Has your smartphone ever beeped or vibrated to let you know that something, some piece of information or message, is waiting, just for you? Without even thinking, you read, listen to, or watch, and become completely absorbed in it. How have these pieces gained so much power over our behavior and attention? How do software companies hook us, and what can marketers learn from this phenomenon?
Today’s guest is Nir Eyal, who says today’s smartest companies have melded psychology, business, and technology into habit-forming products. Nir is the best-selling author of Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products. He’s an angel investor and expert in behavioral design. He unveils some psychological principles behind some of today’s biggest, most valuable, and most frightening companies.
Some of the highlights of the show include:
- Skill of the century is the ability to cultivate focus
- Behavioral Design: Products that are most engaging and habit forming were built with consumer psychology in mind
- People use the Hooked model to engage with a product or service
- Step 1: Internal trigger (reason why you use a product - to modulate your mood, to feel something different; products and services cater to emotional discomfort)
- What’s the user’s itch? What’s their pain point that occurs frequently enough to build a habit around?
- Step 2: Action (the simplest behavior done in anticipation of a reward and relief from discomfort; technology shortens the distance between the need and reward)
- Lewin’s Equation: “People act in accordance to their personality and their environment,” which means the easier something is, the more likely people are to do it
- Step 3: Reward Phase (the itch gets scratched, the customer’s need is satiated, and their problems are solved)
- Element of Variability: Something of mystery, something of uncertainty
- Three types of variable rewards are: Rewards of the tribe, rewards of the hunt, and rewards of the self
- If you can form a habit, you can engage people with your brand through a community/content habit, and monetization is the result of engagement
- Step 4: Investment Phase (increases likelihood of the next pass through the hook by loading the next trigger and storing value)
- Content, data, followers, and reputation are ways to get users to invest in your product
- Companies should make a deliberate effort to understand consumers better; what makes people click and tick, so you can build services that they want
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