Bottlenecks

Gestalt” is the German word for shape or form, meaning we judge your meme based on its appearance and the company it keeps

One set of persuasion strategies attempts to increase the attractive features of the alternative; the second set attempts to decrease the negative features of the alternative. We have called the first one the alpha strategies because they seem always to be the first ones attempted.... We have called the second set the omega strategies because they attempt to reduce the resistance to selecting an alternative, because omega is the universal sign of resistance, and because they seem often to be the last strategies considered.

when you notice that a company is using loud, distracting peripheral routes to persuasion, it might signal that their product is not entirely worth the cost. Any time you’re in a teen-apparel store with loud music, disconcertingly cold air-conditioning, and wall-sized posters of attractive models wearing perplexingly little clothing at all, ask yourself whether it might be intended to distract your internal counterargument against paying those prices for logoed T-shirts

Similarly, another norm in our society is the golden rule: if someone gives us something we should give something back. Cialdini showed that this is another peripheral route by which you can get us to act without thinking, and it works especially well in the digital world where you can give us very cheap gifts. Tell us you just gave us a few gigs of storage space, a few free minutes of talk time, a few free reads of an online article, or a few free texts. After that, send us a message that implies we should join your service, implying we should give something back. It works more often than you think, and more often than we would like to admit.

Slack was among the fastest-growing apps on the web—and while it was installing, the screen showed the confusing message “You look nice today” in another example of how being unexpected can distract us from our own internal resistance and avoidance.

If your value-proposition is strong, that is, unique, meets a clear need, and is differentiated from competitors, then use central routes to persuasion that increase our attentional capacity to process your rational, argument-based message.
If your value-proposition is weak, that is, similar to alternatives, not a necessity, and is only an incremental improvement over competitors, then use peripheral routes to persuasion and decrease our attentional capacity for counterarguing against your emotional image-based or lifestyle-based message.

Prevent the listener from arguing back.

dialogue going on, one side being vocal and the other subvocal…

you could just run right past the big boss monster and get the ultimate treasure, it would be the most boring game ever.

Count how many small commitments you ask and minor rewards you give, leading up to the moment of truth.