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Nudge 2: Make a Suggestion

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Can you offer a practical, concrete suggestion before anyone else does? If so,
you’re likely to significantly influence the outcome of any discussion that
follows. Even if people don’t end up choosing your idea as a handy default
option, your first suggestion creates an easy anchoring point in people’s minds.
As I explained in 
Chapter 12
, once people have been exposed to an anchor
suggestion, it subliminally exerts a drag on their choices—even when the anchor
is plainly wrong or irrelevant.
For example, in one experiment, some volunteers were asked whether
Mahatma Gandhi died “before or after age 9,” while others were asked whether
he died “before or after age 140.” That question was enough to implant the
numbers 9 and 140 as anchors in the minds of each group, respectively. Then all
of them were asked to guess the actual age of Gandhi’s death. The first group
guessed (on average) that he died at age 50, and the second group at age 67. The
9 dragged the first group downward, while the 140 dragged the second group
upward.
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The powerful drag of the first suggestion is helpful to understand not only in
big negotiations—those involving budgets, salaries, and the domestic split of
housework, for example—but also in the many miniature daily negotiations
involved in setting deadlines and fixing appointments.
For example, if we want to propose a lunch meeting with a colleague or client,
the usual approach is to say, “Would you like to have lunch?” But with default
bias and anchoring in mind, you could make a more specific suggestion, such as,
“Would you like to have lunch, perhaps on Wednesday next week? There’s a
great new pizza place across the street we could try.” Your prospective lunch
companion might not want to do precisely what you suggest, but you’ve
anchored him on a date in the near future and a convenient nearby venue, so any
countersuggestions he makes will tend to reflect those starting points. (I’ve
found that making a concrete proposal can also reduce the amount of back-and-
forth on email tremendously—and people are often grateful that they don’t have
to think up a suggestion for themselves.)
If you are actually negotiating numbers with someone—maybe you’re trying
to agree on a salary, or you’re doing a deal with a customer—consider giving a
range that allows you to provide 
two
anchors. In a recent study of this kind of
tandem anchoring
, Columbia Business School professors found that sellers who
wanted $7,200 for a used car achieved better deals when telling buyers “I want
$7,200 to $7,600 for my car” compared with saying “I want $7,200 for my car.”

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Giving this kind of modest range, including a bolstering (but still reasonable) top
number, also worked better than pitching an unreasonably high starting point.
And interestingly, the sellers stating a range weren’t perceived as arrogant—they
were seen as flexible.
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Charities are using a form of tandem anchoring when they give you guidance
on “suggested donations.” If they provide standard options of $100, $50, $30,
and “other,” they know they’ll get higher contributions than if the options are
$50, $30, $10, and “other.” The $30–100 range is more likely to result in a
donation of $30 than giving a suggested range of $10–50, even though $30 is
contained within both.
So, if you can:
Make a specific suggestion as early as you can in any exchange where there’s
a joint decision to be made. If you don’t want to sound too pushy, frame it
with a “maybe,” or signal your flexibility: “If that doesn’t work for you, let
me know what you prefer.” You’ll still have an influence on the outcome.
If you’re talking numbers, try giving a range that spans your desired outcome
and an even better (though still reasonable) outcome.