Slow Switching by Asking About Prior Choices

Most shoppers are tempted to switch brands and locations from time to time for no reason other than that all people seek variety. If we want to introduce the customer to a new brand in a category, their interest in switching is fine with us.
     However, if the brand the customer has been buying delivers good value for the customer and the best profits for us, we'd prefer to at least delay the brand switching, even if we can't completely eliminate it. And if the drive for variety consists of the customer switching their spending to a store other than ours, we'd like to do our best to stomp out that foolish idea.
     Research findings from Carnegie Mellon University, University of Minnesota, and New York University suggest that we can slow down switching by encouraging variety-seeking customers to think about other alternatives they've already tried.

• If the shopper talks about purchasing a different brand "to break out of my routine," we could ask, "What are some of the other brands you've used in the past, and what convinced you to start using the brand you're using now?"
• If the customer is talking about holding off on a purchase so they can try out a store that opened recently in the area, we could ask, "What are some of the stores you've shopped at before or in addition to shopping here, and what about our store keeps you coming back?"

     This technique is an example of how what we do might make us money for a combination of reasons. The customer's answers to these questions not only provide "virtual variety," but also give us the chance to find out what is important to this individual shopper and then use this information to make our case for the shopper forgetting about switching.