Persuasive techniques or strategies in written and spoken form have been developed throughout time as ways to influence others. In the business world, being able to influence others is key to being successful, especially in fields such as sales and marketing. Repetition is sometimes cited as a way to increase persuasive abilities in these areas. A carefully planned and executed repetition strategy can increase the effectiveness of your message. However, small business owners who use this technique also should be aware of its pitfalls.
Psychological studies have suggested that repetition can have a positive effect on someone's reception of and agreement with a persuasive argument. J.T. Cachiappo and Richard Petty were two pioneers in this field in the late 1970s and 1980s. They concluded that low to moderate levels of repetition within a message tend to create greater agreement with the message, along with greater recall. However, their work also suggested that too much repetition has an adverse impact and can lead to stronger disagreement with the argument being made.
The use of moderate repetition in a persuasive argument can be effective if the argument is constructed in such a way that the repetition is spread out over time. The use of repetition over the long course of an argument, written or spoken, creates a greater familiarity with the message and leads to gradual agreement if the intensity of repetition is gradual itself. Too much repetition in a short span of time or space can defeat the purpose of gradual acceptance by creating a stronger aversion to the argument. All repetition should be carefully spaced at equal or similar intervals throughout the argument.
In speeches or other spoken arguments that are highly emotional in nature, frequent repetition of key emotionally charged phrases can be effective. Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream Speech" often is cited as one of the primary examples of the success of such repetition. However, it may be effective in messages of this nature only because of the already emotional nature of the issue. Such techniques in sales and marketing may have the opposite effect -- turning off the consumer -- if not approached carefully.
Although repetition can be successful as a persuasion strategy, subtlety can be as important as the frequency and intensity of the message. Rather than repeating the same words and phrasing throughout the course of an argument, finding more than one way to make the same argument repeatedly can be a more effective approach. The reader or listener is likely to respond more positively to the same argument stated several ways rather than having the same message shoved down his throat over and over.
- Basic and Applied Social Psychology; Effects of Repetition on Argument Processing, Recall and Persuasion; J.T. Cachiappo and Richard Petty; 1989
- Journal of Personality and Social Psychology; Effects of Message Repetition and Position on Cognitive Response, Recall and Persuasion; J.T. Cachiappo and Richard Petty;
- Erupting Mind Education: How to Create a Persuasive Speech
- Presentation Magazine; Analysis of Martin Luther King’s I Have a Dream Speech
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