Have you ever thought about what impacts your purchasing decisions? Why do you prefer certain brands and vendors even though their competitors offer practically identical services?
These aren't overly complicated questions, but would you be able to answer them without thinking? Probably not. In reality, so many factors can influence our purchasing decisions, that thinking about each one is impossible.
However, while you may not think of that, marketers study every decision you make during your buying process. Using that knowledge, they can then create marketing content tailored for you.
Enter marketing psychology.
Also referred to as neuromarketing, marketing psychology is a concept of optimising content, communication, and marketing strategies to human behaviour patterns. Using basic psychological principles and variables, marketers can influence their customers' purchasing decisions.
How exactly can brands influence consumer behaviour? And what are the common psychological marketing strategies marketers use?
Let's answer these questions (and more) and dive deeper into the fascinating world of marketing psychology.
What Is Consumer Behaviour?
First, we need to tackle what marketing psychology means to influence, and that is consumer behaviour.
It's a much broader term than psychological marketing, defined as the study of consumers, mainly their purchasing patterns and decision-making processes. It refers to the motives and needs of individual consumers, groups, or organisations.
Marketing psychologists and professionals study these behaviours to determine the consumers' expectations and adjust marketing strategies accordingly.
Studying consumer behaviour also enables new businesses to find a gap in the market and introduce a needed product or service to fill that gap.
What Impacts Consumer Behaviour?
What is essential to understanding consumer behaviour is that it is not static. It constantly changes, influenced by numerous factors, both internal and external. Experts distinguish the three primary categories of factors affecting buyer behaviour:
- Personal factors. These include individual interests, beliefs, opinions, etc. Such factors are typically influenced by demographics (age, culture, gender, etc.).
- Psychological factors. These variables refer to buyers' perceptions and attitudes towards a marketing message.
- Social factors. Such factors refer to all external variables that may impact purchase behaviour, including social media pages, family, friends, education, income, work, etc.
What Is Marketing Psychology?
While consumer behaviour is a broader term that tries to explain what impacts shopping patterns and behaviours, marketing psychology dives deeper into why and how consumers think and act as they do.
Using psychological theories and cognitive biases, marketers can then anticipate how their target audience will react to the content they want to create. That allows them to adjust their message accordingly, making it much more effective.
Using that knowledge, brands and marketers can use triggers and tap emotional reactions to shape and influence purchasing decisions.
For instance, imagine a company that sells life insurance. The best sales strategy here would be to use emotional triggers, such as fear of leaving your family without money when you die.
Using these triggers, a life insurer can show why their insurance is the best, providing your family with a reliable income when something happens to you.
It is a simplified example, but using human emotions and triggers is one of the most popular ways a brand can influence your purchase behaviour. There are, however, much more subtle marketing psychology strategies. Strategies we don't often notice.
We'll talk about them more in a minute.
How Is Psychology Used in Marketing?
Marketing and psychology are two inseparable terms. Using psychology, marketers can learn how to anticipate their target audience's behaviour. Then, by using basic psychological principles and factors, they can adjust their marketing strategy to achieve their marketing goals and create content that will influence purchasing decisions of their customers.
But we've already covered the theory behind marketing psychology.
Now, it's time to show how it looks in practice. When it comes to that, there are several marketing psychology strategies marketers use to shape consumer behaviour.
Colour Psychology
An average consumer takes about 90 seconds to decide whether to buy a product. And do you know what affects their decision the most? Colour. As one study suggests, way over half of the assessment is based on colour alone.
That said, colour psychology is one of the most powerful weapons in the brand's marketing armoury, but it's a weapon that has to be used carefully to reach various audiences.
We associate colours with different emotions and concepts. Take red as an example. It's typically associated with passion, excitement, or strength. It can, however, also mean danger or aggression.
Think about it, whenever you see something written or displayed in red, it immediately catches your attention. That is why practically every website you visit has a red CTA (call-to-action) button or text.
Your brain immediately associates it with something important, subconsciously forcing you to read it or click on the red link - a simple yet effective way to increase conversions.
Colours are also associated with brands. For instance, can you imagine if Coca-Cola decided to switch their cans from red to yellow? Would it drive sales? Probably not.
Social Proof
Imagine you want to buy a coffee machine. There are two products you're considering. Both are rated five stars out of five, but the first one has over 2,000 reviews and the other only 100. Which one would you buy?
Now, imagine that both these machines have the same rate and the same number of reviews, but the first one is endorsed by your favourite celebrity. So again, which one would you buy?
The answer to both these questions is the same - the first coffee machine.
The reason for that is a simple psychological concept called social proof. It's a principle that describes how we tend to follow others in new situations.
In marketing, social proof means looking at other consumers' or influencers' actions and behaviours in our decision-making process.
Brands use social proof all the time, and it has become one of the leading promotion techniques in the digital marketing era. For instance, if a business adds positive reviews and testimonials on its landing page, it can increase the conversion rate by a whopping 34%.
Social proof is not a very subtle marketing psychology strategy. It is, however, incredibly effective, and you'll fall to its victim more than once in your life. Don't worry, though. You're not the only one.
Scarcity
Scarcity theory suggests that people tend to associate a scarce product with a higher value than a product that exists in abundance. Think about it. How many times have you bought something labelled as "limited offer" or "exclusive"?
Probably more than once. And we don't blame you. Who hasn't?
Indeed, scarcity marketing is one of the businesses' most common and effective marketing strategies. Scarcity marketing uses our emotions. Labelling a product as limited supply triggers fear that you might miss out on the offer.
One of the best examples of the scarcity marketing phenomenon is Black Friday sales.
By creating a sense of scarcity around highly-discounted products, marketers trigger their customers to make immediate purchases, resulting in a massive boost in sales during that period.
Of course, it also applies to other periods, such as the Holiday Season or Easter. Scarcity is also incredibly popular among airlines that use phrases like "only three tickets left" or “for a limited time only” to encourage you to book a flight.
Reciprocity
Suppose you helped a friend in moving to a new flat. Naturally, you'd want them to return the favour. The same goes another way around. That principle is called reciprocity and is commonly used by businesses worldwide.
Reciprocity marketing is used to build a personal connection between the brand and customer, increasing the customer experience and loyalty in the process.
Typical reciprocity marketing techniques include:
- offering free content, e.g., an ebook or free guide;
- offering free trials;
- writing blog posts, guides, tips, notes, etc.;
- providing consumers with coupons or discount codes;
- implementing a customer loyalty reward system.
Sometimes, a business can even go as far as offering a free product or service. The idea here is to make customers think they receive the better end of the deal.
Then, as a customer, you will be more likely to return the favour and perform the conversion, be it a purchase or subscribing to a newsletter.
Anchoring Bias
Imagine your favourite store runs a sale where jeans that typically cost £50 are now discounted to £30. What a steal, right? Wouldn't you be more willing to pay that price and get yourself a pair of cool-looking jeans?
That strategy is called anchoring. It's based on the anchoring bias, which is a tendency of people to use the first piece of information as a benchmark for making a decision. That is why this technique is incredibly effective for pricing.
The key here is to show a customer how much they can save on the purchase. That is why brands always display the initial price of a product or service when running a promotion.
That initial price or information on how much consumers can save is called an anchor (hence the name), attracting their attention and encouraging them to take advantage of the deal.
The Mere Exposure Effect
Although display ads are dismissed as ineffective due to their low CTR (click-through rate), businesses use them for a different reason - exposure.
The concept of the mere exposure effect comes from a 1960s study by social psychologist Robert Zajonc, who found that repeated exposure to a stimulus can enhance an individual's attitude towards it.
In other words, if you hear about something often enough, it will subconsciously lead to a preference.
So yes, as annoying as brands bombarding us with ads is, it tends to work a treat, even if we as consumers don't want to acknowledge it.
They build brand awareness and, whether you like it or not, are likely to make you more prone to buy a product you've heard about a thousand times rather than the one you've heard about ten times less.
Key Phrasing
Like colours, words and phrases can evoke different emotions. That is why content marketing is such a significant part of every marketing strategy. It can drive conversions and turn potential customers into actual customers.
Emotions play a massive role in purchase behaviour, with some researchers stating that approximately 95% of purchasing decisions are emotional.
That is why a marketing message that utilises phrases like "the best", "top-selling", "amazing", etc., has a stronger resonance than bland and obvious statements.
Phrasing will also depend on the target audience's age. For instance, brands use youth phrases and shorter messages to reach a younger audience. That phrasing will also depend on the product and emotions a business wants to evoke in its customers.
Focusing
Your brain is like a sponge absorbing tons of information every second. However, when making a decision, it only focuses on a limited number of factors, emphasising the most distinct and sensational information available to our memory.
Typically, we rely on the first piece of information we receive.
That is why focusing is so similar to anchoring. In this case, however, marketing professionals use that to emphasise the selected key factors about the product or service.
The key here is to get across the message on why and how a certain product can improve a customer's life. That selling point is then used as the first thing a customer sees or hears.
For instance, when creating a product page on an online store. Vendors will provide users with the most significant information that they want to provide their customers with.
Fashion brands are perfect examples of using focusing in their online stores. They provide their customers with essential information about materials, style, colours, and sizes.
Loss Aversion
Imagine someone giving you a pen. You start using it and find out it's the best pen you've ever had. After a week, that person comes and says you can either give up the pen or pay a tenner to keep it.
What would be your reaction? Would you give it up, or would you prefer to pay that fair price to keep that lovely pen of yours?
Probably the latter. And you know why? Because most people don't like to lose what they've already gained. And that's the basic principle behind the loss aversion marketing psychology strategy.
Loss aversion is a theory discovered by the Nobel prize-winning psychologists Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky. During their research on prospect theory, Kahneman and Tversky found out that people prefer to avoid losing something rather than accessing an equivalent gain.
Brands use that theory a lot in their marketing efforts. The most common strategy here is offering a free trial. You get to use a service for free for a given period. Once it's over, you need to pay to continue using it.
You're probably more than familiar with such an offer. And unless it's YouTube Premium we're talking about, loss aversion marketing is fairly effective.
Baader-Meinhoff Phenomenon
Have you ever heard (or thought) about a product and then started to see it everywhere? We've all been there. But did you know this situation has a name? It's called the Baader-Meinhoff Phenomenon.
Also referred to as frequency illusion, the Baader-Meinhoff Phenomenon, according to several studies, is caused by two processes. The first one is selective attention, and the second is confirmation bias.
- The first process to kick in is selective attention. It occurs when we encounter something new, be it a product, word, or idea. Once that happens, we subconsciously start thinking about it more. Suddenly, it starts popping out surprisingly often.
- Confirmation bias assures you that every time you encounter the thing proves your impression of it gaining omnipresence overnight.
Of course, marketing professionals are well aware of the frequency illusion. That's why they bombard consumers with ads, emails, and other forms of content. They want to create an illusion of the brand being everywhere, which can increase conversions.
Novelty
Barney Stinson once said that "new is always better." And while it may not apply to everything, the quote from the legendary "How I Met Your Mother" character carries an element of truth.
It is true that most people deem new products as more valuable. Take a pair of Converse sneakers as an example. Would you rather buy last-year’s outmoded designs or the latest design on the market?
Of course, it depends on a person, but most shoppers would prefer the second option, even if it meant paying a few pounds more.
Companies know that. When shopping, you'll notice a lot of products labelled as new even though they are just a re-release of an older model but in a different colour, size, or feature.
Decoy Effect
Although all the above marketing psychology strategies are fascinating, the decoy effect has to be one of the most interesting on this list.
You can often see it when a company offers several pricing packages, and one price point is there to convince you to opt for the most expensive option.
Dan Airley described this phenomenon in his famous TED talk, "Are we in control of our own decisions?" where he provides an example of the one-year subscription packages from "The Economist." They offered three pricing models:
- online subscription worth $59/year
- print subscription worth $125/year
- print + online subscription worth $125/year
Do you notice anything odd about them? The middle option doesn't seem to have much sense. Why would you pay only for a print subscription if you can get it AND an online one for the same price?
To pay for the last option.
And before you say anything, it works. Airley showed this example to a group of students. With the three options available, most students chose that combo package.
However, once he removed that theoretically pointless print-only option, students preferred the cheaper digital subscription.
But that is just one example. You can see companies use decoys all the time. For example, when you go to the cinema, you can buy a small, medium, or large popcorn. However, medium and large come practically at the same price. Doesn't it make more sense to buy a larger one?
We think we don't need to answer that question for you.
Fitt's Law
According to Fitt's Law, the time a person takes to choose an object depends on its size and how far it is.
In essence, it will take less to pick a larger object that's closer to your starting position. The same applies to related items that are close to each other. On the other hand, if the item is smaller or several related objects are far away from each other, you will take more time to select them.
Using this model is popular when designing a website. Listing similar and popular items at the top, using larger CTA buttons, etc., makes the site easier to navigate. That alone improves the user experience, encouraging consumers to convert.
Unity
People are herd animals. We want to be part of something; we want to belong. You name it, whether it's a family, group of friends, Star Wars fanatics, or football supporters. Being a part of something bigger adds meaning to our lives.
That said, the principle of unity in marketing is extremely powerful.
Businesses tend to encourage users to join their email lists or subscribe to their newsletters all the time. And by wrapping it in cleverly-written copy that utilises unity, they can be more than convincing. For instance, consider two pieces of copy:
- "sign up for our newsletter."
- "join the community of 50,000+ gamers and sign up for our newsletter to stay up to date with all the gaming trends and news!"
Which one sounds better?
IKEA Effect
IKEA is known for two things - delicious Swedish meatballs and the fact you need to assemble every piece of furniture you buy yourself. And while we'd love to talk about their meatballs, let's focus on the latter.
The reason we bring it up is the fact that this simple concept has become a benchmark for other companies to promote their products. We're talking about the IKEA effect.
In simple terms, it refers to a principle of a consumer adding more value to a product they helped create. Even a simple case of a company allowing you to change the colour of the product or personalise it any other way can make all the difference and influence your decision in a positive way.
Key Takeaways
Psychology and marketing have continued to intersect since the idea of marketing was born. The current digital age, however, has only magnified the impact of psychology on consumer behaviour.
Marketing psychology has become a leading concept among brands. It enables them to anticipate how consumers behave and then adjust their marketing efforts accordingly, using specific psychological factors to get their message through.
And now that you know those tricks and tactics, should you defend against them? Is it even possible to do that?
Given the abundance of marketing content we're bombarded with each day, that may not be a straightforward task. However, we hope that after reading this article, you will at least be able to notice when a brand is trying to use your mind against you.
That alone should be enough to stay a reasonable consumer.
