1454: Mass Persuasion, One User At A Time by Nir Eyal on Digital Marketing

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[00:00:30] This is Optimal Work Daily.

[00:00:33] Mass persuasion one user at a time by near-al of near and far.com.

[00:00:39] Successful entrepreneurs recommend reading this article and the persuasion techniques companies

[00:00:43] used to drive engagement.

[00:00:45] Scratch that.

[00:00:46] How's this?

[00:00:47] Tons of people are tweeting this article.

[00:00:49] Find out why.

[00:00:51] Okay, here's one more.

[00:00:53] This article will only be on the Tech Crunch front page for a few hours before fading

[00:00:56] into the information of BIS.

[00:00:59] Perhaps your preference for one of those opening lines is a matter of taste, but for companies

[00:01:03] leveraging the explosion of personal data, it's very big business.

[00:01:07] Marketers are increasingly personalizing their products and services to meet their

[00:01:11] customers' changing needs.

[00:01:13] But customization used in conjunction with powerful persuasion techniques is arming marketers

[00:01:17] with new weaponry to boost customer engagement and drive profits.

[00:01:21] The tools of influence such as authority seen in the opening line, social proof,

[00:01:27] second line and scarcity in the third line have been used to persuade consumers

[00:01:31] since Edward Bernays launched the public relations industry during the first world war.

[00:01:36] Bernays, the nephew of Sigmund Freud, applied his uncle's theories of the human subconscious

[00:01:40] to drive consumer behavior.

[00:01:42] Back then, marketers including tobacco companies in the CIA hired Bernays to shape public

[00:01:47] opinion at influence the masses.

[00:01:49] Bernays and the PR and advertising industries he spawned sold consumers goods and ideas

[00:01:54] by tapping deep into the human psyche.

[00:01:57] For example, Bernays engineered demand for cigarettes among women by associating smoking

[00:02:01] with the desire for independence and freedom from male domination.

[00:02:05] More recently, Robert Childini's research and subsequent book Influence popularized

[00:02:10] the use of the psychology of persuasion.

[00:02:13] But the business of influence has always been limited by its inability to customize

[00:02:16] for the individual.

[00:02:18] Messaging was one size fits all and it was delivered through mass media channels, first

[00:02:22] in print, then over the airwaves.

[00:02:25] AB testing is so yesterday.

[00:02:28] That's all changed now.

[00:02:29] Today companies are able to test messaging in real time, trying dozens of variants to discover

[00:02:34] which ones create the desired behavior most efficiently.

[00:02:37] But so-called AB testing, which is designed to find the best solution for the average

[00:02:42] user, is rapidly being replaced by far more sophisticated methods, designed to

[00:02:46] optimize on an individual per user basis.

[00:02:50] Mass customization of the kind used by Amazon to predict which products to offer based

[00:02:54] on past behaviors is increasingly supplemented with personalized persuasion, whereby the

[00:03:00] psychological technique used to appeal to the customers is tailored to increase the intended

[00:03:04] action.

[00:03:05] Companies not only customize their experiences to give customers what they want, but

[00:03:09] they also keep tabs on users to present their messages exactly how the user wants it.

[00:03:15] Adaptive Marketing

[00:03:17] A recently published study in personal and ubiquitous computing demonstrated how matching

[00:03:22] the right persuasion technique with the right consumer, how performs traditional methods.

[00:03:27] The study tracked the results of an email campaign run by an unnamed company selling

[00:03:31] a product similar to the Fitbit or Nike Fuel Band.

[00:03:34] Users wore their devices throughout the day to track movement and calories burned.

[00:03:38] They then uploaded their data by connecting the device to their computers.

[00:03:41] Doing so gave the winners insight into their fitness levels and prompted them to take steps

[00:03:46] to improve their health.

[00:03:48] However, shortly after customers started using their devices, the company noticed something

[00:03:52] was going very wrong.

[00:03:53] Users stopped connecting them.

[00:03:55] With no data uploaded consumers weren't getting the results they wanted and that meant

[00:03:59] no advocates to spread the word about the benefits of the product.

[00:04:02] To try and solve the problem, the company crafted four emails urging customers to connect

[00:04:07] and upload their data.

[00:04:08] They sent a standard email message to a control group and also sent alternate versions

[00:04:13] that simply substituted a short paragraph utilizing one of three persuasion techniques

[00:04:17] similar to those applied in the opening lines of this post.

[00:04:21] From there, they tracked how users responded.

[00:04:24] Interestingly, when a randomly selected group of users of the service was asked which message

[00:04:28] they thought would be most effective in persuading people to action, they picked this email

[00:04:32] which employs the authority persuasion technique.

[00:04:35] Quote, Dear Name, how are you doing?

[00:04:39] We hope all is well.

[00:04:40] It is three days since the last time you connected your activity monitor.

[00:04:44] Experienced coaches recommend frequent uploads of your activity data.

[00:04:48] This will help you to gain more insight and be more active.

[00:04:51] We would like to remind you to connect it to your PC soon and stay in touch.

[00:04:55] Since nearly, the company, and Quote.

[00:04:58] Although most respondents predicted this email would be the most effective, it performed

[00:05:01] much worse than expected.

[00:05:03] So much for the wisdom of the crowds.

[00:05:05] In fact, the test concluded that the best performing messages were those tailored to the

[00:05:10] users preferred persuasion method. For example, if the customer performed the intended behavior,

[00:05:15] like plugging in the device, after receiving a message using a scarcity persuasion technique,

[00:05:20] connect now before it's too late. They would receive future messages using that same technique.

[00:05:25] This form of personalized persuasion outperformed other test groups.

[00:05:29] After the system learned the customer's preferences,

[00:05:31] the messages tailored to users beat the response rate of the standard email by nearly 20%.

[00:05:37] Improvements like these add up to huge returns when applied to marketers sending millions of messages.

[00:05:43] Too much of a good thing? But the field of personalized persuasion is in its

[00:05:47] infancy, and marketers and researchers are still learning the limitations and rules of the practice.

[00:05:52] For example, a study appearing next month in the International Journal of Internet Marketing and

[00:05:56] Advertising reveals some non-obvious truths about the application of the tools of persuasion.

[00:06:01] Namely, when it comes to the tools of influence, more may not always be better.

[00:06:07] The study's simple experiment compared click-through rates on Google Text Ads attempting to

[00:06:11] influence people to take a mock survey. The study tested the use of multiple persuasion techniques

[00:06:16] per add, such as social proof, authority, and scarcity, versus an ad with only one of the techniques used.

[00:06:23] For example, while one add might say, there are only 18 hours left to participate in this study.

[00:06:27] Another said, only 18 hours left and professor Ford recommends it, hundreds took it.

[00:06:33] Average over multiple trials with similar ads, the study concluded that the click-through rate

[00:06:37] of the single method ads were double that of those using multiple persuasion techniques.

[00:06:42] Talk to me. Though the test was basic, the implication that companies may be

[00:06:46] subjecting users to persuasion overload is an important consideration for marketers. It appears

[00:06:51] that adding too many persuasive arguments may arouse suspicion and increase the likelihood the

[00:06:56] ad will be scrutinized. Potential customers may also find a approach to be too mentally taxing,

[00:07:02] whereas using just one clear persuasion method may be more easily understood.

[00:07:06] Finally, according to Maritz Captine, one of the authors of the fitness device study and founder

[00:07:11] of science rock stars, a company specializing in personalized persuasion.

[00:07:15] Quote, marketers are realizing that people are more than numbers. We are all different and have

[00:07:20] certain a versions to particular techniques more than others. By throwing everything at a customer,

[00:07:25] companies may be increasing the odds that any one user sees something they don't like.

[00:07:30] And, quote,

[00:07:31] By single-ing out one persuasion strategy per person,

[00:07:34] companies are addressing customers in the way that best suits the user.

[00:07:38] In the age of increasing personalized data and a greater understanding of the tools of persuasion,

[00:07:43] companies will no longer need to communicate with customers as an amalgam of an average user

[00:07:47] that doesn't actually exist. Instead, by marrying psychology and customer data,

[00:07:52] smart companies will give customers more of what they want, someone who speaks their language.

[00:08:01] You just listen to the post titled Mass Persuasion One User at a time by near-a-all of near and

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[00:09:14] and his site is near and far.com with NIR being spelled just like his name. He has two popular

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[00:09:26] how to control your attention and choose your life. He's been a lecturer in marketing at the

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