MARKETING 101 IS ALSO LIFE 101
Don’t Make Assumptions In Your Mass Messages and Negativity Bias
This is going to be short and to the point, okay? Because none of us have extra time right now.
Here you go: Don’t make assumptions in your mailing list, especially the header. Also, try not to do this in regular life, too.
For some reason, both political parties send me donor emails. These ramp up during the time of presidential elections. These emails always assume that I support the candidate and have supported the candidate in the past.
This week, one of those emails’ subject line read: You were one of my campaign’s fiercest advocates in 2020.
And I thought, “What? Me? Oh, gosh, you’re in trouble then.”
What it did more is:
1. Made me feel manipulated;
2. Made me not really trust the sender.
This also happened to me last week about something that had nothing to do with politics. It was a writing business that I’ve worked for, taught for, mentored for. The email? It was all about helping me to get out of the query trenches and get an agent since I have an MFA.
Do I have an agent? Yes. Am I published author with a bunch of awards? Yes. Am I in the agent query trenches (a terrifying place to be sometimes)? No.
Do I trust this organization as much now? No.
Is that fair of me? Probably not, but it’s a gut reaction, right? More on that in a second.
Another recipient of the same email felt hurt because it mentioned only people who had MFAs. She didn’t have one. And it felt icky to her, like she was excluded.
I’m sure that’s not what they intended.
When you have mailing lists and you send out group emails and haven’t curated those lists, you run the risk of offending people, of dehumanizing them even, because you don’t understand who you are messaging too. There’s a risk they will feel like you’re lying to them (not one of your fiercest supporters, buddy), or even purposefully alienating them forever (you do know I’m one of your teachers, right?).
That’s something you don’t want to do. So, just be careful, okay?
And this goes for life, too.
When you size someone up by looks or occupation or income or religion or any demographic you want to pick, you risk making assumptions about them that might not be true. We all need to step back from thinking that our take or our assumptions are always right, especially when those assumptions are negative.
There’s this thing called a negativity bias. And a lot of times our assumptions lean into that bias toward negativity, which has a scientific and sociological explanation.
Margaret Jaworski writes for Psycom,
“Not only do negative events and experiences imprint more quickly, but they also linger longer than positive ones according to researcher Randy Larsen, PhD, This stickiness is known as positive-negative asymmetry or the negativity bias. In other words, for a multitude of reasons including biology and chemistry, we’re more likely to register an insult or negative event than we are to take in a compliment or recall details of a happy event. The negativity bias can even cause you to dwell on something negative even if something positive is equally or more present. For example, you might spend all day with a friend and have a wonderful time, but if they make one small comment that perturbs you, you may end up remembering the day just for that comment--categorizing the experience as negative when the entire day was actually positive.
“Another example, Dr. Bono explains, "Danny Kahneman (an economist who won the 2002 Nobel prize for his work) has designed studies in which participants are asked to imagine either losing $50 or gaining $50. Even though the amount is the same, the magnitude of the emotional response is significantly larger for those imagining what it would be like to lose the money. In other words, the negativity of losing something is far greater than the goodness of gaining something…even when the “something” that has been lost or gained is objectively equivalent."
So, when you put information out there (like that presidential candidate, writing business, town council meeting), you run the risk of having everyone remember the negative things you say and not all the good ones . . . or even any of the good ones.
When you have a community that has controversy, that controversy becomes all you see. You forget that your Republican neighbor baked you a casserole when your mom died. You forget that your Democrat neighbor gave you a ride home when your car broke down. And the more that happens? The more the bitterness seeps into debate? The more negativity it spawns. You may give 100 compliments, but that one time you say something mean? That’s what a lot of people remember.
Catherine Moore, Psychologist, MBA has a really great and extensive article on this at Positive Psychology and I think I’ll talk more about this on Monday, but she writes,
“By causing us to attend to and dwell on negative entities, negativity bias can make it harder for us to accept constructive feedback, encourage others, and build trust with coworkers.
“Research suggests that we can start to tackle negativity bias in the workplace by upping the ratio of positive to negative comments that we give (Zenger & Folkman, 2013). To boost team performance and lead others more effectively, in other words, a good ratio to aim for is 5:1. Try it!”
It’s pretty good advice for all of us and not just in the workplace, but in our homes and our lives and our emails.
Think about who you are talking to. Not a statistic. Not an email list. A person. Think how what you say will impact them. And think about how you might only be feeling/seeing the negative too. It’s important to look toward, talk about, remember, and celebrate the good, too. That starts with recognizing that business and marketing and life can be more than just getting subscribers/donations/people to agree with you in all the things. It starts with recognizing people as individuals, people with lives and hearts and hurts and joys.