--- title: "Cialdini persuasion in marketing and sales | Len P. van der Hof" description: Robert Cialdini named six principles of influence in 1984, and later a seventh, Unity. In a funnel they show up as favours, commitments, crowds, liking, titles, and limits. The test is whether each lever is still true if the buyer replies. image: "https://lenvanderhof.com/media/generated/blog-hero-cialdini-funnel-v1.57f6975a064e.wide.webp" --- [Venture Building](https://lenvanderhof.com/en/blog/category/venture-building/) Research guide # Cialdini in the funnel: six levers, one honesty test Reciprocity is a real sample. A fake crowd is still a fake crowd. Name the lever, then keep it. Len P. van der HofPublished 10 September 20266 min read A sample is a gift. A returned ticket is still allowed. Direct answer Robert Cialdini's Influence (1984) named six principles of persuasion: reciprocation, commitment and consistency, social proof, liking, authority, and scarcity. In Pre-Suasion (2016) and in the expanded Influence (2021) he added Unity: people are more ready to say yes to someone they treat as one of them. A marketing or sales funnel is a sequence of those asks. You benefit by knowing which lever you are pulling on each step, and by using only the ones you can keep when a human answers. A genuine sample is reciprocity. A counter that invents '12 people viewing' is a claim. The published honest-conversion rule still holds: automate the follow-up, not the claim. This page is the map of the levers. It is not a script for pressure. ## Key takeaways - Six principles from 1984, Unity later. Learn the names so you can see them in your own sequence. - A funnel step is one ask. Write which lever it uses. If you cannot, the step is fog. - Social proof, authority, and scarcity are the usual forgeries. If the crowd, the title, or the limit is not checkable, cut the line. - The Founder Sales System and Marketing Without Manipulation are in production. Neither is a Cialdini workbook. A funnel is not a drawing. It is a series of asks: look, try, talk, pay, stay. Robert Cialdini spent *Influence* (1984) naming why those asks land. The names are useful because they make the ask visible. They are dangerous when they become a costume for a lie. He listed six principles: **reciprocation**, **commitment and consistency**, **social proof**, **liking**, **authority**, and **scarcity**. In *Pre-Suasion* (2016) he argued that a seventh had been sitting in the data: **Unity**, the sense that the other person is one of us. The 2021 expanded *Influence* puts Unity on the list. You do not need all seven on one page. You need to know which one you are using. ## The six, in a sequence you already run **Reciprocation.** People repay. A real sample, a useful PDF, a call you did not invoice, a chapter you can read without a card. The lever dies when the “gift” is a countdown to a pitch the sample did not earn. Give something the person can keep if they never buy. **Commitment and consistency.** People like to stay in line with what they already said. A small written yes (“I’ll try the diagnostic”) makes a later yes cheaper. That is why a serious discovery call starts with a real next step, not a vibe. It is also why a checkbox that says “I agree I am ready to buy” before they have seen the price is a trap. Write commitments the buyer would repeat out loud. **Social proof.** People look at what others like them did. Named customers, with permission, on a page the customer can recognise. Invented viewer counts, stock faces, and “join 10,000 founders” with no list behind the number are not proof. They are set dressing. If you cannot name how the number was made, delete it. **Liking.** People say yes more readily to people they like and who seem to like them. In founder sales that is often just being specific and on time. In ads it becomes fake kinship. You can be decent without pretending you grew up on the same street. **Authority.** Titles, uniforms, and credentials shortcut evaluation. A genuine credential belongs on the page. A white coat you did not earn, a “as seen in” strip of logos you paid to rent, a fake professor, do not. If the authority is borrowed, say it is an ad. **Scarcity.** What is rare looks more valuable. A cohort that actually closes. A print run that is actually numbered. A calendar that is actually full. A timer that resets on refresh is not scarcity. It is a prop. [A conversion system that stays honest](https://lenvanderhof.com/en/blog/conversion-systems-that-stay-honest/) already banned inventing the deadline. This page will not reopen that door. **Unity**, the later one. Shared identity: we, not just like us. A community that exists off the landing page can carry it. A “we” invented for the headline cannot. Do not cosplay a tribe you do not host. ## Funnels are sequences of those asks Map one live path: ad or search, landing page, mail or call, checkout, onboarding. On each step write the lever in the margin. “This mail is reciprocity: the worksheet.” “This checkout line is scarcity: the cohort date.” If two levers fight (authority plus fake crowd plus fake timer), you are not persuading. You are stacking costumes. [The Founder Sales System](https://lenvanderhof.com/books/the-founder-sales-system/) is the longer practice for deals before you have a sales team. It is in production. It is not for sale. SALES is Story, Ask, Listen, Evaluate, Sustain. This page does not teach that motion. It only says: each Ask has a Cialdini name, or it is fog. A call that listens is not “liking.” It is work. A sequence that only talks is not a funnel. It is a broadcast with extra steps. Walk a four-step path that does not need software to exist. 1. A stranger finds a page. The only honest lever here is usually authority you can check, or a sample they can keep. Not a crowd you invented. 2. They take the sample. Reciprocity has fired. The next mail can ask for a small yes: a time, a diagnostic, a reply to one question. That is commitment. It is not a cart. 3. A call. Liking is specificity and showing up. Unity is only real if you actually share a practice, a city, a craft. Listen is the feedback. If you cannot shut up, you are not in Cialdini. You are in a monologue. 4. A proposal. Scarcity is the calendar or the cohort if those are true. Social proof is one named peer if they consented. Stacking all six on the last PDF is how a decent process starts to smell. Pre-Suasion, the 2016 book, is about what you attend to *before* the ask. A room, a first sentence, a question that puts the relevant identity in mind. Used cleanly, it is focus. Used as a trick question that boxes the buyer into a yes, it is still a claim. You can prepare attention without painting them into a corner. Automated funnels fail the same test as live ones, faster. A sequence can remember the sample and the date. It cannot invent the peer, the title, or the last seat. If a step only works because nobody will answer, it is not persuasion. It is hope that the inbox is empty of adults. ## The honesty test, once per lever Would this sentence survive a reply from the person it describes. - Reciprocity: can they keep the gift if they never pay. - Commitment: did they actually make that small yes, or did a form make it for them. - Social proof: can a stranger check the example. - Liking: would you say the intimacy without the pixel. - Authority: is the title theirs, and is the quote theirs. - Scarcity: is the limit in a system you could show finance. - Unity: is the “we” a group that meets, or a font. If the answer is no, the lever is a claim. Claims belong on the honest-conversion page, not in a “principle.” [Marketing Without Manipulation](https://lenvanderhof.com/books/marketing-without-manipulation/) is in production for the longer ethic. [Positioning is a decision](https://lenvanderhof.com/en/blog/positioning-is-a-decision/) is who you will not serve. Who you will not fake a crowd for is part of that refusal. ## How to benefit this week Do not add a seventh mail that “applies Cialdini.” Take one existing step and make its lever true. Replace a viewer counter with one named example, or with nothing. Replace a fake timer with the real next date, or with no date. Replace “as seen in” with work you did, or with silence. Give one thing they can keep. Ask for one small yes they could explain to a colleague. That is the benefit. The books on the psychology shelf are maps. The funnel is your house. You do not honour Cialdini by putting his name on a dark pattern. You honour the buyer by leaving them a way to return the ticket. ## Sources 1. [A conversion system that stays honest when you automate it](https://lenvanderhof.com/en/blog/conversion-systems-that-stay-honest/) 2. [Marketing Without Manipulation](https://lenvanderhof.com/books/marketing-without-manipulation/) 3. [The Founder Sales System](https://lenvanderhof.com/books/the-founder-sales-system/) 4. [Positioning is a decision, not a tagline](https://lenvanderhof.com/en/blog/positioning-is-a-decision/) ## Related essays - [A conversion system that stays honest when you automate it](https://lenvanderhof.com/en/blog/conversion-systems-that-stay-honest/) - [A go-to-market system that survives the first ten customers](https://lenvanderhof.com/en/blog/gtm-that-survives-ten-customers/) - [Marketing nudges are choice architecture, not a growth hack](https://lenvanderhof.com/en/blog/marketing-nudges-are-choice-architecture/) - [Kahneman for marketing: System 1 is not a permission slip](https://lenvanderhof.com/en/blog/kahneman-for-marketing/) ## Further reading - [A conversion system that stays honest](https://lenvanderhof.com/en/blog/conversion-systems-that-stay-honest/) - [Marketing Without Manipulation](https://lenvanderhof.com/books/marketing-without-manipulation/) - [The Founder Sales System](https://lenvanderhof.com/books/the-founder-sales-system/) - [Positioning is a decision](https://lenvanderhof.com/en/blog/positioning-is-a-decision/) About the author ## [Len P. van der Hof](https://lenvanderhof.com/en/authors/len-p-van-der-hof/) Entrepreneur, AI Innovator and Venture Builder Len P. van der Hof builds practical AI systems, digital ventures and evidence-informed tools for founders. ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "Person", "@id": "https://lenvanderhof.com/#person", "name": "Len P. van der Hof", "alternateName": [ "Len van der Hof", "L.P. van der Hof", "Leendert Pieter van der Hof" ], "honorificSuffix": "MSc", "url": "https://lenvanderhof.com/", "image": [ "https://lenvanderhof.com/photos/len-portrait-1.jpg", "https://lenvanderhof.com/photos/len-portrait-2.jpg", "https://lenvanderhof.com/photos/len-portrait-3.jpg", "https://lenvanderhof.com/photos/len-portrait-4.jpg", "https://lenvanderhof.com/photos/len-speaking.jpg", "https://lenvanderhof.com/photos/len-hero.jpg" ], "jobTitle": "Entrepreneur, AI Innovator and 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