The early modern ‘public sphere’ emerges out of a popular ‘culture of persuasion’ fostered by the Protestant Reformation. By 1600, religious identity could no longer be assumed as ‘given’ within the hierarchical institutions and elaborate apparatus of late-medieval ‘sacramental culture’. Reformers insisted on a sharp demarcation between the inner, subjective space of the individual and the external, public space of institutional life. Gradual displacement of sacramental culture was achieved by means of argument, textual interpretation, exhortation, reasoned opinion, and moral advice exercised through both pulpit and press. This alternative culture of persuasion presupposes a radically distinct notion of mediation. The common focus of the essays collected here is the dynamic interaction of religion and politics which provided a crucible for the emerging modern ‘public sphere’.

Conversions begin in the brain. Every purchase starts with a decision, and every decision is shaped by consumer psychology. This book explains how mental shortcuts (cognitive biases) affect your customers' decision making and shows you how to be more persuasive online. Philippe Aimé and Jochen Grünbeck are optimisation addicts and have been at the forefront of digital marketing since the beginning. Inspired by behavioural economists like Daniel Kahneman, Dan Ariely and Richard Thaler, the techniques described in Smart Persuasion leverage powerful decision-making biases to make marketing more effective. Alongside these behavioural insights, Smart Persuasion incorporates research from marketing experts such as Jonah Berger, Robert Cialdini and Roger Dooley. Principles relating to attention and perception, as well as the cognitive effects that make consumers predictably irrational, are distilled into concrete website optimisation strategies. Drawing from hundreds of unique studies, Smart Persuasion lists proven effects such as Anchoring and Framing. Each one is illustrated with case-studies, examples and ideas that you can apply immediately. Using the persuasive strategies outlined in this book will allow you to influence consumers more effectively, unlocking your website's potential. All profits from the sale of this book help provide educational resources for children in Africa.

How do you turn website visitors into customers? Conversion Optimization offers practical advice on how to persuade visitors to make a buying decision -- without driving them away through data overload or tedious navigation. You'll learn how to use marketing principles, design, usability, and analytics on your site to increase your buyer-to-visitor ratio, whether you're involved with marketing or designing a large ecommerce site, or managing a modest online operation. Based on the authors' broad experience in helping businesses attract online customers, this book addresses every aspect of the process, from landing visitors to finalizing the sale. You'll learn several techniques for blending successful sales approaches with the particular needs of the people you want to attract. Are you ready to do what it takes to get a double-digit conversion rate? Explore case studies involving significant conversion rate improvements Walk through different stages of a sale and understand the value of each Understand your website visitors through persona creation Connect with potential customers and guide them toward a conversion Learn how to deal with FUDs -- customer fears, uncertainties, and doubts Examine the path that visitors take from landing page to checkout Test any change you make against your original design "The Web is unique in its ability to deliver this almost improbable win-win: You can increase revenue AND make your customers happy. Yet most websites stink. Worry not, Khalid and Ayat to the rescue! Buy this book to follow their practical advice on how to create high converting websites that your visitors love."--Avinash Kaushik, author of Web Analytics 2.0 and Web Analytics: An Hour A Day (both Sybex)

Influence: Science and Practice is an examination of the psychology of compliance (i.e. uncovering which factors cause a person to say "yes" to another's request) and is written in a narrative style combined with scholarly research. Cialdini combines evidence from experimental work with the techniques and strategies he gathered while working as a salesperson, fundraiser, advertiser, and other positions, inside organizations that commonly use compliance tactics to get us to say "yes". Widely used in graduate and undergraduate psychology and management classes, as well as sold to people operating successfully in the business world, the eagerly awaited revision of Influence reminds the reader of the power of persuasion. Cialdini organizes compliance techniques into six categories based on psychological principles that direct human behavior: reciprocation, consistency, social proof, liking, authority, and scarcity. Copyright © Libri GmbH. All rights reserved.

The acclaimed New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller from Robert Cialdini—“the foremost expert on effective persuasion” (Harvard Business Review)—explains how it’s not necessarily the message itself that changes minds, but the key moment before you deliver that message. What separates effective communicators from truly successful persuaders? With the same rigorous scientific research and accessibility that made his Influence an iconic bestseller, Robert Cialdini explains how to prepare people to be receptive to a message before they experience it. Optimal persuasion is achieved only through optimal pre-suasion. In other words, to change “minds” a pre-suader must also change “states of mind.” Named a “Best Business Books of 2016” by the Financial Times, and “compelling” by The Wall Street Journal, Cialdini’s Pre-Suasion draws on his extensive experience as the most cited social psychologist of our time and explains the techniques a person should implement to become a master persuader. Altering a listener’s attitudes, beliefs, or experiences isn’t necessary, says Cialdini—all that’s required is for a communicator to redirect the audience’s focus of attention before a relevant action. From studies on advertising imagery to treating opiate addiction, from the annual letters of Berkshire Hathaway to the annals of history, Cialdini outlines the specific techniques you can use on online marketing campaigns and even effective wartime propaganda. He illustrates how the artful diversion of attention leads to successful pre-suasion and gets your targeted audience primed and ready to say, “Yes.” His book is “an essential tool for anyone serious about science based business strategies…and is destined to be an instant classic. It belongs on the shelf of anyone in business, from the CEO to the newest salesperson” (Forbes).

A harrowing account of brainwashing’s pervasive role in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries This gripping book traces the evolution of brainwashing from its beginnings in torture and religious conversion into the age of neuroscience and social media. When Pavlov introduced scientific approaches, his research was enthusiastically supported by Lenin and Stalin, setting the stage for major breakthroughs in tools for social, political, and religious control. Tracing these developments through many of the past century’s major conflagrations, Dimsdale narrates how when World War II erupted, governments secretly raced to develop drugs for interrogation. Brainwashing returned to the spotlight during the Cold War in the hands of the North Koreans and Chinese. In response, a huge Manhattan Project of the Mind was established to study memory obliteration, indoctrination during sleep, and hallucinogens. Cults used the techniques as well. Nobel laureates, university academics, intelligence operatives, criminals, and clerics all populate this shattering and dark story—one that hasn’t yet ended.

Call to Action includes the information businesses need to know to achieve dramatic results from online efforts. Are you planning for top performance? Are you accurately evaluating that performance? Are you setting the best benchmarks for measuring success? How well are you communicating your value proposition? Are you structured for change? Can you achieve the momentum you need to get the results you want? If you have the desire and commitment to create phenomenal online results, then this book is your call to action. Within these pages, New York Times best-selling authors Bryan and Jeffrey Eisenberg walk you through the five phases that comprise web site development, from the critical planning phase, through developing structure, momentum, and communication, to articulating value. Along the way, they offer advice and practical applications culled from their years of experience "in the trenches."

The Persuasion Code Capture, convince, and close—scientifically Most of your attempts to persuade are doomed to fail because the brains of your audience automatically reject messages that disrupt their attention. This book makes the complex science of persuasion simple. Learn to develop better marketing and sales messages based on a scientific model; NeuroMapTM. Regardless of your level of expertise in marketing, neuromarketing, neuroscience or psychology: The Persuasion Code: How Neuromarketing Can Help You Persuade Anyone, Anywhere, Anytime will make your personal and business lives more successful by unveiling a credible and practical approach towards creating a breakthrough persuasion strategy. This book will satisfy your interest in neuromarketing, scientific persuasion, sales, advertising effectiveness, website conversion, marketing strategy and sales presentations. It’ll teach you the value of the award-winning persuasion model NeuroMapTM : the only model based on the science of how your customers use their brain to make any decision including a buying decision. You will appreciate why this scientific approach has helped hundreds of companies and thousands of executives achieve remarkable results. Written by the founders of SalesBrain who pioneered the field of neuromarketing SalesBrain has trained more than 100,000 executives worldwide including over 15,000 CEO Includes guidance for creating your own neuromarketing plan Advance your business or career by creating persuasive messages based on the working principle of the brain.

This rhetorical study of the persuasive practice of English Puritan preachers and writers demonstrates how they appeal to both reason and imagination in order to persuade their hearers and readers towards conversion, assurance of salvation and godly living. Examining works from a diverse range of preacher-writers such as William Perkins, Richard Sibbes, Richard Baxter and John Bunyan, this book maps out continuities and contrasts in the theory and practice of persuasion. Tracing the emergence of Puritan allegory as an alternative, imaginative mode of rhetoric, it sheds new light on the paradoxical question of how allegories such as John Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress came to be among the most significant contributions of Puritanism to the English literary canon, despite the suspicions of allegory and imagination that were endemic in Puritan culture. Concluding with reflections on how Milton deploys similar strategies to persuade his readers towards his idiosyncratic brand of godly faith, this book makes an original contribution to current scholarly conversations around the textual culture of Puritanism, the history of rhetoric, and the rhetorical character of theology.

This book sheds light on the course of the Counter-Reformation and the nature of early modern Catholicism.