Ms. Dickinson advised him to accept that his family members would bring meat entrees if he wasn’t providing one. She added that she suspected family dynamics were playing out here.
I agree. This is about values and self-identity. Vegetarians do not want to be confused with meat eaters, just as meat eaters prefer not to be confused with vegetarians.
A team of researchers from France, Australia, and the U.S. told study participants they'd be given either a beef sausage roll or a vegetarian roll to eat. But those tricky researchers lied to half the participants, who actually were served the other entrée from what had been promised.
One group of those participants granted a high rating to what they ate, regardless of whether they actually ate the meat or vegetable version, as long as they thought it was meat. Unlike the veggie fans, these meat elitists showed up on psychological testing as embracing values of power and strength.
Psychological dynamics like this one can lead to selling opportunities. Researchers at Southern Methodist University and University of Texas-Austin watched what happened when people from UT were assigned to purchase a present for someone who wanted an item carrying the logo of UT archrival Texas A&M. The reactions were compared to those of a comparable group assigned to buy a gift emblazoned with the UT Longhorns logo.
The researchers report that when selecting the item for the Texas A&M fan, the shoppers fidgeted, chewed on their lips, and averted their eyes. They crossed their arms, as if to distance themselves from what they were doing, and at the cash/wrap, they actually stepped away from the item, as if to say to anybody watching, “Don’t think this item represents who I really am.”
Then the researchers provided relief. They offered to each participant a choice between an expensive silver pen with no logo or a low-priced plastic pen with the Longhorn logo. Those who had bought the Texas A&M gift were more likely to select the cheap pen.
The lesson for you, retailer? Carry items that allow customers to affirm their desired identities.
Click below for more:
Sell Benefits to Fit Shoppers’ Values
Sell to Values, Not Just Value
Bruce, love this post! At www.pattycakedoll.com, we sell both Black baby dolls and Hispanic baby dolls. We have learned to show many of our dolls on both the 'Hispanic' and 'Black' pages, understanding that ethnicity comes in all hues.
ReplyDeleteOur customers very much self-identify their children, Black or Hispanic, as well as 'multi-racial,' 'bi-racial,' and 'mixed.'
There is very definite correlation between the inbound search phrase, (which our analytics and 'chat' software shows us), and the ultimate dolls purchased. If they searched for Black or African-American baby dolls, they usually buy off the Black page. If they searched Hispanic dolls, they will typically buy off the Hispanic page. Remember, many of the dolls are on both pages! So your last line is 100% correct: "Carry items that allow customers to affirm their desired identities." And we would add, learn how your customers identify themselves as well.
Thanks so much for adding real-life retailing meaning to my research-based post. Your example shows that by making use of the proper tools, the ecommerce retailer might discover important truths about shoppers at least as well as the brick-and-mortar retailer can.
ReplyDelete