The Power of Free
Anything we get for free is hugely motivating and attractive.
What is the Power of Free?
The Power of Free is a psychological quirk in human behavior where individuals exhibit a strong inclination towards items that are offered at no cost, despite minimal price differences compared to other options available for purchase.
The evidence it works
In his quest to understand the phenomenon of how individuals perceive value concerning complimentary items, Dan Ariely crafted a straightforward test.
The initial phase presented participants with a selection between two chocolates: a familiar and economical Hershey’s Kiss priced at a mere cent, and a luxurious Swiss Lindt chocolate truffle valued at 14 cents.
Surprisingly, approximately 75% of the participants opted for the sophisticated truffle.
At the next stage, both prices saw a reduction of one cent. This resulted in the Lindt being priced at 13 cents and the Hershey’s offered for free.
The outcome shifted significantly: over 66% of individuals favoured the free Hershey’s over the more premium Lindt.
How it builds brand memorability
One of the key drivers of brand memorability is ‘Ease’.
If you make your brand easy to access, deal with and buy from, you’re going to build strong, positive connections that lead to memorability.
At the point of purchase, or during the journey to purchase, customer’s decision-making can be made easier by leveraging behavioural biases. And METRIC is our tool for harnessing the power of these biases - snap judgements that help the brain make quick decisions in context - for clients.
METRIC organises the biases into six categories - because these are the key ‘resources’ we always have to spend when make decisions. They are Money, Effort, Time, Risk, Individuality, and Conscious thought. Which handily spells METRIC.
So presenting choices in one of these six frames can tip the balance in comms.