Changing
Consumer Behaviour to suit your business By Vivek Banerji, Helen Donald and Jenny Hall
Incite | Changing Consumer Behaviour
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Foreword: The relevance of behaviour change for business
1.0 Getting started with behaviour change
Behaviour change is happening all around us; from user-friendly smart phones replacing ‘clunky’ business phones, to coffee brands reframing quick refreshment into a rich, physical experience in dedicated shops.
When faced with a variety of behavioural sciences like social cognition, psychology, and neuroscience it is easy to become overwhelmed. There is a plethora of facts, figures, case studies, jargon and theoretical frameworks which make it difficult to know where to begin, or how to customise the principles to real-life situations.
Behaviour change is inherently linked with material progress and innovation – but what happens when people behave in ways that are inconsistent with your business objectives? How do you proactively initiate change? Put yourself in the shoes of a mobile phone manufacturer losing customers to a new iPhone – could you entice them to switch back, boosting sales and brand image in the process? Alternatively, imagine a pharmaceutical company looking to influence patients; how easy is it to have people adhering to treatment regimens? This will lead to better health outcomes, increased sales and less wastage, but how exactly is this executed? It quickly becomes apparent that encouraging people to behave in a way that’s conducive to a business’s objectives is a complex task that should not be underestimated. A preliminary scan of behavioural economic principles reveals how people are naturally wired to resist change and less willing to give up something in order to gain a benefit through a new behaviour. In general, they like maintaining the status quo and avoiding perceived ‘loss’. However, there is huge opportunity to unlock growth potential by creating a successful behaviour change programme. Brands just need to adopt the right approach to tackling this. The following report acts as a guide to help navigate the behaviour change journey, and explores the necessary components which will help companies understand and realise the business benefits of a well-executed programme.
Incite | Changing Consumer Behaviour
Before attempting to get to the ‘nitty gritty’ of behavioural science, it is essential to contemplate the answers to three straightforward questions:
1.1. What behaviour are you trying to change? On the face of it, this seems a simple question. But consider how often consumer research briefs contain non-specific objectives such as ‘driving growth’ or ‘exploring attitudes’. What we need to see is definitive focus such as ‘getting consumer A to use product B on occasion X’. The first question therefore involves applying a behavioural lens to our problem; what is it we want consumers to do? Thinking about what consumers need to do in order for our objective to happen will ensure the big questions that underpin your insights clearly focus around this.
1.2. How are consumers behaving (and why)? The market research industry excels at telling us how consumers are behaving, but where the industry sometimes falls down is explaining why consumers are behaving in this way. This is critical if we are to understand which levers to apply to change behaviour. Disciplines such as behavioural economics help us to codify and understand behaviours that may seem irrational, but the key to success here is asking the right questions to arrive at a deeper level of behavioural interpretation.
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1.3. What creates the change? Finally, it is critical to identify the behavioural interventions that are most likely to result in change. It is not enough to merely recognise the barriers to change; we need to reach the next level of insight in order to overcome these barriers to then create the change. Considering these three questions provides an ideal start point, and ultimately equips us for the next step which is to develop the change programme itself.
2.0 Designing the change programme – a seven step approach Contrary to the complex nature of behaviour change for business, consumers seem to possess the ability to make it look simple. Nicotine addiction and compulsive eating are well known examples of people giving up behaviours – something marketers can learn from in order to create a systematic programme for change, rather than relying on chance. Extensive knowledge on the change process is available from both academic disciplines and real world experience and these can be extremely useful to commercial marketers. Synthesising these lessons and adopting a pragmatic approach will help execute a change programme successfully.
2.1. Map the route – change is a journey Many programmes fail because they do not take into account that behaviour change is a journey, not an overnight process. A classic mistake is not realising how important it is to create the desire to change. For example, before deodorants were widely used, the greatest barrier was not the absence of a good deodorant, but that people had no desire to use one and did not feel the need. Successful marketing involved activating that latent need for personal hygiene as a first step before the usage of the category became broadly prevalent.
Incite | Changing Consumer Behaviour
2.2. Inspire the journey – use ‘moments of truth’ There are distinct events that might initiate people into the change journey, and some of these moments are life-stage based. Take pregnancy for example, which brings about many changes in a woman’s life. A smoking cessation campaign targeted at pregnant women is likely to be more successful because of a greater receptivity to becoming healthy. Alternatively, such moments may occur more serendipitously. Catching a glimpse of the attractive user interface and design of a tablet computer could be enough to tempt someone to switch from their current laptop, or coming across a blog on the value of eco-tourism may influence future holiday plans are less-contrived ‘moments of truth’. Marketers can either target the natural occurrence of events like pregnancy, or they can create inspiring ‘moments of truth’ through different levers such as advertising, social media, and the retail environment to incite behaviour change.
2.3. Focus on what really works Many factors involve influencing people to move across the behaviour change journey, but there are four which marketers must pay specific attention to: Benefit of change: The new behaviour must offer a distinct advantage over the old behaviour. In social marketing situations, the benefit is often obvious, like weight loss to become healthier. But commercial marketers must work harder to establish why using their products would enhance the consumers’ lives as the benefits may seem less consequential to consumers. Mitigation of losses: Consumers do not want to give up their old behaviour because of the fear of loss. For instance, influencing Apple users to switch to an alternative brand might experience a lot of resistance from consumers concerned about losing all their music and videos on a new system. Self-efficacy: Consumers need to be confident that they have the skills to make the change. For instance, a barrier to switch to a new operating system may be the effort required to learn an entirely new system.
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Social norms: People are affected by what they think other people do. The likelihood of someone adopting a new behaviour increases significantly when the social norm is in favour of that behaviour. Conversely, it is very difficult to initiate a new behaviour against the prevailing social norm.
2.4. Acknowledge emotions Human beings are not rational in their evaluation of alternative behaviours and Behavioural Economics has made a huge contribution by shedding light on this. Acknowledging that these irrational quirks influence the way in which people respond to change is crucial. It is important to note, however, that these emotional biases not only present obstacles to change, they can also be used to encourage it.
The emotional biases of the irrational consumer Loss aversions reign supreme Behavioural Economics tells us that people strongly prefer avoiding losses to acquiring gains and this fear of loss can form a key barrier to behaviour change. A prime example of loss aversion is a reluctance to switch mobile phone model for fear of the known functionality the consumer might lose in the process (even when the new model may provide significant benefits such as faster processing, lower cost, more apps, etc.).
No trigger, no hope Another common trait of human behaviour is the tendency to stick to what is known and what is easy, even when the change is something that is desired. In the absence of a strong trigger to change, people will undertake default behaviours. To counter-balance this tendency each stage of the behaviour change journey must be made as easy as possible for the consumer to complete, with triggers communicated throughout.
Peer pressure Human beings are often affected by what others do and it is important to understand the social context of any behaviour change journey. The media and legislation may also play a role here with people often forming views of what is ‘acceptable’ based on what they read, are told or are made to do.
Short-term fix over long-term gain The choices we make are often influenced by our preference for instant gratification and default to options where ‘the prize is in sight’, valuing short-term benefits over long term gains.
Incite | Changing Consumer Behaviour
People attempting to give up smoking, for instance, may value the short term ‘benefits’ of satisfying a craving vs. the longer term health benefits, which ultimately can lead to relapse.
Cueing up change The choices we make can be deeply affected by the way that they are shown to us and it is possible to change behaviours by modifying the manner in which they are presented. The influence of framing should be taken into consideration when seeking to change behaviours, and we need to understand the best way to present the choices to our target group for maximum effect.
Blowing hot and cold As a general rule, people act very differently when they are ‘in the moment’ and the same is true for people moving along the change journey. A decision to cut down on caffeine, for instance, may be curtailed by the mere whiff of freshly ground coffee. This facet raises an interesting challenge for practitioners trying to influence change: how exactly do we ensure we retain a level of momentum when the state of mind varies wildly throughout the process?
Mental accounting The tendency to artificially separate money into different accounts based on the source of the money or the intention that the person has for the money is referred to as ‘mental accounting’. Whilst a fashion fan, for instance, may not bat an eyelid at spending £100 on a t-shirt, they may be loathe to part with £3 for a parking ticket.
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2.5. Keep people on course by enabling practice
3.0 Measure behaviour, change success
From learning theory to hobbies, practising is vital to learning a new behaviour and preventing relapse. Enabling people to practice the behaviour and providing support to help them carries significant influence in reinforcing the change. This may for example, translate into clear actions once a consumer considers a new behaviour when buying a new product. At this stage it is helpful to facilitate frequent product experiences in-store and provide proactive support provided by trained personnel.
After all the rigour and planning that goes into a behaviour change programme, it’s tempting to assume that the hard work is complete, allowing you to simply sit back and watch the interventions take effect. Unlike conventional research, once the programme is launched to consumers, rather than ending, the behaviour change journey moves to a new stage of engagement and response where further planning will be needed.
2.6. Customise the programme Segmenting consumers based on their barriers and drivers for change is crucial to a behaviour change programme. Consider the behaviour change challenge of switching a Mac user to a PC user. For a certain segment, the barrier might be a very emotional one, with the users identifying strongly with the brand. Yet, for another segment the barrier might be the perceived user-friendly design, meaning the interventions required for the two segments would be completely different.
2.7. Implement for impact – use a portfolio of actions Finally, behaviour change programmes need to include a variety of actions – communication, empowerment, diffusion, rewards, disincentives and environment design. Programmes focused on a single lens, for instance on communication are less likely to succeed. Integrating multiple elements into a single campaign enables a much greater chance of success.
One of the central tenets of behaviour change is that it’s impossible to predict human behaviour. While a behaviour change programme brings us closer to devising interventions which prompt change, this simply cannot be 100% guaranteed. It is crucial to continue to push for deeper direction after the initial intervention and a test and learn approach is the only way to accurately measure progress.
Test and learn Behavioural Economists are strong proponents of this measurement technique which involves piloting an intervention amongst a small group of target consumers to measure its efficacy. A prominent example is the Government’s controversial ‘nudge unit’, who recently undertook a pilot study in partnership with Jobcentre Plus with the aim of getting people back to work. This involved six randomised, controlled trials the results of which were very promising; job seekers in the treatment group emerged as 15-20% more likely than those in the control group to be off benefits 13 weeks after signing on. As a result of this apparent success, the interventions are now being rolled out across the region. Whilst this pilot scheme is a great example of how well-planned interventions can deliver real results, it can be argued that ‘testing and learning’ approach still needs to broadened in order to truly demonstrate the worth of a particular intervention.
Incite | Changing Consumer Behaviour
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Broaden the search Measurement initiatives should not simply record the success of the intervention in promoting the desired end behaviour, and merely conclude that ‘xx% of people began to demonstrate the desired behaviour’. These initiatives should also take into account how successful interventions have been in prompting behaviours along the change journey. Take the change from ‘consideration’ to ‘intention’ for example – an intervention able to overcome intermediate barriers which lead to a desired behaviour is arguably just as valuable as an intervention that leads to the behaviour itself. This is especially poignant if the majority are stuck at the initial ‘consideration’ stage. Exercise routines are a ubiquitous example of this. Whilst the end goal for many may be to go running three times a week, the interventions employed to reach this point will not necessarily impact directly on this behaviour – but they will contribute towards this final outcome. By purchasing running shoes it enables people to go running, which ultimately sets an incentive to exercise that moves from the ‘consideration’ to ‘intent’ stage.
Dig deep While measuring the success of each intervention across a broad number of factors is essential, the evaluation needs to go beyond basic quantitative measures. If we only track success in hard figures, we lose the opportunity to understand why particular interventions are working – or, more importantly – missing the mark. This is where testing the biases and heuristics expected from consumers facing intervention comes into play. It is also important to ensure that interventions, while having a positive impact on behaviour, do not have a negative impact on the consumers’ emotional wellbeing. The best way of doing this is through techniques such as observation, immersion and in-depth questioning, all of which go beyond the behaviours displayed to get to the heart of the emotional and less-rational motivators behind these behaviours.
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Incite | Changing Consumer Behaviour
4.0 Conclusion There is huge opportunity to unlock commercial growth potential by creating a successful behaviour change programme, if companies can adopt the right approach. However, encouraging people to behave in a way that’s conducive to a business’s objectives is not to be underestimated. Consumers are programmed to resist change and a multitude of emotional biases present a huge challenge to marketers trying to alter behaviour. But while there is an undoubted tendency to maintain the status quo, approaching behaviour change in a strategic, end-toend manner will ensure that these barriers can be overcome. It is essential to test for interventions resulting in the desired behaviours through pilot schemes before investing significantly and rolling them out. Ensuring that the pilot scheme’s define success, not just in terms of superficial quantitative measures, but also through deeper, emotional diagnostics is also vital to the overall behaviour change programme.
Meet Incite’s Behaviour Change team
Vivek Banerji Director
Jenny Hall Associate
Helen Donald Associate
A St Ives Group company 06