Why Behavioral Science matters for your business?
Behavioral Science is like the Metaverse. It has different meanings for different people.
What is Behavioral Science?
According to the esteemed professors and students at my alma mater, the London School of Economics and Political Science
It is the cross-disciplinary, open-minded science of understanding how people behave.
Understand causes of behaviour of individuals, groups and organizations at/across different levels.
Systematic study of human behaviour. …explain when and why individuals behave as they do.
…to understand why we behave the way we behave and make decisions we make. It is also a facilitator for making better decisions which is equally valuable.
…science that investigates circumstances under which thinking does not lead to behaviour.
..describes how people actually do think and act, rather than how they should.
They all agree that Behavioral Science is concerned with human behavior. In real world, we believe that under a given set of circumstances, we would behave in a set fashion. However, often, we do not behave as we thought we would. Why?
I strongly agree with Barbara Fasolo, Associate Professor of Behavioural Science and the Head of the Behavioural Research Lab when she says that Behavioral Science is the science of understanding, predicting, and influencing how people behave.”
What do Behavioral Scientists do?
Human beings are funny and complex. They do not always behave as you expect them to. They will sometimes take decisions that will not maximize their own well-being. They sometimes follow rules because their group is following them. Even if those rules are against their personal beliefs. Example - masking up during the pandemic.
They sometimes will take a decision that offers short-term gains because they receive an immediate incentive. They forego the opportunity to do better long-term if they are required to wait.
Behavioural Scientists study all different human behaviors to understand why humans do what they do. They observe, run experiments, collect data and support behaviors that lead to a positive impact. Then they guide companies, governments, policy makers and the society on how to persuade and influence decision-making.
Behavioral Scientists conduct experiments to understand our behavior. These include studying how good are we at reading the social cues around us, as individuals and groups.
For example, the researchers at the University of Chicago Booth did an experiment on how to spot if someone is lying. Further, they investigated if individuals do better than groups at finding out the liar.
Are companies using Behavioural Science in their business?
Yes.
What’s more? You are responding to Behavioral Science strategies in your everyday life.
Companies are using Behavioral Science principles to persuade and influence buyers to buy their products and use their services. They cleverly utilize subtle cues that immediately evoke an emotional response and reduce cognitive effort. This leads to faster decision-making and buy action.
Let’s talk about Amazon, the world’s largest online retailer
When you search for an item on Amazon, it shows you a list of products at various price points from various brands. There are multiple options available even if you know the brand and the price that you want to purchase.
There is a high chance of you not buying at all because you cannot decide. Why?
Cognitive Overload - there is a LOT of information for the brain to process. A lot of cognitive effort is needed. So, you end to procrastinate and not buy at that time.
How does Amazon resolve this?
It labels a specific listing as a Bestseller.
The bestseller is easy to spot as it is mentioned in a bright orange box on the lists page.
The bestseller item is placed within the first 5-10 spots on the list.
Amazon is using a behavioural science principle called Social Proof.
Bestseller products are usually those that have a high sales volume. Many people bought that product in the past. So, when you see an item labelled as Bestseller, you automatically assume that it must be a good product since many people purchased it and must be happy with it. There is lesser risk associated with buying a bestseller as it has social approval.
For a B2B company to persuade and convert, its content must reduce the buyer's cognitive effort during decision-making. Make it easy to decide using behavioral science.
The Mixtiles email that made me buy $90 worth of tiles within 2 hours
Mixtiles sells photo frames that can directly be stuck on the wall, no nails needed. I usually wait for a sale because their tiles are priced at a higher price point than their competitors.
They sent me a promotional email because I had been a customer before. It was so well-written that I mentally made up my mind to place my order as soon as I was home. They managed to register themselves in my to-do list.
How did they do this?
Their email seemed like it had been written by a person just for me. Of course, this is not true! But, that’s clever writing.
They built a connection with me by not offering me a discount or an offer at the very first instance. Instead, they offered help. Interesting. I was not looking for help, specifically. But, this offer got my attention.
The offer did not sound like a sale-sy offer. It gave me a happy feeling and a slight feeling of not wanting to miss out on memories.
I was so impressed that I immediately put on my behavioural scientist hat and wrote a blog post about it.
You can read it here.
How can your company and marketing team leverage behavioral science?
Behavioral Science helps marketing and sales understand their customer’s behavior, motivations, thoughts, mental barriers and the ways to overcome them. Used ethically, behavioral science helps marketers to persuade, influence and convert the prospect into a buyer.
Using Behavioral Science, marketers can craft digital campaigns that evoke an emotional response, reduce cognitive overload, minimise decision paralysis and enable decision-making. They do all these using Behavioral Science principles.
Some examples are:
Availability Bias
Remind the prospect of a pain point and how stressful it was for them to overcome it. Then, inform them how your product removes that pain-point such that they will never have to encounter that stress again.
Because the buyer had recently gone through an inconvenience, they will readily recall the unpleasant experience and will make efforts to not have it repeated.
Social Proof
In your conference registration email, mention the number of attendees that are expected to attend this year. Name the influential speakers. Prominently display their designation.
Because your reader thinks that if so many and such famous people are attending the conference, there must be some value in it. They will register to attend.
Loss aversion
Offer a free trial period for your product before charging for usage. Display this prominently in your communication channels such as emails, websites and blog posts.
Because the prospective user gets an opportunity to experience and trial it, they will be more receptive to buying the subscription. Another reason is that the user gets to experience the benefits of lesser effort and lesser time because of your product, they will likely not want to go back to their old ways.
Let’s craft Behavioral Science based content for your business
For B2B companies who generally have a longer sales cycle and therefore a longer campaign cycle, you can utilise multiple behavioural science principles for different phases and responses.
All your content must be crafted keeping human behavior in mind. Simply stating the benefit, price and sending multiple emails/calls is not enough. Multiple posts on social media or running ads that do not appeal to the human mind will not land your customers.
Looking for a marketer with a behavioural science bent of mind? Let’s work together to build persuasive content.