Consumer Psychology Marketing

An informative and entertaining account of how actions send signals that shape behaviors and how to design better incentives for better results in our life, our work, and our world.

Customers everywhere describe their interactions with companies in a deeply personal way: We hate our banks, love our smartphones, and think the cable company is out to get us. What is actually going through our brains when we make these judgments? Customer loyalty expert Chris Malone and top social psychologist Susan Fiske have discovered that our perceptions arise from spontaneous judgments on warmth and competence, the same two factors that also determine our impressions of people.

“Scale” has become a favored buzzword in the startup world. But scale isn't just about accumulating more users or capturing more market share. It's about whether an idea that takes hold in a small group can do the same in a much larger one. Translating an idea into widespread impact, says University of Chicago economist John A. List, depends on one thing only: whether it can achieve “high voltage”—the ability to be replicated at scale. In The Voltage Effect, List explains that scalable ideas share a common set of attributes, while any number of attributes can doom an unscalable idea.

Why are people named Kim, Kelly, and Ken more likely to donate to Hurricane Katrina victims than to Hurricane Rita victims? Are you really more likely to solve puzzles if you watch a light bulb illuminate? How did installing blue lights along a Japanese railway line halt rising crime and suicide rates? Can decorating your walls with the right artwork make you more honest? The human brain is fantastically complex, having engineered space travel and liberated nuclear energy, so it's no wonder that we resist the idea that we're deeply influenced by our surroundings.

We live in an age of addiction, from compulsive gaming and shopping to binge eating and opioid abuse. Sugar can be as habit-forming as cocaine, researchers tell us, and social media apps are hooking our kids. But what can we do to resist temptations that insidiously and deliberately rewire our brains? Nothing, David Courtwright says, unless we understand the history and character of the global enterprises that create and cater to our bad habits.

The biggest, most successful businesses you can think of all started small and grew their way to massive success. What was their secret? Is there something those companies have in common - from Microsoft to McDonald's to U.S. Steel - that helped them grow from small businesses to globe-spanning corporations?The answer is "yes," and it's right here.

If you want to succeed in life or career; regardless of your industry, profession (not just marketing or sales profession), location, age, gender, or any other aspect, you need to become more persuasive, you need to influence people. You cannot do it all on your own - you need people to leverage your efforts and get results faster. Persuasion is not merely for marketing and sales people - it’s the basic life skill that every human being needs to sell their view point, ideas, and get people along - everyone is into salesmanship.

Marketing data isn’t a spreadsheet problem. It’s a people problem. In Data Lemonade, digital marketing strategist Malene Jorgensen shows you how to squeeze powerful insights from messy, overwhelming data and turn them into marketing that actually connectsThis isn’t just another analytics book. It’s a guide to making sense of data through the lens of psychology, behaviour, and decision-making. You’ll learn how to go beyond dashboards and dig into the human truths behind your marketing numbers so you can stop guessing and start scaling.

Every day, we make decisions on topics ranging from personal investments to schools for our children to the meals we eat to the causes we champion. Unfortunately, we often choose poorly. The reason, the authors explain, is that, being human, we are all susceptible to various biases that can lead us to blunder. Our mistakes can make us poor and unhealthy. We often make bad decisions about education, personal finance, health care, family, and the environment.

Ever notice that all watch ads show 10:10 as the time? Or that all fast-food restaurants use red or yellow in their logos? Or that certain stores are always having a sale? You may not be aware of these details, yet they’ve been influencing you all along. Every time you purchase, swipe, or click, marketers are able to more accurately predict your behavior. These days, brands know more about you than you know about yourself. Blindsight is here to change that.

Persuasion is a technique that you use on a daily basis, but how persuasive are you? Are you getting what you are seeking when attempting to persuade others? If not, it is time to start working on your ability to persuade. It is often thought that persuasion, and the techniques that fall under it, is only used for selfish reasons, but this is not true. In fact, being good at persuasion is needed to get ahead at work, form friendships, and even when interacting with strangers.

A revelatory guide on how to build, sustain and grow a brand. A brand is either beloved, or it’s noise. We live in a fast-paced world of immediate gratification where consumers can listen to any song, watch any movie, or read any article, with the touch of a few buttons. They are peppered...

We live in an era of tribalism, polarization, and intense social division - separating people along lines of religion, political conviction, race, ethnicity, and sometimes gender. How did this happen? In Conformity, Cass R. Sunstein argues that the key to making sense of living in this fractured world lies in understanding the idea of conformity - what it is and how it works - as well as the countervailing force of dissent.

The Art of Manipulation offers you a framework to master powerful and practical ways to influence and control people’s behavior, negotiate better, make your pitch, and manipulate others to get what you want. The Art of Manipulation will reshape the way you think about influencing people and getting what you want. You will get tools and effective strategies - not mere theories, but real practical strategies and how-to’s to start transforming your thinking and behavior, influencing people, and thus, get desired results faster.

Do you want to know exactly how to get the upper hand in conversations, debates, and negotiations? Do you desire the ability to persuade individuals as well as audiences? Persuasion is one of the most important skills to acquire and it is all around us. You are affected by it every day. Simple choices like the colors of a company logo influence the way you think. You may already practice persuasion without even realizing it.

Why do three out of four professional football players go bankrupt? How can illiterate jungle dwellers pass a test that tricks Harvard philosophers? And why do billionaires work so hard - only to give their hard-earned money away? When it comes to making decisions, the classic view is that humans are eminently rational. But growing evidence suggests instead that our choices are often irrational, biased, and occasionally even moronic. Which view is right - or is there another possibility?

Online shopping continues to grow at an astounding rate. In 2012 more than $1 trillion were spent in online retailers alone. The nature of shopping is drastically changing - but with so little information on how best to interact with online customers, how are businesses to succeed?

Every business knows that the best customer is a happy customer. They return again and again, bring their friends, and deliver tons of free advertising via word of mouth and social media. But in order to grow that loyal base, you must be aware of your customers’ needs. Drawing on the latest research in the exploding field of positive psychology, Columbia Business School marketing professor Bernd Schmitt offers three unique approaches any business can use to turn a casual customer into a committed fan.

In this endlessly fascinating book, New Yorker columnist James Surowiecki explores a deceptively simple idea that has profound implications: large groups of people are smarter than an elite few, no matter how brilliant. Groups are better at solving problems, fostering innovation, coming to wise decisions, even predicting the future.

From bargains in the Big Apple to the bustling bazaars of Istanbul, from in-store to interactive and online to mobile, neuromarketing pioneer Dr. David Lewis goes behind the scenes of the "persuasion industry" to reveal the powerful tools, techniques, technologies, and psychologies seeking to stimulate us all to buy more - often without us consciously realizing it.