How To Get Your Boss To Say Yes To CoSchedule (Powered By Science)

How To Get Your Boss To Say Yes To (Powered By Science) Marketing has  changed more in last few years than in the last half-century before them. And the velocity of change is only accelerating. This means there are more areas than ever we need to be competent in. Not only do we have to be awesome at being visionary leaders, sharp copywriters, email wizards, rockin conversion experts, killer project managers, Ogilvy-esque advertisers, and 48 other skills we have to build the skill of leading change. weve gotta challenge the status quo  before were stuck. even more, weve gotta convince our bosses to come along for the ride. And if youve made the decision to adopt , the worlds best marketing management platform, the task is the same. It all comes down to our ability to influence others. From our peers to the C-Suite execs. But, if youve ever read about the psychology of influence, it can be sad news. Doubly so when it comes to how to convince your boss or top brass to try new tools like . How To Get Your Boss To Say Yes To @(Powered By Science) by @jordan_loftisThe *Semi-Depressing* Reality Of Influencing Others One of the first principles of influence you come across is called the halo effect. In the 1920s, psychologist Edward Thorndike piloted a study of how military officers judge their subordinates. He found more physically attractive soldiers were were rated higher across the board on a four-point scale: intelligence, physique, leadership, and character. This means positive reactions to physical appearance were projected onto other areas of the soldiers. And as much as we hate to admit it, the rabbit hole goes deeper. This principle holds true in elections, as well. In a study called Beauty at the Ballot Box, researchers theorized that since physical attractiveness is a cue toward good health, we may be biologically programmed to esteem it. Meaning were naturally inclined to favor attractive people. However, when it comes to convincing your boss to say yes to a fresh software tool like obliterating makeshift marketing a flexible work-from-home policy that new process weve got many more science-backed levers to pull than just our faces. 4 Ways To Convince Your Boss To Say Yes To Fueled By Science 🚀 In this post, Ill share the best research on ethical approaches to convince your boss to say yes to (and just about anything else!). No makeup required. Youll learn four strategies: How to position your ask in concrete terms, How to align implementing with team objectives, Why to conduct a trial run with a mini post-mortem conversation, And how to win the conversation by starting big, then going small. One of the most powerful benefits of is its ability to crush the bug we call makeshift marketing. A major change to the marketing landscape is the sheer number of single-function software tools available. Unfortunately, most dont play well together. This means were stuck with tools not designed with marketers in mind. This makes your life more frustrating and puts a lid on your results. So, well walk through examples of leading change to combat it by getting your boss to say yes to ! Saddle up, partner! #1: Convince Your Boss To Say Yes To Through Loss Aversion Lets begin with  opportunity cost. An opportunity cost is the benefit someone loses in favor of taking a different action. When you choose between things, you lose the benefits of the alternative choice. With this first tactic, well leverage the principles of loss aversion and prospect theory. Research shows that people fear loss more than they desire benefit. And this greatly influences the way they choose between options (aka: prospects). Research shows that people fear loss more than they desire benefit.This means people will over emphasise even minor opportunities for loss. Nielsen Norman Group  says it like this: When choosing among several alternatives, people avoid losses and optimize for sure wins because the pain of losing is greater than the satisfaction of an equivalent gain. For example, you want to adopt a new marketing tool  like to replace a less effective one (or even multiple tools). The problem is theres a chance the new tool will cost more than its worth. Either in hard cash  and  in lost productivity. In turn, your boss may be instantly loss averse. This will impact her choice between the prospects of status quo and potential loss. The risk may seem falsely outsized - especially if budgets or time are already tight. To use this knowledge to your advantage, simply structure your ask in two parts: If we do [thing you want] it will add [positive value]. If we dont do [thing you want] it will cost [negative value]. In this case, it may sound like: If we [adopt ], it will give us a [55% lift in productivity per team member]. If we dont [adopt this new tool], we are actually losing [$1,255 per week in lost productivity]. To help you make that case, you can actually use the nifty Time Savings Calculator we built. After extensive research of our customers, we found the average time savings based on the above criteria. Simply enter your team size, the number of projects you complete each week, and the number of social profiles you manage. Then click Calculate Time Savings. In this case, a team of two completing four projects and managing three social media profiles per week can save over 20 hours per month! (Whats even cooler is  this actually happened for customer Florida Realtors ®) If you dollarize your time, thats an incredible amount of money. Ask your boss: What would it mean for us to have 80 hours back per month? The idea here is to highlight the gain as specifically as possible. Then showcase the loss of the alternative option - in this case changing nothing - as specifically as possible. This way, you can position the facts according to the emotional principles at play. If your boss says no to , theyre actually saying no to 80 bonus hours per month (on average)! Set the stakes,  make loss aversion your friend, and get to yes faster. Thanks science! #2: Convince Your Boss To Use By Aligning Change With Team Goals Next, marketers have #goalsfordays A recent study we conducted found that marketers who set goals are 429% more likely to be successful. Tactic number two is using this stat to your advantage. If you have goals, like driving  500 fresh leads every month make us of  alignment theory. In simple terms, it says the most successful people understand their strengths and then arrange their lives in alignment with them. This theory works for both individuals and teams. Successful organizations run like machines using this principle. And the power of alignment is possible when strategy, goals, and purpose mutually reinforce one another. To put it to work with your boss, structure your ask for change like this: Our team is trying to achieve [goal]. But we have [failed] for the past [timeframe]. I think the best way we can do this right now is by [thing you want]  [based on prior success]. In keeping with our 1,000 qualified leads example, the ask might be: Our team is trying to achieve [1,000 qualified leads every month]. But weve [only reached 70% of that goal] for the [past three months]. I think the best way we can do this right now is by [focusing exclusively on driving traffic] [to our top-performing landing pages]. The change youre after is a shifted focus: driving more traffic. However, the goal youre trying to achieve is the same: 1,000 qualified leads. Also notice this clause: based on prior success. If your team has had any related successes in the past, highlight them for leverage as proof.If your team has related successes in the past, highlight them for leverage as proof. In this example, it was top-performing landing pages. In their fantastic book, Switch, authors Chip and Dan Heath call these prior wins bright spots. Theyre powerful because they showcase that positive results  are possible, because you have achieved them in the past. Youre team is capable of knocking it outta the park. So, you align your methods accordingly. Bonus: This is also a great chance to sharpen your goal-setting strategy if it needs a little work. #3: Convince Your Boss To Say Yes To With A Post-Mortem Post-mortems sound sad but can I be real for a minute? I think theyre amazing. Post-mortems are amazing persuasion hacks.A post-mortem is an analysis held after a project, usually with the aim of answering this question: How on earth did things go so wrong?! So why do I love em? Because theyre amazing chances to learn. Theyre even beneficial to hold on the heels of successful projects. They promote healthy self-reflection and can benefit your entire team. To persuade your boss to say yes to , though, I want you to tactically use a mini post-mortem with your boss in advance of your ask. Two reasons: You can learn why similar changes, like adopting new tools, have failed in the past. You can pre-empt legitimate objections your boss will have ahead of time. Why Have Other Things Failed? By learning why other initiatives have failed, you can learn what pitfalls to avoid. For instance, if youre proposing a move from messy-as-hell spreadsheets to   - or a similar transition from an inefficient way of doing things - how helpful would it be to learn that the last tool transition to be shot down actually had the support of your manager, but got squashed by the CFO? Setup this convo like this: When was the last time we wanted to get budget for a new software tool in our department? How did it go? If the last attempt bombed, follow with, Why do you think it failed? And is there any way it could have been approved? If it succeeded, even better! Ask, Why was it successful? And how has it panned out? Overcoming Legitimate Objections Next, you can glean what legitimate objections your boss may have to your idea. Almost every boss Ive ever had loved to say, Yes! to great ideas. But so many of my attempts at leading a new change as the underling failed because I didnt understand their field of visibility. Field of visibility means their viewpoint informed by the things they know that you may not. Think of it like this. Company execs sit in meetings that you dont. They hear forecasts, plans, and upcoming constraints that you dont. They understand organizational dynamics you may have missed. They see your team from a broader perspective than you might. This means understanding their field of visibility is incredibly beneficial. With a mini post-mortem, you can dig in to why a similar change failed. This will help you position your ask to overcome your bosss legitimate (or even illegitimate) objections. Whether its data Or a project champion up the chain Or even competitive research You can gain insight beforehand to have great answers to tough questions. And these answers can fuel your case for adopting ! #4: Convince Your Boss By Asking Big, Then Small Last, lets talk about an old psychological warhorse: the rule of reciprocity. Psychologist and best-selling author Robert Cialdini explains it in his book,  Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion, like this. He writes: The rule says that we should try to repay, in kind, what another person has provided us [and] by virtue of the reciprocity rulewe are  obligated to the future repayment of favors, gifts, invitations, and the like. The idea is to do something for someone else  before you ask them to do something for you. When you do so, youre far more likely to get your Yes. While this principle might be effective, its often felt too manipulative for me to entertain actually doing this. You can influence people without being conniving or manipulative.Call me a boy scout, but that seems like a pretty sketchy move. And worse, an infringement on a healthy relationship. That said, there is a version of this rule I happily endorse 😎 Cialdini also shares a specific application of this rule called bargaining, saying, Bargaining is frequently used in the negotiation process, which involves reciprocal concessions. That is, if Person A rebuffs a large request from Person B, and Person B then concedes by making a smaller request, Person A will feel obligated to reciprocate this concession with a concession of his or her own by agreeing to this lesser plea. In 1975, researchers on the Arizona State University campus cracked the code on this. In an experiment, half of the students in the test were asked, Will you chaperone juvenile-detention-center inmates on a day trip to the zoo? A measly 17% said yes. The other half of the test subjects were asked a leading question first: Will you volunteer as a juvenile-detention-center counselor for two hours per week for the next two years? Every single student said no to the new leading question but then the interesting part happened. Nearly 50% said yes to the second (original) question about chaperoning the zoo visit! The angle for our marketing purposes is pretty obvious: construct two versions of your ask.