CXL Digital Psychology And Persuasion Minidegree Review Part 3
Here’s the 3rd part of my 12 weeks’ review for CXL’s Digital Psychology and Persuasion Minidegree. Today in this medium post, I will be covering the course Learning and Memory from Track 1 Psychology Foundations followed by Intro to Neuromarketing from the 2nd track Neuromarketing & Persuasion Models.
Joining the minidegree back was Peep Laja in Learning and Memory. This short course that consists of psychology of learning and psychology of memory aim to equip the course learners with a better understanding of how our brain will process any new information and how the memory related to it is formed and stored.
Psychology of Learning
In this course, I was introduced to three unique learning process which can be applied to online persuasion and marketing. The three unique processes are,
· Classical Conditioning
· Operant Conditioning
· Observational Learning
Classical Conditioning
Classical Conditioning
This process can be best described by Pavlov’s classic experiment. The experiment involves Pavlov ringing a bell before feeding his dogs. Here we can consider the smell of the food as a natural stimulus for the dogs; while the ringing of the bell is a neutral stimulus paired with the natural stimulation.
With continuous training, the dogs began to drool (a conditioned response) upon hearing just the bell sound without the presence of the conditioned response’s natural stimulus -the smell of food.
Hence, it can be concluded classical conditional is an association of natural response evoking stimulus with a neutral stimulus to evoke a conditioned response.
Operant Conditioning
Familiar with teachers and parents, this process will try to change behavior by using positive or negative enforcement. An individual subjected to this kind of conditioning will relate a particular consequence as a result of a particular behavior. To put it simply, the behaviorist B. F. Skinner who coined the term ‘operant conditioning’ states that instead of trying to understand the motivation and thoughts behind a particular behavior we should focus on the noticeable external reasons behind the behavior.
A prime example of the application of this particular learning process in marketing would-be Tinder. Swipe right you can get yourself matched with another person who liked you and swiped right for you. The rewarding system of Tinder can be broken down as below,
Behavior: Swiping right
Reward: Get matched
Can this process can be used only by dating sites like Tinder? Absolutely, no! Many businesses such as accommodation booking services use this process in their marketing effort to retain their customers. By rewarding frequent users of their services with discounts and deals that are deemed profitable (sometimes even steal) in the eyes of their customers; they are encouraging their customers to spend more on their services just to get that special discount rate.
Observational Learning
Observing and imitating others is a process we all are familiar with. We often fill our gaps in knowledge by observing and imitating others. A child learning how to make facial expressions by observing others would be a great example of this.
Psychologist Albert Bandura states that in order for observational learning to work the best, 4 processes are needed. The 4 processes are as follows,
1. Attention- the intensity of the observer while noticing the imitated behavior
2. Retention- the capability of the imitator to create a memory of the imitated behavior
3. Reproduction- the motor skills and physical capacity of the observer to imitate the behavior
4. Motivation- the observer must be convinced that the reward of imitating the behavior must be more than the cost of doing so
Intro to Neuromarketing
It’s Time for a Marketing Revolution.
Carrying forward this course is Roger Dooley the founder of NeuroscienceMarketing.com. In this course, he explains that marketing needs a revolution. He further dives into the crucial need of a revolution in the form of marketing to both conscious and unconscious minds of customers for a better conversion rate.
Schools of Thought
In research, it has been discovered that our thought processes are divided into two types of thinking System 1 and System 2. System 1 which is fast, intuitive, emotional, rule-based, and inefficient while System Two thinks differently by using logic, putting thoughts into analysis when we say something like well I thought about something.
However, it should be noticed that our brain is constantly on System 1 by default as they don’t like System 2 to be always in control. So as a marketer it’s fair to say that when we fail to recognize this issue we failed as a marketer.
In the schools of thought, another perspective fellow marketers are encouraged to look through would be evolutionary psychology. Geoffrey Miller’s book “Spent” explains how evolutionary psychology still applies to us humans despite advancing rapidly every day. In his book, Geoffrey Miller explains how today’s modern consumer, in this age of technology, is still driven by programs that were set up during our pre-evolutionary stage. Of course, his claim was backed up by a very convincing case.
It’s fair to say In Schools Of Thought Roger Dooley has dropped an exhaustive list of breakthrough thoughts from other marketing experts as well for course learners benefit.
The Persuasion Slide
In this part of the course, Roger Dooley explains what are the 4 components of The Persuasion Slide. Also according to Roger Doley, each element mentioned in the slide has both conscious and non-conscious component which are designed to be discussed or thought about whenever the course learner is discussing customer’s motivation into acting with a trigger.
Now let’s look at the key components of The Persuasion Slide.
1. Gravity
2. Nudge
3. Angle
4. Friction
Gravity
Gravity is one of the main forces involved in a slide to function well. Without gravity, we could not reach the bottom of the slide. Here in the persuasion slide, gravity is considered as the initial motivation of the customers. So whenever you ask your customers to do something you are fighting against gravity. That is why you need to align your messaging to your customer’s needs and wants.
Nudge
Referred to the part where a push is applied to the person at the top of the slide to move a person to the bottom of the slide, a nudge is where you start to get your customer’s attention and start persuading them. The nudge can come in many forms such as a call to action or a pop-up ad. In order for the nudge to be successful, you need to provide a nudge with the correct motivation.
Angle
In a normal slide, the correct angle enables the individual at top of the slide to reach the bottom of the slide. Ideally, the angle of motivation you provide to your customers via the nudge should appeal to both the conscious and non-conscious minds of the customers.
Friction
Sometimes in a slide, somebody is stuck due to the slide being not slippery enough. Similarly, friction in conversion appears in many forms such as a large number of fields in forms and unclear instructions that confuses the customer. That is why as part of the conversion process special emphasis to UX should be given to avoid friction that can cost the conversion rate carefully built previously.
