Power Play

Chapter 1 Influence versus manipulation

What if lives were saved or lost based on your ability (or lack of it) to influence people and events? How do you exert influence when the stakes are so high?

Pet Rescue Australia faces this challenge every day.

Tragically, 100 000 rescued dogs are put down every year in Australia. In an effort to make a difference, Pet Rescue set out to persuade more Australians to adopt rescued dogs. First they had to break down their biggest barrier: getting people to visit a shelter.

Their strategy was simple: ‘If we can't bring people to the rescued dogs, we'll bring the rescued dogs to the people.' How, though? Pet Rescue is a not-for-profit organisation with limited marketing budget and resources.

A perfect match

But they had a secret weapon. Japanese researcher and psychologist Sadahiko Nakajima has made a study of dog–owner resemblance. Nakajima's research shows that pet–human resemblance is empirically valid, a key reason being that some pet owners consciously or unconsciously choose dogs that look like them! Pet Rescue Australia used this insight to deploy their strategy.

They commissioned an app called Dog-A-Like. You download the app and upload a photo of yourself, and the app scans through all the photos of dogs in rescue shelters to find your perfect dog match.

Bingo! Dog-A-Like was an instant hit, becoming the number one app in the Australian iTunes store for a couple of weeks. Whether or not they were thinking of getting a dog, thousands ...