Influencing Buyers and User Reviews

An essay I wrote almost two years ago, truer today.

I published this on Flote on January 14th, 2021, before the mRNA vaccines were in widespread circulation. We can look back on so many things during the entire Covid scandal that lasted as long as they did because of this same psychology described and notice how they played out in hindsight.

Many ask, “why?”

“Why were people so inclined to take an experimental medication, to wear a mask, to enlist their children?”

It’s harder to understand now in light of the failure of the product what everyone was so excited about when its effectiveness was sight unseen to begin with. Was it just the false promises of efficacy? I think this essay illustrates it was so much more.

Furthermore, regardless of what people say about how they feel lied to about the alleged 95% efficacy, the real reasons most humans bought into the vaccines had little to nothing to do with their suggested efficacy. That was just a defense. They were psychologically more swayed by all these other somewhat subliminal marketing strategies. It is almost always a sense of meaninglessness in a consumerist world that drives purchases. Particularly, those most susceptible to cult tactics, those who had the lowest sense of self-worth and purpose were consumed with an insatiable desire to be injected with an experimental biotoxin to improve their significance.

Below is this little essay I wrote on marketing gimmicks we see all the time that often go unnoticed. Perhaps, it can serve as a consideration for your own future investments: financial, physical, mental or emotional.

One way to get people who are hesitant to buy something to change their mind is to manufacture a sense of scarcity around it. So obviously, having a waiting list you have to be on to get the item, even if society might be generally uneasy or skeptical about it, will create a mystique of standing in line to buy something with other excited customers. The people who camp out for the latest tech gadget or science fiction films may relate to this experience. It generates anticipation, excitement and an idea that merely having the item in your possession (regardless of how good it is) will be the reward for your energy invested in waiting for it.

Tesla Motors proved this beyond a shadow of a doubt when they revealed their Cybertruck. It was a vehicle which proved itself a complete failure for every one of its promised targets. Musk literally face palmed his creation from the unveiling and uttered the “fuck” heard round the world. Yet, because of its alleged scarcity and the excitement of the mere possibility of it improving, people fell for it anyway. This was based solely on the reputation of past Tesla successes and the CEO, Elon Musk being propped up somewhat artificially as a pop culture icon and a genius in fields of science. Despite a massive failure, millions got on the list to preorder it and be the first to have it. What’s more? The buyers were going against what every shred of evidence told them about the actual quality of the product.

These investors who pre-ordered a Cybertruck were also up against what society saw. Their entire decision to stay sold on this truck was based only on the faith that this product would measure up to the company’s first and only, one-off product, enhanced year-after-year with no more than aesthetic embellishments. For these people to admit they made a mistake after their Cybertruck is finally delivered to them (if it ever fucking is), admitting the truck is a failure, would by this point, also be admitting they are a failure and worse, a fool! If that truck made NO improvements from the embarrassing day it rolled out all jenky and failing every possible target, the company would have already sold millions before anyone dared to beat it with a bat to find out if their money was wasted. What motivation would there be to further devalue (through damage for which they’d be personally liable) their already ugly truck which they invested months waiting for and tens of thousands of dollars on?

Most would never test it out for fear of being wrong. It’s kind of like that saying, “it’s better to keep quiet and have people assume you are ignorant than to open your mouth and prove it to them.” In this case, they’ll just drive the truck with the hope it lived up to all of its promises before the keys were handed to them. They can go around boasting that it’s indestructible and how safe they feel in it without ever knowing if it really is. It’ll look stunning in motor trend. But what happens when the first bird smacks the windshield, when a pebble flies off the tire of a semi on the highway and cracks that indestructible force field? I foresee a long, slow process of grief starting with uniform denial, etc before acceptance comes to pass.

So if it’s a new iphone, a playstation or a new medical treatment, having a waiting list will be equally effective at shifting perception and demand for any product as well as improving user reviews.

The next way to influence consumers is to add a specific criteria to qualify for the opportunity to stand in line. It must feel personal, wherein someone fits a particular standard even if it’s actually quite broad and inconspicuously, all-inclusive. This manufactures a sense of deservingness. When getting selected out of perhaps billions of people to stand in that line or get on that waiting list, the buyer feels special for having been selected, being eligible to be the first to have something. Suddenly, the opportunity to buy something equates to a sort of air of importance. The potential buyer identifies himself as exclusive and as such, couldn’t have a negative take on the product, a product which hardly matters anymore at a certain point. Not only would this “specialness” decimate the likelihood of a negative review, but should anyone else hint at a negative review, all current and potential buyers eligible to be on that list or to wait in that line will take the negative review as a personal attack. A negative reviewer threatens the collective feeling of superiority. In the end, no one wants to say anything and be attacked defensively by people feeling personally threatened.

All of these marketing gimmicks and schemes reduce the likelihood of buyer’s remorse or negative reviews. Once an identity has formed around being a worthy recipient of said item and being a special honoree in your investment therein, admitting the product fell below one’s expectations reflects on you, how worthy you are of being a “chosen one” diminishes. You stand to lose everything you started to feel about yourself in light of making the purchase.

Last, if you add a component in the marketing which makes the purchase a sign of the buyer’s virtue it will decrease the chance of the buyer admitting product defects. If all of society believes the product will save the world, you dissing the product makes you the enemy of saving the world. Using Tesla vehicles as the example again, there is a reputation associated with the drivers of electric vehicles saving the world from climate change. With all the identity of being a savior of the world for buying the product (and aforementioned reasons) having the courage to defy the popular belief and admit buyer’s remorse, would bring you a heretical level of scorn and hatred by a religious following literally more popular than God’s.

All of this is to say, when you create a “Golden Ticket” mystique around a product or purchase process, the power of it has a star magnitude density of its own that drives people far beyond the mere sense of desire for the meager product.

Stay awake, stay aware, stay sovereign!