Fear and Greed as Motivators

A colleague of mine once made the comment that two of the strongest motivators of people are fear and greed. I have pondered this, and I believe that this is a very basic human behavioral pattern. When I discussed this subject with my wife, she said that sex and money are the strongest motivators. Unfortunately, she is right about sex since porn is one of the hottest things on the Internet. Money is also a motivator but it is associated with the greed to which I previously referred. If we have money, we always want more.

Since respectable businesses will not associate with porn, let’s address fear and greed.

These emotions are the major motivators used in some of the advertising on the Internet. Most of the “high pressure” ads that you see begin by promising to make you $1000+ per day (pick your own number). This offer appeals to greed. As you read through the ad, you come to the part where you are told that today is your lucky day since if you order RIGHT NOW, you will get a ???? % (pick your own percentage) discount off the list purchase price AND you will receive many FREE bonus gifts to go with the deal. This is the fear and greed combination since you immediately think that unless you take advantage of this offer you will miss this once in a life time opportunity. What you may not know is there is a built in script (small computer program) on the web page that changes the date of expiration daily so it always remains the same number of days till the offer expires).

Search the Internet and check out a few of the ads that promise to make you rich without your having to work at it, and you will see this pattern. Many of the eBook ads on the Internet today use these same techniques.

Remember FEAR and GREED. Do not let these emotions cause you to make poor decisions on the Internet, because you will certainly be offered the opportunity.

On the contrary, if you are writing sales pages or landing pages for your own website, you can employ the basic human emotions of fear and greed as motivators since they will enable you to create some “killer” sales pages.

The human emotions of fear and greed are powerful human motivators. These can be used against you if you are the buyer. However, you can use them in your favor to write effective ad copy if you are the seller.

John V. W. Howe is an entrepreneur, author, inventor, patent holder, husband, father, and grandfather. He has been involved in entrepreneurial activities for over 40 years. He founded http://www.boomer-ezine.com, www.boomer-entrepreneur.com and http://www.retirement-jobs-online.com to help Boomers (baby boomers) become entrepreneurs when they retire.

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