Jerry Weissman On Persuasion: Getting From Point A to Point B In Your Presentation

August 1st, 2007 Sean Murphy

I wrote earlier in “Kierkegaard On the Art of Helping Others To Understand” about the need to understand where what Jerry Weissman calls “Point A” is for a prospect. Here is an excerpt from his book “Presenting to Win: The Art of Telling Your Story” (pages 6-7, emphasis in original) on persuasion.

Persuasion: Getting From Point A to Point B

All presentation situations have one element in common.

Whether it’s a formal presentation, speech, sales pitch, seminar, jury summation, or a pep talk, every communication has as its goal to take the audience from where they are at the start of your presentation, which is Point A, and move them to your objective, which is Point B. This dynamic shift is persuasion.

[…]

In psychological terms, Point A is the inert place where your audience starts: uninformed, knowing little about you and your business; dubious, skeptical about your business and ready to question your claims; or in the worst-case scenario, resistant, mentally committed to a position contrary to what you’re asking them to do.

What you are asking them to do is Point B. The precise nature of Point B depends upon the particular persuasive situation you face. To reach Point B, you need to move the uninformed audience to understand, the dubious audience to believe, and the resistant audience to act in a particular way. In fact, understand, believe, and act are not three separate goals, but three stages in reaching a single, cumulative, ultimate goal. After all, the audience will not act as you want them to act if they don’t first understand your story and believe the message it conveys.

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