The Core Motivators

  The core appeals of today are described by horror-film director and master copywriter Herschell Gordon Lewis as:

Fear

Exclusivity

Greed

Guilt

  There are dozens of other persuasive appeals but they are arguably variations of these four. Direct marketing innovator Joe Sugarman identified 24. For example one of Sugarman’s is the Desire to Collect. That’s sort of a variation on exclusivity... but in selling a collectible all the core selling appeals may be used -

  Fear of losing a one-time opportunity, desire to feel like we are in an exclusive group, greed for the a thing that will appreciate in value, even guilt.

  Guilt doesn’t have to be some sort of Catholic thing - the appeal can be much simpler. There is the kind of guilt we get from Mother-in-Laws, but there is also the kind of guilt-trip of a cajoling friend wanting company on a fishing trip... so it’s not as if Guilt is always a heavy, heavy thing. Guilt is however a palpable motivator in our everyday lives. We might put money away for the kids’s college out of a mixture of elevated motives and simple guilt trigger telling us that if we don’t do it we’ll get bad karma down the road.