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Episode 1589:
Steve Chou explores how the psychology of commitment can influence customer behavior and boost sales. By leveraging principles like the foot-in-the-door technique and consistency bias, businesses can encourage repeat purchases and stronger brand loyalty. Understanding these strategies helps create long-term customer engagement and increased revenue.
Read along with the original article(s) here: https://mywifequitherjob.com/the-psychology-of-commitment-and-getting-customers-to-spend-more/
Quotes to ponder:
"The more time or money someone invests in something, the more committed they become to seeing it through."
"Once a customer makes a small purchase, they are more likely to make a larger purchase later due to the need for consistency."
"People tend to justify their past decisions, which makes them more likely to stick with a brand they’ve already invested in."
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
[00:00:00] Klar können wir Multitasking, aber wenn's drauf ankommt, sind wir froh, wenn wir uns auf eine Sache konzentrieren können. Das neue Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra macht's möglich, als dein persönlicher AI-Begleiter. Aktiviere Google Gemini und frag die AI zum Beispiel nach passenden Restaurantoptionen und teile sie mit deinen Kontakten. Das klingt dann so. Hey, such mir ein indisches Restaurant in der Nähe raus und sende es an Luca. Easy. Was das Galaxy S25 Ultra noch kann? Erfahre mehr auf samsung.de.
[00:00:30] This is Optimal Work Daily. How to Leverage Consumer Behavior To Get Customers To Buy More by Steve Chou of MyWife Quit Her Job dot com. When it comes to negotiation or convincing customers to buy more, you can leverage certain innate characteristics of consumer behavior to increase your sales. Here are some examples of how to use the psychology of commitment to get what you want. More sauce, please.
[00:00:56] I really hate getting nickel and dimed, especially when I believe that two items should come packaged together at no additional cost. For example, every time I go to McDonald's and order chicken McNuggets, I get really annoyed. Back in the good old days, McDonald's used to give you as many packets of sauce as you wanted for free whenever you ordered their chicken McNuggets. But a while back, they started charging you for extra sauce that exceeded their recommended quota.
[00:01:20] Today, when you order 20 nuggets, you're only allocated three packages of sauce. For a 10-piece, you get two, and for a 6-piece, you only get one. For me, when I order a 20-piece, I need at least five packets of sauce. No doubt someone at McDonald's calculated the sauce usage for the average consumer and determined that three was the magical number. In any case, sauce packets now cost an additional 30 cents a pop at checkout. Personally, I hate getting charged an extra 60 cents for something that used to be free.
[00:01:48] So one day, I decided to try a different tactic. Instead of telling the cashier up front that I wanted to order two extra packets of sauce with my 20-piece, I simply asked for three. Then, once the cashier had already swiped my credit card, I said, Actually, I changed my mind. Could I get two more packets of sweet and sour, please? Sure enough, the cashier handed over two additional packets of sauce for free. My Experience Shopping for Embroidery Machines
[00:02:14] When my wife and I were shopping around for embroidery machines, we were extremely price sensitive. After all, these machines cost anywhere from $5,000 to $15,000, and we wanted to only pay for as much machine as we needed. For such a large purchase, we shopped mostly at physical store locations and a variety of sales tactics were used against us. Some retailers tried to present us with large package deals. Buy this machine along with an embroidery starter kit at one low price.
[00:02:41] Buy this package and receive free servicing for life along with all the accessories you need. Other salespeople tried to sell us the base machine and then nickel and dime us for all the extra accessories. But the smarter salesman read my wife and I like a book. Sensing that we were extremely cost-averse, the salesperson that we ultimately purchased the machine from didn't try to sell us anything more than the base machine. He seemed conscious of the fact that we wanted to spend as little as possible and didn't try to push anything on us at all.
[00:03:09] However, once we had settled on a price and were all ready to make the purchase, he casually walked us over to the accessories aisle and gave us a brief tutorial on additional items that we might need. And somehow, we ended up spending a good amount of extra money on these accessories and didn't feel too bad about it either. The Common Denominator So what do these two stories about chicken nuggets and sewing machines illustrate? It's that both customers and retailers are much more vulnerable once a commitment has already been made.
[00:03:39] And as I've already illustrated with the stories I just mentioned, this can be used to your advantage. As an online store owner, make sure you upsell an existing product or cross-sell your customer with additional accessories and or related items when they're ready to check out from your store. For example, if you sell cell phones, you might want to present the customer with a variety of cases or a car kit just before checkout. If you sell shoes, hit them up for some socks or other accessories.
[00:04:05] If you want to see an extreme example of this tactic, go and try to buy something from GoDaddy.com. While I think that GoDaddy's tactics are annoying and way over the top, it clearly works. Otherwise, they wouldn't be doing it. As a consumer, you can extract every last value of your dollar by asking for additional concessions after a salesperson has already committed to helping you and you've both already agreed on a price. This tactic works especially well for larger purchases but ultimately depends on how desperate the shop owner is
[00:04:33] or how trivial your demands are. The secret to increasing average order size The hardest part of sales is convincing your customer to choose your store. But once that decision has been made, adding a few extra items isn't as big of a deal. In other words, they already like your company and your products, so it then becomes a question of what to buy and not whether to buy. Therefore, it is crucial to get your customer to commit to making a purchase no matter how small the cost
[00:04:59] and then try to cross-sell them with additional enticing items just before checkout. As a shop owner, you should always use cross-selling in conjunction with a draw-in item that is priced very attractively. Customers who commit to buying your inexpensive draw-in item will be vulnerable to cross-sells because psychologically they'll feel inclined to spend what they had already planned on spending. Wow, I just saved 50 bucks. May as well blow this money on something else. After all, it's practically free money. Many larger retail chains use this tactic all the time.
[00:05:29] Stores like Fry's Electronics and Best Buy routinely offer ridiculously low-priced items to get you in the door. And as a result, most consumers end up buying additional higher-margin goods on their way out. My wife and I increased our average order size by roughly 29% almost immediately once we started using draw-in items and cross-selling. We found that the easiest and most painless way to do cross-sells is to rely on prior sales data by pointing new customers to what others have already purchased along with what is in their shopping cart.
[00:05:58] It takes a bit of hand-tweaking to make sure the recommendations make sense, but it's well worth the time. Another tactic that we found useful for increasing average order size is offering free shipping and discounts when certain purchase amounts are met. For example, customers can save up to $11 on shipping for all orders over $100 at our store. On many occasions, I've observed in real-time customers looking for extra items to add to their shopping carts just across that $100 threshold.
[00:06:26] These tactics work and are an effective way to increase revenues without having to increase foot traffic. Conclusion When it comes to making additional sales, getting a commitment from your customer is 90% of the battle. And once you have that commitment, it's very easy to increase the average order value with additional offers. So the next time you shop online, pay close attention to the tactics being used to get you to spend more money and copy their tactics.
[00:06:57] You just listened to the post titled, How to Leverage Consumer Behavior to Get Customers to Buy More, by Steve Chu of MyWifeQuitHerJob.com And thanks to Steve for letting us share his work today. When his wife became pregnant and she planned to stay home with the baby, they knew that they were going to need to find more income. So they started a little online store called Bumblebee Linens.
[00:07:19] Well, in just a year, they were able to replace his wife's salary of $100,000 per year, and they started My Wife Quit Her Job to document it all, including income reports. And now Steve was able to leave his job too, so it's not just his wife who quit her job anymore. He also started the Sellers Summit, and you can learn more about that at SellersSummit.com. And thanks again to Steve for letting us share his work today. But that should do it for today. Hope your week's been going great so far.
[00:07:46] And of course, I thank you again for being a subscriber to the show and sharing it with others when you get the chance. And I'm going to see you back here again tomorrow. That's where your optimal life awaits. Thank you.