How to Get People to Care About What You’re Saying - Part 2

Here’s another way to get your listeners to care about what you’re saying to them. When you tell them stories, focus the story on a single person rather than on a group.

For example, let’s say that you want to convince people that your product is wonderful. One way to do this is by telling your listeners a story about a single person that benefitted and enjoyed using your product. Focus on that individual’s experience with your product.

Avoid focusing on a group of people that used and love your product. Tell the story of the individual user in detail. Then after telling that story, if you feel strongly that you should say something about a group that used your product, do so in passing at that point (after telling the story).

In the book, “Made to Stick”, by brothers Chip and Dan Heath, Chip and Dan tell of an experiment that demonstrated that people were more likely to give a donation when the pitch for the donation contained a story about a single person the donation would help. In contrast, pitches for donations that told of groups of people the donation would help generated smaller donations than the single person pitches. It was found that people were more emotionally touched by the story of an individual than they are by stories about masses of people.

So, what’s the lesson here? It is this: when attempting to get people to care about what you’re saying, one way is by telling relevant stories that center on the experiences of a single person.