Don't Pull That Trigger!

Don’t Pull That Trigger!

Now that you have a full overview on behavior traits that construct the psychological triggers, you can insulate and inoculate yourself against scams, fraud and predatory sales tactics.

We become victims due to a lack of understanding of our consistent behavior trends in making financial decisions. The thought process that is grooved in can easily become a rut which exposes individuals to becoming victimized. The cons, scammers and fraudsters are masters at manipulating the psychological triggers of their marks. If you don’t have knowledge of your own triggers you have no chance of avoiding victimization.

What does the process look like? It starts with desire; of course we all have the basic desire to accumulate wealth. Desire simply puts an investor in a position of constant interest; this is how one gets identified as a mark. If you are actively soliciting perpetrators they will find you. Desire is a scarlet letter that allows the world of scammers and fraudsters to identify you. Control your desire and you can insulate yourself from the perpetrators. Much like the storyline for Vampires, the conman has to be invited in.

Once in the conman now has access to manipulate you into the role of a victim. When you become interested in the scam you have stepped in with both feet and now the game begins. All of us are susceptible to the fear of loss. For most situations the fear of loss is a healthy behavior trait, unfortunately for the victim the fear of loss is directly tied to the greed trigger which is aptly initiated by the scammer.

A normal fear of loss would to consider the risks involved with the amount of capital you are seeking to invest. For example if you are looking at an opportunity that requires $100K investment then your healthy fear of loss would be that capital investment of $100K. This is the normal effect of a reasonable and healthy fear of loss. The scammer and fraudsters though are expert at twisting the fear of loss towards the future gain they are tempting you with.

An example would be this same offer which you are considering investing the $100K into. The conman triggers your greed by manipulating your focus on the future gain to be enjoyed. Let’s say the scammer tells you that the gain will be $500K on your $100K investment; this is just one aspect of the gain, the scammer takes it a step further and puts a timeline on the gain; say in 6 months your $100K will turn into $500K and there will be the usual levels of guarantees and other risk mitigation factors which will make the offer appear to be almost a sure thing. At this point your healthy fear of loss becomes focused on losing $500K not $100K. You have now been successfully manipulated into a greed based focus. This is the point of no return; once your greed trigger has been initiated it is a nuclear event.

The scammers and fraudsters seek to initiate your greed trigger and tie it to an unhealthy fear of loss. This is how victims are created and the process is the same in every situation. All scams and frauds are perpetrated through the use of 3 common psychological triggers and all scams and frauds can be avoided by understanding what these triggers are and thereby fully inoculating and insulating oneself from the initiation of these triggers.