Prepare for Pickiness to Pale

People who consider themselves socially advantaged are more picky consumers than are people who consider themselves socially disadvantaged. The University of Iowa researchers who conducted the studies supporting this finding defined pickiness as a willingness to acquire a product only if the product is at or close to ideal.
     Are those study findings telling you something you didn’t know already? My guess is no, the findings do not.
     Okay, since the findings appear to be common sense, is there anything to be learned to assist in improving your marketing profitability? My argument is yes, the findings can, but only if you dig deeper than the what to ask about the why.
     Based on their hypotheses and study results, the researchers say the effect of social advantage on pickiness cannot be completely explained as being due only to the advantaged having greater resources with which to access and possess items. Entitlement also matters. Even when the other factors are accounted for, the socially advantaged feel more entitled to be picky than do the socially disadvantaged. Entitlement is the feeling that you are more important and more deserving than inferior others.
     This sense of entitlement is related to what the researchers refer to as Social Dominance Orientation. In my email exchange with Prof. Bryce Pyrah, the primary researcher, he writes, “People who endorse inequalities (those high in SDO) demonstrate the differences that those who are advantaged are pickier than those who are disadvantaged because of entitlement. Those who challenge existing inequalities do not show these differences on entitlement or subsequent pickiness.
     “This sense of entitlement arises due to people's general motivation to justify the current hierarchy and their place in it. That is why those who are advantaged tend to feel more entitled, as they believe that their standing in their hierarchy is justified, and thus feel like they deserve more. And so, those who are low in SDO (or those who challenge the hierarchy) don't show this pattern.”
     I contend that your understanding of this why will be helpful by giving you a heads-up to prepare for pickiness to fade somewhat in the future. At present, there are deeply-entrenched wealth, racial, and ethnic inequalities in society. However, rumblings of a drive to moderate these inequalities can be seen in public polling. I anticipate reductions in entitlement deriving from our culture’s Social Dominance Orientation in the foreseeable future.

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Offer Poor Items to Low Self-Esteem Shoppers 

Box In Gift Shoppers for the Picky 

Hover Within the Shopper’s Power Level 

Insulate Perfectionists from Unwise Risk

Hew to Humility when Highly Handsome

Abundant attractiveness in a persuasion agent can alienate consumers. Shoppers who perceive themselves as being less attractive might respond negatively. For instance, women browsing through cosmetics in a store compare themselves to how others in the store look. If the comparison comes across with the shopper thinking they end up on the short end, the chance of a sale drops.
     Researchers at University of Dayton, University of Oregon, and TEKsystems saw this beauty backfire effect with fitfluencers—social media content creators specializing in workout, nutrition, and lifestyle guidance. This is a realm where we’d expect physical attractiveness to be appealing, but, at the same time, expect physical attractiveness to jeopardize relatability and produce unpleasant self-other comparisons. In the study, those expectations were met. Fitfluencers rated as highly attractive received lower consumer engagement than did those rated as moderately attractive.
     But the researchers then found a way around the effect: Show humility. For some participants in that study, the caption below a photo of the influencer read, “Just so you know… I haven't always looked like this. It's taken a lot of hard work, but true greatness takes time,” while for the other participants, the caption read, “Just so you know… I've always looked like this. I work harder than the rest, and true greatness is reserved for champions.”
     When the photo was of a moderately attractive fitfluencer, there were no differences in the participants’ ratings of relatability based on the humble versus proud caption. But with the highly attractive fitfluencer, the first caption produced greater participant ratings of relatability than did the second one. Further analyses showed that this greater relatability resulted in greater viewer engagement.
     Curbing the negative responses allows fitfluencers and the many other sorts of persuasion agents to realize documented gains from handsomeness. People are generally more likely to be persuaded when the face-to-face influence agent is good-looking. Pretty solicitors for charitable contributions collect more money. Beautiful store salespeople produce bigger market basket totals. Political candidates whose facial features are symmetrical are more likely to garner votes for themselves and for their causes.
     Humility helps in other retailing areas, too. A decade ago, Starbucks was said to be bragging too much about their ability to be an authentic coffee experience. Customers gave up on Starbucks and aimed for other shops which showed humility. Brands perceived as arrogant might attract through exclusivity, but often repel via intimidation.

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Beautify Persuasion Transactions 

Stay Humble When It Comes to Handcrafted 

Look Out for Where They’re Gazing

Understand Abortion Stand as Insurance Strand

“A conservative is a liberal who has been mugged. A liberal is a conservative who has been arrested.”
     This epigram reflects evidence of how life experiences can uncoil even deeply-wound political orientations. A finding by Yale University and University of Southern California researchers expresses the spirit of the saying from a different time perspective. Also, the researchers’ evidence indicates the complete explanation for the finding is different from what easily comes to mind.
     The research finding is that opposition to abortion among U.S. political conservatives and practicing Christians, both men and women, grows significantly stronger, overall, among those individuals who have had a child. Absence of a particular life experience—having had a child—uncoils a deeply-held conviction—opposition to abortion.
     The easy explanation for the finding is that having a child strengthens appreciation for the preciousness of human life. The researchers’ complete explanation differs in that it encompasses insurance: Political conservatives and practicing Christians are more likely than others to oppose abortion consistent with their moral and religious beliefs. But this opposition is tempered among those without children because accessible abortion offers insurance against an unplanned pregnancy. Once these individuals have a child, their fear of childbearing eases. Now antiabortion convictions can comfortably harden.
     Yes, every additional child is an additional burden, but the one-time cost of adjustment to parenthood has been paid. The researchers point out how this train of reasoning is supported by their analysis of Guttmacher Institute statistics showing non-mothers across the political spectrum are more likely to terminate a pregnancy than are women who have had a first child. The statistic that most women who receive abortions are mothers simply reflects the fact that most pregnant people are already mothers. The effect of parenthood on abortion policy preferences is concentrated among unmarried respondents, who would be especially sensitive to the disruptive effects of a pregnancy.
     Abortion access is among topics about which voters often hold strong views. Valuable for the political longevity of elected officials is the ability to assess their voters’ sentiments about issues important to the voters. This research shows how what determines these views might not be what we’d expect and that information about those determinants might be relatively easy to ascertain. These insights provide tools not just for tracking, but also for influencing voters’ views. Regarding opinions of abortion access, initiatives to ease burdens of parenting could have an effect.

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Deep Canvass to Uncoil Voters’ Rigidity 

Verbalize Victimization to Reduce Censorship 

Augment Political Projection with Introjection

Multichannel Middle-Tier Shoppers Moderately

Marketers have launched multiple channels shoppers can use to buy items. Added to brick-and-mortar stores, paper catalogs, and telephone sales have been websites, mobile apps, social media, and online video platforms. Around a decade ago, studies of people’s purchasing habits began questioning a commonsense notion that retailers should always encourage shoppers to make use of as many of those channels as possible.
     Early advice included encouraging shoppers to prioritize coming into the store. It is there shoppers can touch items, and touching an item usually increases the urge to buy the item. In-store shoppers often enter a flow state in which they make impulse purchases. And when in-store, shoppers are less likely than when using other channels to do price comparisons with other retailers.
     Still, each of the other channels does have its advantages and fans. Now researchers at Maastricht University, NHL Stenden University of Applied Science, University of Groningen, and Boston College refine the advice about multichannel marketing. An overall finding is that middle-tier brands generally do benefit from encouraging shoppers to use a range of channels. Low- and high-tier brands experience flat or even negative effects on revenue.
     The researchers distinguished among the three tiers based on the customer’s primary motivation for purchase. With the high-tier, it is to signal status, wealth, and exclusivity. With middle-tier, it’s to attain maximum value for money spent. With low-tier, it’s to have adequate quality for minimum expenditure.
     The researchers’ explanation for the effects of tier is: 

• High-tier brand shoppers are concerned that multichannel availability could dilute the exclusivity of the item. In addition, these shoppers consider how traditional sales channels allow for higher-quality transactions. 
• For low-tier brand shoppers, price is most important, and there seems little advantage to exploring different channels for the same items in order to ascertain price. 
• Middle-tier brand shoppers are seeking the optimal combination of quality, price, and service. Different channels often offer a range of blends of these, so there’s an incentive for making use of multiple channels.

     Long-term brand reputation and how a marketer presents a brand will influence which tier the brand falls into. In addition, reputation of the retailer might exert an influence.
     Another finding from the studies is that moderate levels of multichannel usage generate higher revenues, while low and high levels reduce profitability. Based on this, the researchers caution firms that encouraging high levels of multichannel use will tend to have negative repercussions on revenue.

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Utilize Multichannel with Hedonic Selling 

Swell Inspiration to Hike Multichannel Buying

Starve Gift Horse Feed Fears

A promising intervention for reducing food waste is to encourage people to donate their unused food to others. They could offer it to friends or to food banks.
     However, researchers at Wageningen University & Research, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, and Ghent University find a hesitancy to share food which is otherwise perfect to eat, but blemished, misshapen, in a torn or dented package, or near its expiration date. This hesitation is consistent with the prospective donors’ own turning away from such suboptimal offerings for themselves and is explained as the prospective donors fearing recipients will think ill of them for considering the offerings to be suitable contributions.
     The researchers go on to show how recipients actually respond to suboptimal food more positively than givers predict. After all, the food is free and fine to consume. If the recipient is a friend, there’s a bond of trust that the donor wouldn’t poison them. If the food is delivered through a food bank, the recipient is often hungry enough to relax expectations of perfect food presentation. In such circumstances, people are likely to take to heart and stomach John Heywood’s maxim from the year 1546 about gratitude and derived from checking a steed’s teeth to assess healthiness, “Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.”
     Based on results of their studies, the researchers also suggest two ways to address any hesitation that might remain about giving away suboptimal food: First, when circumstances allow, offer ready-to-eat meals prepared from the donated raw ingredients rather than the raw ingredients themselves. This hides any suboptimality.
     Second, ease concerns about being thought ill of by announcing thankfulness. In the study, participants read about a food bank campaign, “Every donation matters. More appreciated than you think. Food bank recipients value all donations. That ‘not a quite perfect’ donation? It made someone’s day.”
     A complementary intervention to reduce food waste is to persuade shoppers to purchase misshapen produce. Researchers at Dartmouth College, University of Pittsburgh, and The Ohio State University say the rejection has to do with social image and self-image: People tend to subconsciously assume that purchasing ugly produce in public and eating it each indicate a flawed aesthetic sensibility. A remedy is to buttress self-esteem. In the studies, willingness to purchase increased when signage by bins of misshapen items read “You are Fantastic! Pick Ugly Produce!” as compared with just “Pick Ugly Produce!”

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Waste Not with Misshapen Produce 

Abandon Discard of Damaged Packages 

Dread the Dead, Sell It First

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Abstract the Importance of Luxury Buy Source

Where a shopper buys a used luxury brand item influences what impression the shopper will then have of the luxury brand and company.
     Researchers from Liverpool John Moores University, Oxford Brookes University, and Saitama University documented this with scenarios involving purchase of a second-hand Rolex watch. Some study participants were asked to imagine conducting the transaction at a prestigious department store specializing in authentic luxury watches and certified as an official Rolex reseller. For other study participants, the setting was instead described as a generic reseller of pre-owned timepieces, located within a jewelry and pawnbroker store. Compared to those in the first condition, those in the second condition subsequently reported more negative images of the Rolex brand and company.
     Although this finding might be expected and so add little to our understanding of consumer psychology, the researchers’ companion study revealed an insightful explanation with action recommendations for either type of retailer: Shoppers buying at an official luxury retailer are thinking at a more abstract desirability-related hedonic level, while those buying at a generic retailer are thinking at a more concrete feasibility-related utilitarian level. Examples of items on a questionnaire used to assess abstract versus concrete included: “Acquiring a reliable timepiece” versus “Buying a watch from a store”; “Understanding the watch’s quality” versus “Reading the watch’s specifications & features”; and “Maximizing value for my money” versus “Discussing price with the seller.”
     In addition to suggesting the retailer address these distinctions in the framing of the resale transaction, the researchers advise the prestigious certified luxury retailer to use abundant pleasurable adjectives (“This watch is beautiful on you”) and the generic retailer to emphasize practical customer actions (“This watch is ready to wear”).
     For the luxury brand company, an implication is to protect brand image by establishing a process for certifying resellers and then encourage shoppers to purchase from a certified dealer. Certification standards could involve maintaining high-end selling spaces, protecting against carrying counterfeit items, offering brand-underwritten warranties, and providing abundant after-sales customer support.
     An additional angle on the issue of reseller certification is suggested by a set of Yale University studies, which found that lower serial numbers in a limited-edition release of otherwise identical items hold greater value for purchasers. The explanation is that a lower number seems closer to the source. Similarly, the closer association of a certified versus generic reseller places the certified retailer closer to the brand source.

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Close the Sale Close to the Source 

Book Tours of Your Esteemed Merchandise 

Use Loneliness to Sell Used Merchandise

Cultivate Store Prestige with Context

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Buttress Source Memory by Opining

Accurately recalling the source for information they’ve encountered helps our targets of persuasion evaluate the validity of the information. A small survey by researchers at IESE Business School and UCLA supported the value in recognizing this: About 95% of respondents to the survey said they’d sometimes been unable to remember the source of information they’d learned, and among those who reported this had happened, about three out of every four also replied that it had been important to them to be able to remember.
     In their main study, the researchers went on to show how information type makes a difference in source memory accuracy. Specifically, accuracy is higher for opinions than for objective facts. The researchers’ explanation is that an opinion provides additional information about the source, and this fuller profile enhances the mental association between what we’ve learned and from where we learned it.
     There are circumstances in which raw facts are more persuasive than fact-filled stories, However, an implication of the research finding is to provide information to targets of persuasion in the form of opinions based on the facts rather than just raw facts. In this way, the targets will be better able to remember the source and, if they trust the source, to trust the information.
     The researchers note that source memory becomes weaker as we age because of general associative memory deficits. The implication here is that presenting opinions rather than just the facts can be especially useful with the elderly.
     Findings from the University of Lethbridge and University of Alberta indicate that the persuasive impact of an opinion can be further enhanced by infusing a review with swear words. In one of their studies, a product was rated by readers more positively when the review contained a swear word as a qualifier (“the dishwasher is damn quiet”) than when an equivalent genteel word was used (“the dishwasher is super quiet”). Similarly, use of a swear word as a qualifier in a negative review leads to the item being rated more negatively.
     The researchers say that swear words’ effectiveness comes from challenging a taboo. Further, the swear word usage amplifies both the description of item quality (“damn boring” is significantly more boring than “darn boring”) and the feelings of the reviewer (“I found it to be damn boring” is a substantially stronger reaction than “I found it to be darn boring.”) The dual impact multiplies the persuasion power.

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Project Plain Facts About Philanthropy 

Remind Seniors How You Informed Them 

Damn Positive Item Reviews 

Estimate Imprecisely When Harboring Doubts

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Project Plain Facts About Philanthropy

By immersing readers or listeners into characters and plot, a story—even a brief story—is usually more persuasive than just presenting the facts. This is why persuasion agents are advised to weave the facts into a tale for objectives ranging from making a sale to changing a mind.
     Still, storytelling can fall flat or even dissuade if the audience decides they’re being unfairly manipulated. This effect was explored by researchers at University of Mannheim, University of Hamburg, University of Applied Sciences Dortmund, Baruch College, and Ruhr-University of Bochum in the context of a business telling the public about the business’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities.
     Initiatives which go beyond an organization’s legal and regulatory requirements to assist others outside the organization’s ownership qualify as CSR activities. The beneficiary might be a company’s own employees, a local museum, or a nonprofit aiding domestic violence victims, for example. The central recommendation from the researchers’ studies would be to use a story when the beneficiary is the first of those, but not if it’s the second or third.
     The researchers’ explanation springs from a tendency for audiences to be skeptical about a business’s stories regarding CSR activities compared to stories about the business’s products or service. “What are they trying to gain economically by telling me they’re helping others in ways they’re not required to?” readers and listeners ask about the story. They’ll start thinking more about being persuaded than about the content of the story, erasing any advantage of the storytelling or even generating suspicions they’re being tricked by the indirect message and emotional embellishment of a story. This thinking disrupts purchase behavior and customer loyalty.
     The study results indicate this undesired sequence is less likely when the CSR activity is embedded in the business’s core functions—such as maintaining a childcare program for use by employees—than when peripheral to those core functions—such maintaining a school for disadvantaged children in a foreign country.
     Central to the researchers’ recommendations is the degree of trust the story’s audiences place in the business. The safest alternative is to avoid stories when describing CSR activities serving beneficiaries not central to the business’s core functions.
     Another approach is to monitor consumer trust, carefully maintain signals of business authenticity, and use stories about CSR results in those circumstances where trust is high. Remember that we started here describing the persuasive advantages of narrative transportation.

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Found Influence with Founders’ Stories 

Embed Politically Hot Facts in Personal Stories 

Tell Stories for Price Increase Acceptance 

Dedicate Marketing to Dedicated Authenticity

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Insinuate Insults into Influencing

Lots of people must consider the Carolina Hurricanes to be a bunch of jerks. You see, the popular t-shirts read “BUNCH OF JERKS” above the professional ice hockey team’s logo.
     The twist is that those t-shirts and other merchandise bearing the message were marketed by the team itself following the on-air insult from prominent ice hockey commentator Don Cherry. Sales of the merchandise yielded revenue of $875,000, according to the Carolina Hurricanes Chief Marketing Officer.
     Researchers at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, The University of Hong Kong, and Duke University analyzed this effect of a brand turning a profit by reappropriating insults hurled at it. The technique works, the study data indicate, when the usage projects brand confidence and a sense of humor. Consumers find both those attractive in persuasion appeals.
     Success also requires that the insult be perceived by those consumers as unjustified—so not jeopardizing the brand’s claim of confidence; petty—allowing the brand to harmlessly joke about it; and not issued by a vulnerable person—so the reappropriation is not interpreted as bullying.
     When these conditions are met, reappropriating the insult tends to work out better than ignoring the insult, denying the insult, or apologizing to the insulter.
     Perceiving an insult as unjustified and petty may require understanding the broader context. Another example cited by the researchers of insult reappropriation is the posting in a Penzeys Spices store window of a sign reading, “‘Terrible overpriced product’ D. Trump.” The backstory here is that the quoted insult by presidential candidate Donald Trump followed a September 2024 visit by Vice President Kamala Harris to a Pittsburgh outlet of the business owned by Bill Penzey, a vocal critic of Mr. Trump.
     As to the insulter not being viewed by consumers as a vulnerable person, holding political office isn’t always enough. It matters whether what’s being ridiculed is a characteristic of the politician which is in the politician’s control. In one study, French consumers were asked their intention to share a parody which ridiculed a characteristic of French President Emmanuel Macron. The controllable characteristic presented to some of the study participants was Mr. Macron’s arrogance. The uncontrollable trait presented to the other participants was Mr. Macron being married to an older woman. Mr. Macron had been widely derided for both characteristics.
     Participants were more willing to share the parody when the theme was the controllable trait. Mocking an uncontrollable trait aroused discomfort.

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Certify the Value of Certainty in Persuasion 

Joke Around to Facilitate the Sale 

Constrain Politician Parodies to Controllables

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Control Conspiratorial Thinking

Youth is by far the single most influential sociodemographic predictor of conspiracy beliefs.
     This conclusion from a pair of University of Ottawa researchers is based on their meta-analysis of 110 prior studies which measured the statistical relationship between a person’s age and their degree of conspiratorial thinking and then the researchers’ own analysis of this relationship among people living in Australia, Brazil, Canada, Germany, South Africa, and the U.S. This collection of countries represents a range of political and cultural traditions.

     For their inquiries, the researchers defined conspiratorial thinking as efforts to explain causes of important events by placing blame on secret plots orchestrated by powerful actors. This general tendency has driven beliefs such as that climate change is a hoax and that a group of Satan-worshipping elites are running a child sex ring. There are instances when belief in a conspiracy is justified, but when it is not, the corrosive impact of conspiratorial thinking on our political and cultural dialogues begs questions about who succumbs.
     So why does age seem so central to conspiratorial thinking? The study data support three answers in comparing younger to older adults: 

• Young adults are more likely to express their political preferences via social protest, and social protest movements incorporate belief systems which cultivate conspiracies. These include accusations of injustice and suspicion of compromise. 
• Young adults are more likely to have low self-esteem, and adhering to conspiracy beliefs provides feelings of worth and power. 
• Young adults are less likely to believe their interests are supported by political office holders. This is because the office holders are often substantially older than the young adults. One result is distrust of political institutions.

     In reporting their conclusions, the University of Ottawa researchers highlight the limitations of their inquiry. This is a study of correlations, so although we’ve reason to believe that as people age, they become less likely to engage in conspiratorial thinking, we can’t definitively say aging, in itself, causes the decrease. In addition, the studies were cross-sectional, not longitudinal: People of different ages at one point in time were assessed rather than tracking the same people over the years to see what happens to their conspiratorial thinking.
     The questions of causation still beg for answers. Age counts, but the cause is probably a combination of factors. For now, in correcting dangers of conspiratorial thinking, let’s pay particular attention to young adults.

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Pattern Choices for Frightened Shoppers 

Spot Partisan Recall of What Never Happened 

Long for Longitudinal Looks at Seniors 

Enliven Influence by Viewing Life Scripts

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