Frequently, Movéo experts share their expertise with the team with a short presentation on a timely marketing topic over lunch. Last week, John Reynolds, Director of Consulting and Engagement at Movéo, spoke on designing for behavior change. We’d like to share his insights with you as well.
The concept of behavioral design — using applied psychology and frequent testing to create products and services that meet the needs and requirements of users — has applications in fields including education, patient care, human resources, finance and more. In marketing, it is key to encouraging customers to buy a product or service.
Behavioral design is a field with a robust scientific history, including the work of psychologist B.F. Skinner, whose work in behaviorism focused on positive and negative reinforcement. Behaviorism seeks to understand why individuals’ behaviors change by understanding the environment around them as well as their personal and behavioral characteristics. In the 1970s and 80s, Dr. Robert Cialdini, author of Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion, directly linked theories of persuasion to marketing and business, creating the six principles of persuasion we will discuss below.
While B2B purchasing decisions are often thought of as more logical and less emotional than B2C purchases, emotions play an undeniable role in business purchases. Although business decision-makers have to make certain purchases for work and are not doing so with their own money, those decisions still carry an emotional weight. Marketers must recognize and engage with the emotional side as well as the rational side of each buyer’s journey.
In your own marketing, successfully tap into prospects’ emotions by focusing your messaging on the benefits your product or service will grant and the harms it will remove. Often, focusing on the removal of harm is a particularly effective tactic. When crafting your marketing plan, consider where your product or service can minimize business risk, and how you can weave that throughout your messaging.
Video marketing provides a particularly impactful way to create an emotional link between your audience and your brand. When producing video content, focus on immediately creating an association by presenting someone who has a problem similar to that of your audience, and then tying its resolution to the solution you offer.
Dr. Cialdini’s six principles of influence are:
It’s likely you already practice several of these principles in your marketing. Offering downloadable content in exchange for personal information is an example of reciprocity in action. Demonstrating that a given solution is used by some percentage of companies in the industry is an example of social proof. If you’ve ever made an effort to make your prospects feel more connected to your work or organizations your solutions have benefited, you’ve practiced liking.
Together, Dr. Cialdini’s six principles provide a useful toolkit for marketers looking to increase the effectiveness of their operations. How else have you used these principles in your own work?
If you’re interested in learning more about the power of behavioral design in marketing, contact us.
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