I have long thought that my home computer is lying to me. Whenever I'm installing some new piece of software or whatever, I get that progress bar that kindly lets me know how far the installation has progressed. Well, it zooms along to the point where I'm ever so close to my goal of getting the thing installed...and then it freezes for five minutes. I'm so close that I stick it out, willing it with my mind (and shouts) to get to the end. And I curse it for the fact that it lied to me about all that initial fast progress it made. It was never anywhere near that far advanced, it just wanted me to think it was.
Well, perhaps the guys at Microsoft are just very smart when it comes to their knowledge of human psychology. Perhaps they are invoking the Goal Gradient Hypothesis, something that I caught sight of earlier this week. We've been talking recently about Behavioural Economics and what implications this field might have for communications, and here is another interesting feature of human nature for us to consider.
The basic idea is that the closer we get to our goal, the more effort we expend in reaching it. There's an acceleration of effort as the goal gets closer. The research into this started with rats approaching a food source - they ran faster as they got closer to the food. More recent research has extended the experimental evidence to humans, showing that we too exhibit this response.
All very interesting, but the most important finding within this for us is that the important factor is not absolute distance to the goal, but psychological distance. In other words, how far we perceive we remain from our goal compared to our perceived length of the total journey. How far we believe we've come and how far we believe we have to go. And this is something that is not absolute, but is variable and manipulable.
The academic study demonstrates this within the area of reward programmes, but there seems little reason to believe that the effect doesn't hold within other goal-related processes we engage with, for example a purchase pathway. And here things get interesting. How can communications work to 'frame' consumer progress along the path to purchase? Can communications affect the perceived distance to the consumer's goal, either the distance left to go, the distance so far travelled, or (probably most effectively) both?
This could affect a consumer's level of effort in completing their purchase, or their commitment to completing their purchase goal with a particular brand. This last point is particularly appealing. We've talked about how consumers remember little about a purchase pathway, but focus on the emotional highs and lows, which could perhaps be 'owned' by a brand to gain prominence where choice is wide. Perhaps the same idea holds here. Could a brand take ownership of this increased commitment and heightened effort in consumers, and thereby win the battle to be the goal of choice? Couple this with communications that provide reasons to support their choice after the fact, bringing the psychological effects of goal modification into play, and we have a potentially very powerful approach.
The research also indicates that people 'reset' to their original level of effort once the goal is reached (and they start on the path to the next goal). The authors point out that this has implications for repeat purchase and reducing churn - perhaps motivating consumers immediately after the goal is reached the first time, can keep their level of effort high.
All good stuff for us to add to our developing understanding in this field, and find occasions to apply in our thinking around consumers and brands.
-- Alex
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