Understanding Your Audience

In either case, your true audience usually consists of several kinds of people

In some persuasion situations, you present your proposal to one person; in others, to several or many individuals at a time. In either case, your true audience usually consists of several kinds of people; decision makers (people who approve or reject your idea), key stakeholders (those directly affected by the acceptance of your proposal), and influencers those who can influence or persuade the stakeholders and decisions makers).

Most persuasion situations involve several decision makers. For example, if you want to hire an additional employee for your unit and you’re lobbying your supervisor for the funds, he may not be the only decision maker you need to persuade. His boss may have the final say on new hires.

To identify key stakeholders, think of all the individuals who stand to be affected by acceptance of your proposal. In most cases, key stakeholders include not only the person to whom you’re presenting your proposal but also individuals such as peers, subordinate, customers, superiors, and board members.

Influencers often participate in the decision-making process by providing advice and information to key stakeholders and decision makers. For example, if you’re trying to persuade a marketing manager to launch a new Web campaign, she might invite the head of information technology to participate in a meeting so that she can ask him questions and get his opinion on the matter. The head of IT in this case is an influencer.

ACTION POINT: Identify all of the individuals that make up your true audience for your persuasion situation.