persuasion Researchers from Arizona State University reported that before one of Billy Graham's televised crusades, his organization had coached thousands of volunteers on when to come up front, when to sing, and when to clap, all to give the appearance of great, religious intensity." In televised fundraisers people manning the phones are instructed to pretend they are talking to someone when the camera turns their way, to make it appear that there is a huge volume of calls. This gives social validation to the athome audience that this charity is popular and an acceptable organization to which to donate money. Your video rental stores use social validity as a means of increasing rentals on highprofit movies. Older movies return the highest profit for video rental stores. When storeowners noticed that many customers check the return stacks to see what videos other people were watching, they had workers put older movies into the return bin. Social validation increased the rentals of the older movies significantly. Do you recall MCI's "Friends and Family" campaign? The result was a gain of ten million customers in less than ten years! If we believe friends and family-people we know so well-are participating in the program, then we feel social proof and family pressure that it must be a good company or .product. That's why referrals are some of your best prospects! Referrals are your greatest source of social validation. Etiquette is also a form of social validation. When we eat, what we order, what we drink, where we put our napkins, and how we cross our silverware when finished, all are forms of social validation. Have you ever noticed that no one wants to be the first to order dessert? If the majority does not want dessert, it's likely that no one will. I recently attended a business opportunity seminar that was promoting a home business for $4,000. Throughout the course of the event, I saw many elements of social validation. The organizers used testimonials from people who were successful. The testifier stood up and claimed that this business opportunity was the answer to his economic woes. Then, as a form of social validation, all those who were ready to sign up had to walk to the back of the room to do so. The first few people ran to the back signup table. This was proof enough of the soundness of the business idea, and a storm of people followed suit to sign up. Of course, once at the back, there was a gentleman with a credit card machine running everybody's card through, tempting everyone's ears with that familiar sound of the credit card machine being swiped. Gangs exhibit a powerful manifestation of social validation. New initiates allow older members to beat them up just so they will be able to belong. Fraternity hazings also reduce the initiate to a subhuman level-all because of an overwhelming desire to belong to a group. During one fraternity hazing, new members were forced to drink so much alcohol that one guy passed out. persuasion