Navigate Shoppers Toward Distinctiveness

Consumers are getting more interested in being distinctive rather than conforming to group preferences. You’ll increase sales when you help your shoppers reach their favorite spot on the conformity-distinctiveness scale. Research findings from University of South Carolina, Loyola University, and Baruch College suggest that one tool you have for doing this is the phrasing of a certain preferences question:

• If you ask your customer, “What about this product do you like that your friends would also like?,” this prompts individual distinctiveness, since it puts your customer in the role of advisor and perhaps opinion leader.
• On the other hand, if you ask your customer, “What about this product do your friends like and you also like?,” this prompts the customer to think about the comfort of adhering to group preferences.

     Here is some of what determines which of the two formats you should use:

• The age and culture of the shoppers. Older shoppers are more likely to seek distinctiveness than conformity. Teenagers tend to opt for conformity with groups they aspire to belong to.
• The nature of the item. Consumers are more interested in conformity when it comes to fashion items, such as clothing and entertainment products. They’re relatively less interested in conformity with functional items, like appliances and foods. With functional items, shoppers are interested in what others think, but it is more what the others think of a product than it is what others think of people who use that product.
• The degree of group shopper conformity. People buy more when shopping in groups, so encourage group shopping. Then in your merchandising, allow for both conformity and distinctiveness. Research at Sorbonne-Assas and University of Adelaide suggests that when the degree of product choice conformity reaches about 80%, a drive for distinctiveness takes over.

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