Limit Availability to Overcome Satiation

Even your most satisfied customers may seek out retailers who compete with you for those customers’ business. That’s because people like variety. Take comfort in knowing this doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll desert you, never to return.
     The return is more likely, though, when the customers haven’t satiated on your store’s products. It’s best to leave them always wanting more. Researchers at University of Georgia and University of Minnesota found that one way to avoid satiation is to interrupt the nonstop availability of products and services which are distinctive to your store. Perceived limitations increase post-purchase enjoyment of the items, and enjoying the items results in desires to shop with you again.
     Time limits occur naturally as you phase out certain items to create room for new offerings. Announce to your target audience an item you’re selling is a limited edition, and sales can blossom. It’s true with artwork and, as it happens, with encyclopedias.
     In spring 2012, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc. announced the end of the print edition. The average 60 orders per week promptly grew to 1,050. What had become a marginal part of the business because of the move to digital versions of the product became a prominent profit center, although briefly.
     As a general rule, however, it best serves your profitability to combine “limited availability” with “ongoing availability” to assure your customers of a future source of supply.

• To create perceptions of limitations, remind people that nothing lasts forever. UCLA and University of California-San Diego researchers saw that a large percentage of people who’d moved away from the Chicago had visited local tourist attractions, such as Millennium Park only toward the very end of residency, perhaps in the midst of packing up. The researchers suggested tourism retailers sell to locals the idea of a “staycation,” such as a gift certificate for specific dates to visit the nearby attractions. 
• Invite shoppers to revisit the already done after an interval to recover from satiation. Researchers at American University, University of Arizona, and Northwestern University mused on why people will read the same book a number of times, watch the same movie repeatedly, or go back to the same place and do the same things again. In-depth interviews revealed answers: They seek out details they missed before. They want to give the item another chance for a positive impression. They’ll enjoy being there while friends encounter the experience for the first time. 

For your profitability: Sell Well: What Really Moves Your Shoppers

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Show Them What They’ll Never See Again 
Enable Shoppers to Revisit the Already Done