According to Perloff, persuasion can be defined as “a symbolic process in which communicator tries to convince other people to change their attitudes or behaviours regarding an issue through the transmission of a message in an atmosphere of free choice.”
The key elements of a persuasive message are
Audience analysis You can't persuade your listeners if you don't know much about them. Knowing your listeners helps you to shape your message in a way that's most likely to gain their acceptance. That's all the more important when your goal is to persuade, and not simply to inform, your audience. You'll need …show more content…
For example, a person who lacks a feeling of self-worth is likely to be sensitive to the tone of respect in a message. A collection letter such a person carefully avoids any hint that the person might be considered dishonourable. Although emotional issues can be a pitfall for persuasive messages, you can actually call on human emotion, as long as your emotional appeal is subtle. You can make use of the emotion surrounding certain words, for instance, freedom brings forth strong feelings, as do words such as success, prestige, credit record, etc. Emotion works with logic in a unique way: people need to find rational support for an attitude they’ve already embraced emotionally. To help satisfy this need, a logical appeal calls on human …show more content…
For you to persuade skeptical or hostile audience members, they must believe that you know what you’re talking about and that you’re not trying to mislead them. One of the best ways to gain credibility is to support your message with facts. Testimonials, documents, guarantees, statistics, research results, and the like all provide seemingly objective evidence for what you have to say, so they make your message more credible. It also helps to name your resources, especially if they’re respected by your audience.
To create a persuasive message use the three step writing process. The process will help you simplify and portray your idea or project in the best form to convince you audience that it is the best alternative. One key point to remember is that “persuasion” is not about lying or tricking your audience. The main reason for persuasive messages is to allow you to show you audience why your idea or product would benefit them over the other options.
Planning
Analyze the Situation Define your purpose and develop an audience