Something You Should Know
Scams You Might Easily Fall For & Mastering The Art of Deal-Making
Thu, 26 Dec 2024
You might think that a good way to get closer to someone is to do them a favor. Yes, that might work – but there is another technique that is even more effective and takes less effort. This episode starts with an easy way to bond you with someone you want to get to know better. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-initiative/201605/the-power-merely-requesting-favor Scams and identity theft are a constant threat– and the scammers keep getting better and better. So, it is critical to understand what the latest scams are and how to protect yourself. Steve Weisman is an attorney who has been following the scammers and understands them very well. His website www.scamicide.com is highly regarded as one the best sites for information about scams. Steve is the author of a book called 50 Ways to Protect Your Identity in a Digital Age (https://amzn.to/3sonvav). Since it is very likely that you will be the target of a scammer, if you haven’t already been, you need to hear Steve’s advice. You probably have an idea in your head about how a negotiation is supposed to go. What you are about to hear will challenge that idea. Barry Nalebuff, is an entrepreneur and professor at Yale School of Management, and author of the book, Split the Pie: A Radical New Way to Negotiate (https://amzn.to/3pvOoYi). As you listen to our discussion you will get a new perspective on how to approach any future negotiation. Have you heard of the Baker/baker paradox is? It has to do with remembering peoples’ names - which most of us aren’t particularly good at. Listen and you will hear a simple way to help you remember anyone’s name the next time you see them. Source: Joshua Foer author of Moonwalking With Einstein (https://amzn.to/3psUGrC). PLEASE SUPPORT OUR SPONSORS!!! INDEED: Get a $75 SPONSORED JOB CREDIT to get your jobs more visibility at https://Indeed.com/SOMETHING Support our show by saying you heard about Indeed on this podcast. Terms & conditions apply. AURA: Save on the perfect gift by visiting https://AuraFrames.com to get $35-off Aura’s best-selling Carver Mat frames by using promo code SOMETHING at checkout! SHOPIFY: Sign up for a $1 per-month trial period at https://Shopify.com/sysk . Go to SHOPIFY.com/sysk to grow your business – no matter what stage you’re in! MINT MOBILE: Cut your wireless bill to $15 a month at https://MintMobile.com/something! $45 upfront payment required (equivalent to $15/mo.). New customers on first 3 month plan only. Additional taxes, fees, & restrictions apply. HERS: Hers is changing women's healthcare by providing access to GLP-1 weekly injections with the same active ingredient as Ozempic and Wegovy, as well as oral medication kits. Start your free online visit today at https://forhers.com/sysk DELL: It's your last chance to snag Dell Technologies’ lowest prices of the year before the holidays! If you've been waiting for an AI-ready PC, this is their biggest sale of the year! Shop now at https://Dell.com/deals PROGRESSIVE: The Name Your Price tool from Progressive can help you save on car insurance! You just tell Progressive what you want to pay and get options within your budget. Try it today at https://Progressive.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Chapter 1: How can you bond with someone easily?
Today on Something You Should Know, if you want to get to know someone better, there's a simple technique that works really well. Then, protecting yourself from the constant threat of scams and identity theft.
Chapter 2: What are the latest scams to watch out for?
Identity theft is high tech, low tech, and no tech. It isn't just coming through your computer. It is going through your trash. This is anything they can do to get the information, they will do.
Also, a simple way that will help you remember names a lot better. And a look at some common negotiating techniques that don't work, like starting with a low-ball offer.
Chapter 3: What makes negotiation techniques ineffective?
The problem with doing that is that you make yourself untrustworthy. If I'm selling something that's worth $1,000 and you offer me $200 for it, are you trying to take advantage of me? Do you not know what this item is worth? What kind of person are you?
All this today on Something You Should Know. Every time I've had to hire someone, it had to be done fast. But as I've discovered anyway, hiring can be very time-consuming. And even still, there are no guarantees. Which is why when it comes to hiring, Indeed is all you need. Right? The trick to finding the right person is to make sure a lot of qualified people know about your job opening.
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Something you should know. Fascinating intel. The world's top experts. And practical advice you can use in your life. Today, Something You Should Know with Mike Carruthers.
Hey there. Welcome to Something You Should Know. Have you ever been taken by a scam artist? I have. And fortunately, it hasn't happened very often, and it wasn't very much money. But I don't think I know too many people who haven't fallen victim to some scam sometime, somewhere.
Which is why I think you're going to find the conversation with Steve Wiseman coming up in just a moment really interesting. First up today, you probably think that one of the best ways to get closer to someone you would like to be closer to is to do something nice for them. Do them a favor. Make some nice gesture. Well, it turns out that you're better off asking them to do you a favor.
A study in the Journal of Human Relations revealed that when someone gives you their time or advice or does a small favor for you, a connection is made. And it's a more powerful connection than if you were to do them a favor instead. I'm sure you know from your own experience that it feels good to do someone a favor. So when you ask them to do a favor for you, you're making them feel good.
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Chapter 4: How can identity theft happen through everyday devices?
And with Equifax and the other credit reporting agencies, they make their money from selling our personal information. And so the idea of protecting our information wasn't as high on their priority list as it should have been.
We're talking about scams and identity theft and how to protect yourself, and I'm talking with attorney Steve Wiseman, whose website is scamicide.com. Dell Technologies is celebrating with anniversary savings on their most popular tech. For a limited time only, save on select next-gen PCs, like the XPS 16 powered by Intel Core Ultra processors, and more.
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Anniversary savings await you for a limited time only at Dell.com slash deals. That's Dell.com slash deals. I really love it when I find a great new podcast. And then, of course, I have to share that with everyone. And one I really want you to listen to is Curiosity Weekly. Curiosity Weekly from Discovery makes sense of some of the biggest questions and ideas shaping our world.
It's all about new discoveries happening in science and tech. They have expert guests that make it all make sense. It's a bit similar to Something You Should Know, which is why I think you'll like it, but it takes a different spin.
Listen to Curiosity Weekly and you'll discover things like how neuroscientists are studying TikTok and social media habits to see which chemicals are being released in your brain that make you so obsessed. Or how it is that you can fly from Florida to England on a plane using recycled plastic jet fuel. And how AI can now read hieroglyphics from Egyptian pyramids.
What's so great about Curiosity Weekly is there's so much to learn about science and tech, and these guys seem to have their finger on the pulse of the most interesting stuff. Food science, the science behind social media, the science of algorithms, computer science, and it's all explained in a fascinating way every week on Curiosity Weekly.
Listen to Curiosity Weekly wherever you get your podcasts. So Steve, I want to talk about medical identity theft, because I'm not sure people even understand that that's a thing. And you say it could actually be fatal.
So explain how that works. Interpol once indicated there were only about 100 cyber criminal geniuses, but their business model now is they will create the malware, the botnets to distribute it, provide tech support, and they will sell and lease what they've created, on the dark web to less sophisticated criminals. So they will be able to get all of our information.
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Chapter 5: What is the significance of medical identity theft?
$1,100 is better than I can, but I'm only up $200 and he's up $1,100. And so I say, there's a $1,300 pie. That's what I can save by doing a deal with you and I'm prepared to split it $650, $650. At which point he comes down to $900, kind of halfway between my $650 and his $1,100. And he's saying, that's the lowest I'll go. I won't move anymore. And my point is,
I've made you a fair offer if you can tell me why we do something different okay but you know what you're proposing is giving you more of the benefit than it is to me and I don't see why we should do it that way and so I stuck at 650 he was at 900 and the end of the day I had a principal he was arbitrary and he came and said yes to my 650 so he didn't care about fairness but he recognized that I do
And therefore, if you want to do a deal with me, you have to accept the fair outcome.
See, I would have thought he would have said, okay, well, if you're going to pay them $1,300 to take the domain away from me, give me $1,200 and you can have it right now. And you would have said, okay. But you didn't say okay.
I didn't because if I did that, he's up $1,200. I'm only $100 better than I can. Now, fight fire with fire would be I go back to Edward and say, I'll give you $100. And then I'm up $1,200.
But in fact, I say, look, for the same reason that I wouldn't expect you to accept $200 offer, leaving me $1,100 ahead, you shouldn't expect me to accept your proposal of $1,100, which leaves you $1,100 ahead and me only $200 ahead. It's true that I need you to save this $1,300, but you also need me. We need each other. And that's why we should split it $650, $650. And you got them. And he got me.
And we got each other and we saved the $1,300 and I was $650 ahead and he's $650 ahead. So yes he's a jerk, yes he's a troll, but he also understood the logic of what I was saying and he didn't have any countervailing logic. So my view is principles beat arbitrary.
Well that's a great example, a great story, and I like how you appealed to his sense of fairness with whatever sense of fairness he had. by pointing out your sense of fairness, but not everybody will agree with that. I mean, people come into negotiations often wanting to get as much as they can possibly get, and that's kind of the job of negotiation in many ways, to get as much as you can get.
And so you're right.
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Chapter 6: How does social media contribute to scams?
It's true that a lot of people find emotions to be dominant when they're doing a negotiation. So I'm a little bit like Spock in the sense that I'm trying to bring some logic back into negotiations. And if you can combine Spock logic with Captain Kirk's emotional intelligence, you've really got it made.
So I appreciate that you should be empathetic and curious about what the other side's interests and positions are. In fact, one of the things I like people to do is to make the other side's arguments for them. You see, we can't always win on every point, but we can always be understood.
And a great way to demonstrate that you understand the other side's perspective is to make their arguments for them.
Why would you want to do that? What would be the benefit to you to make the points for the other side? Seems like you're helping the other side get what they want.
What I'm trying to do is figure out what it is that they want. Because my goal in negotiation is actually to give them what they want. The reason is, if they get what they want, then I can get what it is that I want.
And so when people... enter into these kind of discussions, negotiations with other people, what do you think are the things that derail? What do they do wrong? What are the mistakes they make?
That's a long list. So one classic mistake is that they try and anchor with a low ball offer or a super high ask, and they try and soften up the other side. But the problem with doing that is that you make yourself untrustworthy. If I'm selling something that's worth $1,000 and you offer me $200 for it, are you trying to take advantage of me? Do you not know what this item is worth?
If I were to say yes to that deal, what kind of person are you? And then you have to come up, say, from $200 to $600 to $750 to $900. And next thing you know, you've demonstrated that you are just like Gumby. You're totally flexible, that you have no principles in terms of the way in which you're negotiating.
And so by starting at a point that's unreasonably far away from an appropriate number, causes all sorts of troubles in negotiation thereafter.
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Chapter 7: What are the best steps to protect your identity?
that you keep the discussion strictly on what it is you're negotiating and what the value of this thing is to you and what the value is to them? Or should you bring in other things like the reasons why you want this? Is that relevant to the conversation? Or is it better to just stick to what you're talking about and don't elaborate too much?
So imagine a person is selling their family business and it's a gas station. And the reason they're selling it is because they want to go on a sailing trip around the world. Should they reveal that or not? Well, you could say it's a frivolous reason. And so let's keep it hidden. Let's just say I'm planning to retire and spend more time with my grandkids.
But when it comes down to it, there are good reasons and bad reasons for selling. The buyer knows that you've got a for sale sign, so they're wondering, why are you selling? Is it that there's a leak in one of the storage tanks and the gas station is about to become a Superfund cleanup site? Is the highway exit ramp about to close so there will be no more cars coming this way?
In fact, the idea that you want to take a trip around the world is a good reason Not a bad reason from the buyer's perspective. And so, yes, go ahead and let them know why it is you are selling the station.
What about, though, if I'm selling something? I just did this not long ago. I had a piece of equipment that was no use to me, no value to me. It was a piece of recording equipment that is obsolete. Nobody wants it. Except collectors. Collectors collect this type of equipment. Consequently, it has value to them. It has virtually no value to me other than I know it's worth something to a collector.
But I don't want to tell that person it's worthless to me. I want them to pay me what it's worth to them.
That's true. So that's a great case. That's like I said. When the seller values it less than the buyer does, there's a pie, and that's the time to do the transaction. So you valued it near zero, the buyer values it at $1,000, great.
Now it turns out if there are lots of buyers, and one values it at 800, one values it at 900, and one values it at 1,000, then you want to sell it to the $1,000 person, and I think the right price there is more like 950. because your alternative is I can sell it to the $900 person. And so that's really my fallback. The reason I'm selling it to you is to beat the 900. I can't beat 900 without you.
You can't get this value, this extra value without me. And so we have an extra 100 to split. And that's why I think it should be 50-50.
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Chapter 8: What are the dangers of falling for IRS scams?
Well, let's try to at least work that not to my disadvantage because I am in the challenging position. One of the things I like to do there is make what's called a contingent agreement. So imagine the art dealer comes in and sees this painting that I inherited from my father and says, all right, I'll give you $1,000 for it. And I have no idea if this painting is worth $2,000, $10,000, $100,000.
And the problem is it could cost me $2,000 to get it appraised, which could be more than this painting is worth. So what do I do? I could come back and just say $2,000 or $5,000, pick some arbitrary number, which could lose me the deal if it's really only worth $1,000. Or, perhaps I'll get $2,000 but the painting is still worth $50 and I've missed the big opportunity.
Instead, I prefer saying things like, here's what I'm prepared to do. I'll sell it to you for $1,000, but any money you make above $10,000, we split evenly. So now, if the painting is worth somewhere between $1,000 and $10,000, okay, fine, they can make some money on this. But if this thing is really a hidden masterpiece, Now I've protected myself.
So if you don't know what something is worth, make a deal where you get some share of the upside, if it turns out to be worth a lot.
And that way you get a piece of the bigger pie. And it's all about splitting the pie. It's really a unique way to look at negotiating. I've never really looked at it this way before. Barry Nailbuff's been my guest. He is an entrepreneur and professor at the Yale School of Management. And his book is called Split the Pie, A Radical New Way to Negotiate.
And there's a link to that book in the show notes. Appreciate you being here. Thanks, Barry. Have you ever heard of the baker-baker paradox? Basically, it's the result of research that says it's much easier to remember a person whose profession is a baker than it is to remember someone whose name is Baker. Why?
Psychologists believe it's because when people hear about a man who works as a baker, it conjures up images and tastes and smells from our past and creates a very vivid impression. On the other hand, the name Baker doesn't mean much. There's nothing about a generic name to latch onto so people forget it more easily.
The lesson here is that when you meet someone, find something visually memorable about them that connects with their name. When you meet Mr. Baker, imagine he is a baker. When you meet Bob, imagine his head bobbing up and down like a fishing bobber on the water. That kind of thing. You get the idea. It sounds silly, but it's very effective if you want to remember names.
And that is something you should know. As someone who enjoys this podcast, the best thing you can do to support this podcast is to tell someone else about it who doesn't listen. So it helps us to grow our audience. I'm Mike Carruthers. Thanks for listening today to Something You Should Know.
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