request.
Provocative questions: Why do we comply so much more after we have committed to something?
Do you think companies have a whole team of people that think of ways to use these theories to get people to buy something or does everyone in the marketing department just know each of these theories and how to apply them?