Inside the mind of the consumer A guide to discovering what consumers really want Discover what consumers really want

2 A word from Phillip

I love consumer psychology and behavioural science. Understanding the minds of consumers and shoppers has been my career for 25 years: It’s my passion.

Throughout my career two questions the consumer mind. Inside the mind have always intrigued me: of the consumer is a straightforward reference guide to help you better • What do consumers really want? align your brand and business with • Why, when the answers are the mind of the consumer. Packed identified do so many brands with insights, advice and practical fail to deliver? tips, you can either read it all or just tap into the bits that interest you. With the consumer being the lifeblood of so many businesses, Between us, let’s make it better: we all know that we have to delight Better for our brands, better for them. But what do they really want? our businesses and better for How do we implicitly and the consumer. emotionally form meaningful affiliations with them? How can we improve our businesses to make a real difference for consumers?

The answer lies in applying consumer psychology and Phillip Adcock behavioural science. In this guide Psychology & Behaviour I’ll explain some critical aspects of Change Consultant

3 Marginal gains

When it comes to At the 2004 Olympic Games Great making things better, Britain won two cycling gold medals, their best performance since 1908. it’s not so much about Under Brailsford’s leadership, doing 1 thing much the cycling team continued to better, but more about improve, winning multiple world taking 100 things and championships in road, track, making each of them BMX and Mountain bike racing. Great Britain led the cycling medal a tiny bit better. table at the 2008 and 2012 Olympic Games, winning eight golds at both, This is precisely what happened while British cyclists won 59 World with the British cycling team, thanks Championships across different largely to Dave Brailsford and the disciplines from 2003 to 2013. theory of marginal gains. You can apply precisely the “The whole principle came from same thinking to brand and retail performance. It’s time you go the idea that if you broke down beyond looking at traditional everything you could think of performance metrics such as that goes into riding a bike, and share of market and year on year then improved it by 1%, you will differences. A marginal gains get a significant increase when based approach focusses on you put them all together.” a more holistic strategy, embracing Dave Brailsford (2012) such aspects as shopper and consumer psychology.

4 Lets begin Finding what’s what

Evolution Page 7 Social proof Attention Page 21 Page 8 Att ra Loyalty ct Looking or seeing Page 20 Page 9 y u B

Numbers Instinct Page 19 Page 11

L A E P Cognitive biases E P Emotion N A Page 17 G Page 12 A GE

Processing fluency System 1, System 2 Page 16 Page 13 Rational choice Page 15

5 Attract

Our brains only consciously respond to 5% of the visual stimuli they receive. The rest is filtered and then discarded.

6 Attract Evolution

“Consumers are hardwired hypothalamus: A small region by four basic, primal drives located at the base of the Take action brain. While it’s very small, (instincts). That means the hypothalamus plays a You need to align your brand we are evolutionarily crucial role in many important with at least one of the four driven by four Motivations: functions, including: Fs. Do you help consumers fight off something, do you Fight, Flee, Feed, • Releasing hormones help them escape danger? Fornicate. We Adopt • Regulating body temperature Does your brand satisfy a brands and buy products • Maintaining daily basic human need such as primarily because they physiological cycles hunger or thirst or will your brand increase chances of meet at least one of • Controlling appetite sexual activity? these motivations.” • Managing of sexual behaviour • Regulating emotional responses When you align with the four The science Fs, consumers will naturally prefer your brand to those of These Four Fs are regulated by the completion. Why? a part of the brain called the Because evolution has seen to it that the four Fs stimulate the mind 3,000 times faster than rational thought and are 24X more persuasive.

7 Attract Attention “Attention could be The science Take action described as a spotlight The ability to pay attention to that focuses an important things, and to ignore the Does your brand have individual’s awareness rest, helped early humans survive a strategy for grabbing on a particular aspect and evolve. Now, it’s a skill that attention? Here are a small number of proven tactics of their environment. can help consumers make better choices, both in terms of what they to use as you vie for the The honk of a horn buy and what they consume. attention of shoppers might alert us about an and consumers: Studies have demonstrated that oncoming car. The blaring attention is limited in terms of both Physical need. When we’re noise of a smoke alarm capacity and duration. And since hungry and we see food, might warn you that the attention is a limited resource, we we pay attention. casserole you put in the have to be selective about what we Emotion. If something oven is burning.” decide to focus on. Being selective evokes emotion in us, in what we attend to is a process it has our attention. As consumers each of our five that often occurs so quickly that Novelty. The brain pays more senses are constantly being we don’t even notice that we have attention to new things in bombarded by stimuli. In order for ignored certain stimuli in favour the environment. your brand to succeed, you must of others. Contrast. We pay more know how to cut through and attention to things that generate meaningful attention. contrast with other things. Humanity. As a species, we pay more attention to other humans than just about anything else.

8 Attract Looking or seeing “Looking and Seeing both The science Take action involve using the eyes ‘Looking’ is derived from the and sense of sight, but word ‘look’ which is defined in It’s one thing to get shoppers upon closer examination dictionaries as turning one’s eyes and consumers to look at what makes one different toward any object. This describes a your brand, but another to get them to really see it. Here are from the other? ‘Looking’ physical movement of an individual such as ‘Phillip is looking at a can some initial considerations to is turning one’s eyes to of cola.’ Any person can tell what turn looking into seeing. a certain brand while Phillip is doing based on his action. Firstly, consider these If we substitute looking for seeing ‘seeing’ is the perception questions: Why should of a brand or how someone ‘Seeing’ is taken from the word ‘see’ shoppers and consumers determines what he or she which dictionaries describe as to look at your brand? And, What is looking at.” perceive something. Perception do you want them to see? is the process of recognition or Why do people consume your relating what the eyes see with brand? And why is that? And previous knowledge. ‘Phillip is why is that (See evolution seeing a can of Coke’ means Phillip earlier) – Make emotional is mentalising what the aluminium connections with consumers. tube with red and white writing on it How much of a consumption means to him. occasion does the sight of your brand convey? – In summary, ‘Looking’ is turning Develop an occasions based one’s eyes to a certain object while communication strategy. ‘seeing’ is the perception of an Images before words – As a object or how a person determines species, we mentally process what he is looking at. images significantly faster than words – If you can say it with an image, do so.

9 Appeal

Emotions are 3,000 times faster and 24 times more persuasive than rational thought.

10 Appeal Instinct “Instinct: A natural or The science Take action inherent impulse or Instinct is a term used to describe behaviour; the capacity a set of behaviours that are both How instinctive is it for people of an animal to complete unlearned and set in motion as to buy and use your brand? a complex behaviour the result of some environmental In other words, can you make it less mentally taxing for automatically, without trigger. Instincts are also related to motivation since they can occur shoppers and consumers? intermediate conscious in response to a person’s need to If you came across your awareness. satisfy some innate internal drive brand for the first time, what tied to the four Fs: Fight, Flee, would you think, if anything? Feed, Fornicate Could you make your Is it obvious what it is? Is it brand easier to buy and In the world of brands, consumers blindingly apparent what it use? Instinct is defined try them, adopt them and they does? Does your brand have a as the way shoppers and almost become instinctive: ‘We clear point of difference, that always buy XXXX’. Shoppers and has instinctive connotations? consumers naturally consumers have more choice than If shoppers and consumers react or behave, without ever before, so the importance of need to think twice, then having to think or learn becoming an instinctive choice you’ve introduced mental can’t be understated. about it. Every additional friction, and this is the enemy information point, design of instinct. In summary, make change, promotion, range it easy, make it obvious, make review or whatever, makes it instinctive. it harder for people to mentally process your brand. Harder means less likely to do so!”

11 Appeal Emotion

Brands are emotions: experiential, behavioural, and As a simple definition, physiological elements. The specific Take action intensity of the emotion (e.g., trust a brand is often merely or pride) is determined by the How do you want shoppers a commodity with emotion specific significance of the event and consumers to emotionally attached so that it has a to the person themselves. For respond to your brand? Do you really know how people distinct ‘personality’ that example, if the significance involves really feel about your brand? tries to be different from immediate personal threat, fear is likely to be generated. But if the What is it that sets you apart other, competing brands. significance involves personal from the competition.

disapproval from another, shame You no doubt have a brand An emotion is an affective is likely to be generated. strategy and a pricing state of consciousness We can and do get emotional strategy, but do you have in which joy, sorrow, about things that don’t directly an emotions strategy? fear, hate, or the like, is concern us (good films and novels In other words, have you mapped out how you want experienced. A strong are examples). We can also get emotional about brands, both for shoppers to think about emotional response can good and bad. your brand at a deeper, more be accompanied by certain emotional level? Remember, physiological changes, emotions stimulate the mind 3,000 times faster than as increased heartbeat or rational thought and are respiration, and often overt 24X more persuasive. manifestation, as crying or shaking. The science An emotional response is a complex reaction pattern, involving

12 Appeal System 1, System 2

System 1 and System 2 wearing a flattering new shade are two distinct modes of of lipstick this morning? These Take action fleeting impressions, and the many decision making: System other shortcuts you’ve developed Is your brand more of a 1 is an automatic, fast and throughout your life, are combined System 1 purchase or a often unconscious way of to enable System 1 to make System 2 buy? Furthermore, what percentage of shoppers thinking. It is autonomous these decisions quickly, without deliberation and conscious effort. buy and consume your brand and efficient, requiring System 1 vs. System 2. little energy or attention, System 2 is thinking slow. This is a Answering these questions but is prone to biases and more complex and mentally draining is key if you really want to process. It’s also the process used systematic errors. System optimise your marketing to plan and prepare. It’s actually and communications. 2 is an effortful, slow and sitting down to write a shopping controlled way of thinking. list. System 2 shopping is all about As a simple rule of thumb, It requires energy and can’t making rational decisions, which is consider the front of the pack the best price, best value, etc. as System 1 space and the work without attention but, back of the pack, System 2. once engaged, it has the Psychology researchers have found ability to filter the instincts that the more complex a task is, Luckily, most brands can appeal to shoppers and of System 1. the more likely people are to engage in System 2 decision making. consumers by combining One interesting experiment, System 2 messages, which The science performed by Alter et al., found that are more fact-based, with System 1 is capable of making simply decreasing the legibility of reinforcement of consumers’ quick decisions, based on very the font used in a common cognitive System 1 beliefs about little information. Maybe your test made people more likely to the brand. Those rational eye is instinctively drawn to switch to System 2. messages can provide the dark red label on the pasta powerful justification in the sauce… maybe your colleague was choice of what to buy.

13 ENGAGE

As a species, we are unable to prevent all sensory stimuli from influencing us: Sight, sound, touch, taste and smell.

14 Engage Rational choice

The structure of thought when not to. Our best thinking is and reason are familiar to when we think about our thinking, Take action to consider the reasons behind it, many people. They help which enables us to revise it. Thusly There is a saying that goes: us order our world. Among using reason and emotion together. Emotion decides, reason other things they allow Reasoned thought and intuitive justifies, and that’s pretty true when it comes to brands. us to organise, plan and emotion, gives us much better results than would either alone. You present your wares to problem-solve. Many of us shoppers and consumers go around thinking that we Emotions are like the horses of in the hope they’ll choose are reasoned, rational and the chariot while reason is like the you. To significantly charioteer who controls the horses. productive! We try to limit increase the chances of Your reasons must control your them doing so, means or completely suppress emotions to achieve your goals you need a two pronged any and all emotions so in life. When horses go wild, the communication strategy. we can stay “Spock like” charioteer loses all control and Firstly go for the emotions: in our decision making. that leads to the destruction of the chariot, the charioteer and engage using powerful four Unfortunately, that’s also the horses. F cues Fight, Flee, Feed, nothing like what really Fornicate. “This deodorant goes on. When a person is in the state increases my chances of of extreme emotion he loses finding a mate.” Secondly, The science all his reasoning power. This allow consumers to happens when you are in deep congratulate themselves The prefrontal cortex, where love with someone or hate on a good purchase conscious rational thinking occurs someone intensely. decision, “and it was buy 2 is far more developed than in any get 1 free.” other creature. This means we are not slaves to our emotions and intuitions, but can take their benefits while also knowing, a lot of the time,

15 Engage Processing fluency

Every day, potential customers and clients make judgments about products or services based on the way Take action things are presented to them. Processing Fluency is one Because familiarity enables of the most important aspects of design. Making your easy mental processing, brand easier to think about and mentally process will it feels fluent. So people often equate the feeling increase preference, liking and share. of fluency with familiarity. That is, people often infer This causes us to expend more The science familiarity when a stimulus effort, resulting in negative feelings feels easy to process. Here’s Processing Fluency is a cognitive and associations. bias in which our opinion of a quick checklist to check something is influenced by how Seemingly insignificant aspects of the fluency of your brand easily our brain processes it and design and brand presentation can communications. understands it. We tend to prefer have surprising effects on consumer • Is the information you things that are simple to understand and shopper perceptions and present as easy to read and use, and will even find simple behaviour. If information is made to as it could be in terms information more believable. An appear simple, we’re more naturally of short words, phrases intuitive pack design, or a simple receptive to it. If it appears complex, and sentences? special offer represent high we’re likely to be put off. In general, • An easy on the eye processing fluency. anything that affects the ease or difficulty of mental processing can, san-serif font makes the Low processing fluency occurs and does, alter people’s perception product easier to prefer when we find something difficult of your brand. than a scripted font to interact with or understand. • Darker print on a light background is perceived as being more truthful • Graphic illustrations are easier to process than written descriptions.

16 Engage Cognitive biases

If you had to think about When you are making judgments every possible option and decisions about the world Take action around you, you like to think that when making a decision, you are objective, logical, and Here are 2 well-known it would probably take a lot capable of taking in and evaluating cognitive biases that lead of time to make even the all the information that is available shoppers and consumers to make less than ideal simplest choice. Because to you. Unfortunately, these biases decisions. of the sheer complexity of sometimes trip us up, leading to poor decisions and bad judgments. the world around you and Anchoring Bias: This is the tendency to rely too heavily the amount of information People sometimes confuse cognitive biases with logical on the very first piece of in the environment, it is fallacies, but the two are not the information you learn. If you necessary sometimes same. A logical fallacy stems learn the average price of a to rely on some mental from an error in a logical argument, product is a certain value, you shortcuts that allow you while a cognitive bias is rooted will think any amount below that is a good deal, perhaps to act quickly. in thought processing errors often arising from problems with not searching for better memory, attention, attribution, deals. In other words, the The science and other mental mistakes. first price shoppers see in a A cognitive bias is a type of error category anchors them to an in thinking that occurs when people expectation. are processing and interpreting Loss aversion: People tend information in the world around to fear a loss twice as much them. The human brain is powerful as they are likely to welcome but subject to limitations. Cognitive an equivalent gain. Telling biases are often a result of shoppers that they will save your brain’s attempt to simplify 10% feels twice as good as information processing. They saying 10% extra free. are rules of thumb that help you make sense of the world and reach decisions with relative speed.

17 BUY

System 1 decides what we buy, System 2, merely justifies it.

18 Buy

Numbers Take action Here are a small selection Numbers. They’re all A 1981 study conducted by of my 487 specific insights around us. The building Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman, into the human mind pioneers in behavioural economics, and numbers. blocks of calculation demonstrated how framing effects are used in several can have a psychological impact The “odd effect” — it takes different ways, whether on the choices that we make. our brains 20% longer to in their numerical form or When participants of the study were process odd numbers. asked whether they would drive symbolised by a number Prices containing more twenty minutes out of their way to syllables seem drastically of specific objects. Like save $5 dollars on a $15 calculator, higher to consumers. Keep colours, numbers have nearly 70 percent said yes. syllables to a minimum. their own psychology. But when asked if they would drive Ending prices with the twenty minutes to save $5 on a number nine is one of the The science $125 jacket, only 29 percent said oldest methods in the book, they would. Why? Even though Traditional economic theory has but does it actually work? the $5 savings is rationally identical long assumed that humans are Yes, resoundingly! logical, unemotional, and make between the two products, decisions that are in our own self- receiving a 33 percent discount Size matters. Bigger numbers interest. In recent years, however, feels like a more enticing deal than should be used to convey the growing field of behavioural 4 percent, and we’re willing to work increases in nutritional economics has revealed that this harder for it. benefits (1,000 milligrams assumption is flawed. of fibre, not one gram) or cell phone talk time (660 minutes, not 11 hours) to make people feel as though they are getting better deal.

19 Buy Loyalty

The secret to stronger According to one study, the majority brand loyalty starts of consumers want brands to take Take action an active interest in understanding with understanding your their needs before they’d even Ask yourself a big question: customers. And you consider purchasing. What psychological and can’t acquire those That’s why everything you do emotional needs and desires customers unless you as a brand should take human does my brand help my target first understand what psychology into account. Your audience fulfil? drives them to act. customers have to develop an If your answers are all In an ideal world, all emotional investment not only functional, or if your in your product, but also in the your customers would brand fails to address any brand itself. be loyal to your brand. psychological or emotional drivers, you may have some Loyalty means a customer Consumers stay consistently loyal to a certain brand for a variety work to do. is willing to come back of reasons, but loyalty primarily to your brand for begins when a customer trusts multiple purchases and a brand and the brand’s products experiences, forgoing align with the consumer’s values. your competitors’, If a brand can meet a psychological need, like making buyers feel more but they don’t! likable or like they’re part of a shared community, it can create a much The science stronger emotional connection. Brand loyalty is a mental connection Suddenly, the relationship with that consumers have with the brand becomes a statement companies and their products. about self.

20 Buy Social proof

Humans look to others Social proof is the result of a in their social groups to deeply rooted psychological bias. Take action It implies trust in other people. help inform their choices. The Social Proof Theory has Social proof can work That’s social proof. been and continues to be one wonders for your brand. We want to make the of the most effective means of Try out the following tactics and see what type of results right choice, so we look persuading consumers to buy a you can achieve. at what “society” at large product. Supplementing products with tag lines such as “9 out of 10 does to figure out the A sure-fire shortcut to doctors recommend…” or “the most generating perceived social correct action in a popular…,” and using testimonials proof is to show images of given situation. significantly increase the chances others using or consuming of the product being bought. your brand. The science We think anything used by experts When it comes to in-store, Psychologists would call social is good, because they probably some products missing off proof something like conformity know more than us. the shelves or promotional bias or herd mentality. These forces We buy products endorsed by end is a good thing – are what allow just 5% of a group celebrities to be more like them. Communicates that it’s to influence the rest of the crowd. a popular purchase. When it comes to consumers We trust reviews because the making decisions, we tend to reviewers have used the products, Giving away free samples follow others because we’re unlike ourselves. of your brand at the store looking for more information entrance shows your brand to help us make choices. in lots of other peoples baskets and trollies – Instant social proof!

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