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RSSThat's according to researchers at the University of Iowa, who recently announced new research suggesting that people who have only a little information about a product are happier with that product than people who have more information. They dubbed this counterintuitive notion the Blissful Ignorance Effect.
Dhananjay Nayakankuppam, a UI marketing professor, said: "We found that once people commit to buying or consuming something, there's a kind of wishful thinking that happens and they want to like what they've bought."
He added: "The less you know about a product, the easier it is to engage in wishful thinking. But the more information you have, the harder it is to kid yourself. This can be contrasted with what happens before taking any action when people are trying to be accurate and would prefer getting more information to less."
Nayakankuppam said that the Blissful Ignorance Effect demonstrates that people have a need to be happy with their choice, and will often engage in whatever distortion is needed to justify the purchase. That means playing up the positive aspects while downplaying the negatives. While people have a need to be accurate before taking some action, post-action it is the directional need to justify a conclusion that is more important.
There are some key implications when applying this insight from the theoretical garden of academia to the pragmatic streets of marketing.
First, it further underscores the emotional attachment people have with brands -- especially after a purchase. Purchasing a product is an implicit definition and expression of who you are. When a prospect becomes a customer, don't take it for granted. The stakes are higher and emotional involvement can lead to more significant impact when you perform well or poorly in fulfilling brand expectations. If customers have such an enormous need to be happy with their choice -- enough to engage in wishful thinking -- consider how much happier and loyal you could make them simply by delivering on your promise. Imagine if you occasionally delivered unexpected delight.
Second, Nayakankuppam suggests that less information enables wishful thinking and justification about a possibly bad or uninformed product decision. I accept that, but we should consider additional explanations in how information presence can affect product satisfaction post purchase. For example, we all know -- as humans -- that rational information can prevent imaginative or sensory experiences from coming through. If your product is heavily contingent on senses or imagination, then more information could dilute impact.
Finally, the insight that more information often leads to lower levels of post-purchase happiness underscores the merits of simplicity. Practical experience suggests that more, inefficient or excessive information surrounding a product - or information that's embedded in a product - can create damaging complexity. While more information may aid some rational purchase decisions, resulting complexity after a purchase can distract from a brand's core expectations. It can even erode utility by creating cognitive paralysis. To be sure, our interactive marketing industry is suffering from this.
As for business application, Blissful Ignorance would be dangerous as a sole marketing strategy, especially if your goal was to blatantly promote customer ignorance. However, it is an incredibly useful concept in understanding how information presence influences customer reasoning, satisfaction and loyalty.
RSS FEEDS
Considering it's not uncommon for categories to have dozens of options I'd suggest that four reviews isn't much in the way of an information search. It seems to me that this is entirely consistent with the University of Iowa study.
I'd question one of Max's comments from his final paragraph: "As for business application, Blissful Ignorance would be dangerous as a sole marketing strategy, especially if your goal was to blatantly promote customer ignorance."
That would be a spectacular blunder. To say that consumers don't want *too much* information is not the same as saying they don't want *any* information. The questions to be addressed are "how much?", and "how do I make my brand part of the search?".
My takeaway from the University of Iowa study is that this bolsters Bazaarvoice's findings that reviews tend to be very positive, with an average rating of 4.3 out of 5. http://www.bazaarvoice.com/pressrelease.php?id=18
I'll advise my clients to ensure that there are reviews so that their consumers can validate their own choice and provide the positive feedback that other potential customers want before making their own decision.
Schwartz illustrates that when fewer options are presented, a person is able to make decisions easier and faster. His research shows that in many cases when a consumer is given too many choices, they end up making no decision/purchase. This research was one of the factors we evaluated before launching 3LUXE.com in June.
At 3LUXE we recognized that consumers have more purchase options, more research sources and less time than ever before. To give consumers a means for rapid due diligence, we research thousands of products in hundreds of categories, but only post the best three options available in each category. We find these products through a combination of online and offline research. Essentially, we do the research people would do if they had more time. The end result, informed consumers that are happy with their decision, without being blissfully ignorant.
People want to feel good about making the choice to do business with you, which is why, if you can get them to purchase a low-price point product or service, you can almost always get them to purchase a larger ticket item from you in the future. They want to feel good and justify their initial decision to do business with you and they do that by making a second purchase.
Highly interesting...
-Lena