Here are some examples of marketing messages taking advantage of these dual drivers of human behavior.  Note how much more often pleasure seeking is used than pain avoidance, simply because it’s more effective.

Pain:

• Trying to scare you with what has happened to someone else due to the same negative behavior you’re doing.
• Making you imagine yourself in an awful situation to stop a negative behavior.

Pain or Pleasure:

• Trying to get you to accept their opinion as a belief.

Pleasure:

• Making you laugh, thus trying to transfer that emotion that theirs is a ‘fun’ brand/product.
• Trying to ‘wow’ you with cool imagery, thus trying to link the ‘cool’ factor to their brand/product promise.
• Trying to inspire you, thus trying to link the ‘awesome’ factor to their brand/product promise.
• Using the awww factor—animals and babies (often combined with humor)—thus trying to create the ‘halo’ effect toward their brand/product.
• Then, of course, the always-popular sex sells technique.

The problem is that most of us base our decisions about what to do on what’s going to create pain or pleasure in the short term instead of the long term.  Yet, in order to succeed, most of the things that we value require us to be able to break through the wall of short term pain in order to have long term pleasure.  Remember it’s not actual pain that drives us, but our fear that something will lead to pain.  And it’s not actual pleasure that drives us, but our belief—our sense of certainty—that somehow taking a certain action will lead to pleasure.  We’re not driven by the reality, but by our perception of reality. ~Tony Robbins, Awaken the Giant Within

Although pleasure seeking is the stronger driver of human behavior, pain is our most effective creator of behavioral change when going down the wrong path. I learned recently from Tony Robbins that the best way to create change in yourself when doing something that you know is bad for you in the long term, but pleasurable in the short term, is to create so much pain in your mind around that thing that you have no choice but to make a decision to change.  The only way to do this is to “scratch the record” that goes round and round in your brain by feeding it lots of new, negative information about the long term effects of the pleasurable thing.  The down side, when a marketer tries to use pain to change a pleasurable behavior instead of the individual seeking this out for themselves, is that it’s far too easy to ignore if the person isn’t open to hearing it.

Marketers must know if they are trying to create a short term or long term consumer behavior change.  If trying to create a short term affect—e.g. buy our artery-clogging hamburger today—then marketers shy consumers away from the long term affect of their choice and focus on the pleasure (for those who eat meat) of today.  If creating a long term behavior change—e.g. buy our low-fat sandwiches today—then marketers pin their message on the long term affects of healthy eating habits.  This is why Subway recently surpassed McDonald’s in worldwide store units.  Focusing on long term positive (rather than negative) affects is more effective in capturing long term consumer loyalty; however, there are also plenty of folks who focus on today’s pleasures and don’t want to think about the negative affects of their choices in the future.

On another side of this issue, marketers who claim to focus on positive long term behavior changes—e.g. join our fitness gym today—often woefully focus on their short term goals instead.  As example, I called my local Bally Total Fitness to see how much they charge to join ($66 for 2 months upfront), their monthly fee ($30), for classes ($3 each or included in the monthly fee, depending on the class) and for personal training, which was like pulling teeth to get a straight answer.  The first guy I spoke with about personal training said “about $60 an hour” but he really didn’t know(!) and when I asked to be put through to someone in the personal training area, he hung up on me(!).  I called back, undeterred, and was put through to one of the trainers.  Rob also wouldn’t give me a straight answer. Finally, after much annoying back-and-forth about my fitness goals and experience, he said that when you join you can buy a package of 12 classes for $33 an hour but it goes up after that to “$49 to $99 an hour.”  I asked what criteria made the price $49 or more, and he said it “had to do with your fitness goals” and felt that mine, to tone up, would “put me at the lower end of the scale.” So the message Bally is sending to consumers is if you don’t want to spend a ton of money at their gym than don’t have high fitness goals to achieve.  I would like to see gyms include personal fitness training in their price, realizing that helping people achieve their long term goals and not creating a confusing, sliding scale—that even employees don’t know how to communicate—is not good for business.  It seems to me that Bally is focused on their short term goals of getting a minimum of two months out of people, figuring they’ll quit after that, instead of helping their customers achieve their long term fitness goals and making this financially feasible.

Compare Bally to a gym an acquaintance made me aware of recently, which I’m considering joining…Pop Physique is a dance-oriented woman’s gym, which appeals to me as I’ve always hated the gym but love to dance, and their small class sizes offers what is in essence a personal trainer.  Their pricing structure is straight-forward and on their website: $100 for the first month of unlimited classes and $150 after.  They also offer a single class for $20, and packages of classes that don’t provide much of a price break ($1 to $2 each).  If I want to go at least a couple of times a week the unlimited classes are the cheaper option, which is obviously intended.  Overall, it seems to me they are focused on my goals, to break through the short term pain of exercise for the long term benefits, to have fun and obtain the benefits of personal attention.

In summary, be aware of the power of pain and pleasure principals in your marketing efforts.  If your objectives are to help people achieve long term pleasure, you can address the needs of your customers in overcoming any short term pains.  If your objectives are to give consumers short term pleasures that can lead to long term pains, then you can give them other options also, e.g. smaller portions, healthier alternatives and clearly communicate the unhealthiness of the choice so that it is used infrequently.

Happy ROI hunting!

In summary of the article, an individual in the Avis customer loyalty program (lesson #1) hadn’t used their services in awhile but thought they might again for a personal trip, so they logged into the Avis site (lesson #2) to review their options, only to abandon the effort for another day.  A few days later, the person received a postcard from Avis that said their email bounced (lesson #3) and if they logged back in and updated their email address (lesson #4) they would get a free upgrade (lesson #5).  This multi-channel marketing effort converted the browser into a buyer; not only due to the free upgrade but because they were so impressed with the effort.  And then, they happened to work for marketing news site MediaPost and wrote about their experience (lesson #6).  Lastly, now here I am writing about that person’s experience (lesson #7).

Avis knew that having a clean database of email addresses is the most effective way to market to their lapsed customers, and also that direct mail still has its advantages.  As much of marketing has switched to email, postcards stand out more now.  Avis leveraged a predetermined process where an abandoned transaction triggers the next steps of a reminder email and, if that fails, a postcard to the last known mailing address, both with an offer to close the deal.  All this can not be done, of course, if customers are not first enrolled in a program to identify that person and their activity on the site.  What Avis was unaware of in their establishing this multi-step process is the resulting loyalty it would create, as well as the press they would receive from it.

Other companies would do well to follow Avis’ lead and think through where their customers may abandon a purchase in the buying cycle, what offer could encourage them to follow through, and how exactly to administer that offer.  If there are many reasons and points where an abandoned shopping cart could take place, and if there is no way to, or reasons for, a customer to enroll in a loyalty program, I recommend the company should survey its customers and prospects to map the buying process out and determine the best offer to cinch the deal.  Understanding all the opportunities for customer touches, having multi-step processes in place, and knowing what concessions may be offered to encourage the purchase, is key to success.

Happy ROI hunting!

On a personal note: I’m bacccckkkkk….from my blogging hiatus.  Sometimes one has to turn inward for a bit in order to once again turn outward…a marketing lesson in and of itself!

Why is this important?  Because it’s so expensive to find a new potential customer that it is of value to invest in retargeting that customer who now knows about you.  Of course, the company offers a solution to this problem which is to somehow tag that person and no matter where they go online, they will show your ad to them.  Pretty nifty for a marketer.

As a strategist, I like to see what companies are doing in one area of business and think through how I might apply it to another area of business.  It’s good mind exercise.  I have a friend who is considering taking over a hair salon and running it, so while they could use this for their online marketing, how could this work in a real-life scenario?

Say that she successfully takes control of this business, and decides to throw an “open house” to invite as many people as she can to visit.  Some are current customers, some are their friends, and some are other people that she meets or who see her ad/press release.  She could have a sign-in book which requests name, phone and email.  After the event, she then has to sort through to categorize them as either current or potential clients.  Now, how to retarget?

Some ideas:

• See if they are on LinkedIn, Facebook or Myspace and connect to them, thanking them for attending and offer an incentive to schedule an appointment.  A larger incentive within the next 30 days, a smaller one for the next 60 days, another smaller still for next 90 days.
• If, after 30 days, they do not take her up on the offer remind them again of the smaller incentive for the next 30 days.  Same for 60 days.
• If, after 90 days, she still has not received a response, follow up again with another offer, say  a free haircut if they refer 2 friends who make appointments or a free haircut and color if they refer 5 friends who make appointments.
• Send them an email asking if she can add them to an email update list that shares specials, or possibly an e-newsletter, no more than once a month.
• For those she connects with on social media, she could send them a note saying that she’d like to offer THEIR friends a “2nd degree discount,” meaning that if they forward her offer to all their friends, the friends will will receive a discount on a service within 30, 60 and 90 days plus get a free [trial sized bottle of a hair product or whatever].  They just have to connect with her via one of the social sites (give the profile address) and provide the name of the person referring, which can be verified through their friend listing on their profile, unless they have hidden this view.
• Those new first degree friends can then be provided the same opportunities as the previous.

Of course, it is important for her to track metrics for her business that would be applicable:

• Number of customers who have made second appointments.
• Number of customers who did not make second appointments.
• Number of return conversions (those who did not initially make appointments, but later returned and did).
• Number of customers who have been customers longer than one year.
• Number of customers who have referred someone else.
• Number of customers who purchased hair products but did not make appointments.
• And so on

Does anyone have any other thoughts on how she could “follow” a potential customer around to retarget?

Like a PB&J is not possible without peanut butter, behavioral marketing is not possible without an investment into understanding a company’s customers through segmentation.Segmentation is the foundation of behavioral marketing, but unless you are in the business of market research you may not understand how segments are derived and why the manner in which you derive them is important.

Of course, you can classify using a simple segmentation based on demographics (age, ethnicity, female/male) or by usage (heavy, light), but these rarely yield needed information.  In a true segmentation, people are typically grouped by how alike they are in terms of their behaviors and attitudes towards life or a particular topic.   This type of segmentation analysis is conducted by carefully constructing a questionnaire so that some questions are behavioral in nature and others attitudinal.

Results are then viewed by an experienced researcher, who identifies patterns in the data through the use of “cluster analysis.”  There are  multiple sub-types of cluster analysis (“algorithms”) that can be used to view the data from differing  vantage points, allowing the researcher to see the “stories” in the data.  From there, certain attitudinal questions are identified that yield the strongest differences, which are then used as the basis of behavioral analysis.

The resulting data cuts are then analyzed and clever segment names are created to represent different types of customers who share similar values or lifestyles.  For example, “Facebook Fanatics” or “iPhone Moms.”

Now the trick is…how to translate that customer knowledge into a marketing strategy that captures people’s attention at their interest points – their behaviors and attitudes.

A way that this data can be used is to evaluate which segments are worth pursuing through the creation of indices.  By looking at each group size, their spend levels, and how much the group likes the company/brand, it can be determined, for example, that segments 2, 3 and 5 are best to target.  They are the largest that spend the most and like the company/brand best.  Furthermore, we can look at their wants/needs and what they have in common with each other for marketing messaging.

As an aside, the company that I work with, C.A. Walker Research Solutions, regularly conducts segmentations for its clients, if you need assistance in this area.