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Persuasive Messages
Chapter Overview
Persuasion involves providing the motivation for people to act in specific ways, including ways that require them to change their behaviour. In any profession, knowing how to be persuasive is a vital skill. In this chapter, you’ll be introduced to strategies for motivating readers to change their attitudes, beliefs, or behaviours or to take action according to the arguments and benefits you present. You’ll see how two standard writing plans can be adapted to fit any situation to help readers overcome their resistance and how establishing rapport and making strong arguments can be key to gaining acceptance and influencing readers.
Learning Objectives
In this chapter, you will learn to do the following:
- Identify the need for persuasive communication.
- Use the indirect writing plan to persuade.
- Apply persuasive appeals.
- Ask for favours and action persuasively.
- Gain support for new ideas in persuasive memos.
- Make contestable claims successfully.
- Convince debtors to pay their bills promptly.
- Compose effective sales letters and fundraising messages.
- Identify how to harness the power of social media to influence people.