Here are some of the most interesting insights we've collected with the Social Values Project. Check back often as we are continually adding new articles and research on how values intersect with marketing communications and consumer purchase behavior.
Authored by Sarah Hardwick, Founder; Ravi Iyer, Data Scientist; Graham Hill, Lead Researcher; Tina Malott, Marketing Scientist; Hilary McCarthy, Marketing Scientist
While it is certainly preferable to explicitly collect data on values from your customers, that may not always be feasible. However, you may already have data that helps you understand your customer’s values. Data on social interactions, openness to new experiences, and location can give you hypotheses that you can test more rigorously in your marketing and communications campaigns.
Yes, it’s true. Money can equal happiness for your and your customers. Just maybe not the ways you initially thought…
Lately all of the books I am reading are about “happiness”. Perhaps it’s the fact that, in our crazy, busy lives, we all want to get more time and enjoyment to focus on the things that really matter. And that the summer gives us a great time of year to take inventory and do so!
First, there’s the “Happiness Project”, in which Author Gretchen Rubin spends a year of focusing each month on one thing that will make her happier.
And then there’s “Happy Money,” from Elizabeth Dunn and Michael Norton, concentrating on the science of smarter spending. “Happy Money” indicates that whomever said money can’t buy happiness is wrong; it can make you happy, just not the way that you probably think…
“Happy Money” focuses on five insightful principles of human behavior and how money can lead to happiness, something we are no stranger to at Zenzi with our Social Values Project that identifies value-based differences in consumer behaviors, such as experiential buying to help brands better communicate with consumers. The book offers some great concepts to think about both from (a) the standpoint of being a consumer and making wise spending decisions, and (b) of marketers, to determine how to best reach out to consumers or other businesses to help them to capitalize on their experiences to make them happy.
Here are the five principles and recommendations. Which ring a bell and resonate the most with you?
• Buy Experiences – materials things (like homes, expensive clothes, etc.) often bring less happiness than purchasing experiences, like concerts, horseback riding lessons, a good meal, that can have a lasting impression
• Make it a Treat – after I read this one, it clicked: why that morning mocha I was buying every day before work (when I had the money and time in my 20s, before kids) wasn’t really making me happy, and why some of my colleagues were up to two per day and still not really “happy”. The authors point to the fact that “limiting our access to the things we like best may help to ‘reverginize’ us, renewing our capacity for pleasure.” I’m in!
• Buy Time – Hello, as a mom (heck, as anyone), wouldn’t I love to do this? Dunn and Norton suggest outsourcing your most dreaded tasks. This can help to transform the time you have to pursue your passions. My solution to this one is Peapod.com for groceries, when I can, versus bickering about every sugar coated concoction my kids try to sneak into the cart, and doing something fun, with the extra time, on the weekends instead.
• Pay Now, Consume Later – getting the dreaded credit card bill, or paying after the fact for goods or services, can zap some of the ‘happiness’ from your purchases. This is no surprise, considering the effects of the holiday hangover and incoming gift expenses, and everything else, in January. Pay upfront and delay consumption for greater happiness, the authors say.
• Invest in Others – spending money on your kids, coworkers, parents, coworkers, those less fortunate can make you happier than buying something for yourself. Working in a food kitchen, making a meal for a neighbor in need, donating money to a family in need so that they can enjoy the holidays—any of these gifts, also give back to the person making them.
Of course “Happy Money” backs up all five principles with interesting research and experiments that you can check out in the book. And not every consumer is universally the same in which of the five, and to what degree, will ultimately make him/her happy. We delve in even deeper, at Zenzi, to identify these value-based differences for brands to better understand and communicate with specific, key audiences.
Given the above five, how can you change your life for the better? And, how can you make your consumers’ lives even happier with something you just might excel at?
If you can successfully apply, and communicate the effects, of even one of these five to your business you will help to reach not only your consumers’ wallets but their minds. Building positive, lasting sentiment, and even possibly a little happiness, for your audience, and for your brand, in the meantime…now that’s money.
One of the more talked about trends in marketing recently is “happiness marketing,” which describes an attempt by many brands to associate their offerings with increased happiness for the consumer. Coca-Cola’s “Open Happiness” campaign and Zappo’s “Delivering Happiness” messaging are just two examples of how brands are capitalizing on consumer demand for products and services that help them satisfy their psychological needs, as opposed to basic, utilitarian needs.
Brands seeking to align themselves with consumer happiness will benefit from a good understanding of the types of purchases that make people happy, and how their product or service taps into this universal desire.So what types of purchases actually do make people happier?
One consistent finding from the field of positive psychology is that purchasing experiences, such as travel, concerts, and dining experiences, makes people happier than purchasing material items, such as clothing or jewelry. Among the reasons for this are that experiences provide opportunities to enhance social relationships, are less subject to social comparison, and are viewed as more central to a person’s identity.
Some brands are capitalizing on this knowledge by promoting the “experiential” aspects of their product. For example, a hiking shoe company may present a visual of a vast, tree-lined hiking trail as opposed to presenting the shoes themselves. Indeed, recent studies have shown that experiential ads generate more eWOM (electronic word-of-mouth) than more product-centric ads.
However, before diving headlong into an experiential marketing campaign, brands must first develop a meaningful understanding of their customer base and what motivates them at the level of their core values. Namely, not all people prefer experiences to material objects, and if your customers are among those who don’t, experiential advertising may fall flat.
Zenzi’s Social Values Project seeks to identify value-based differences in consumer behaviors such as experiential buying. The graph below shows the relationship between Zenzi’s Social Value Types and the tendency to purchase experiences:
As the graph indicates, Pleasure, Purpose, and Freedom Seekers gravitate toward experiences while Security, Prestige, and Tradition Seekers tend to be more materialistic. Zenzi’s Social Values Project offers insights such as this to companies seeking to engage with their customers at the level of value-driven, psychological needs. As consumers increasingly demand more from their brands, we believe it is vital for businesses to make this type of value-based connection with their customers.
Why? By building personal, meaningful relationships on a one-to-one level, you can discover what’s truly important to people, how to better motivate and inspire them to action.
At Zenzi, we take a values-based approach to using social platforms as a critical component of the sales cycle, driving purchase decisions through communication of lifestyle benefits, sales and incentives in an authentic voice.
With emerging technologies, we can capture leads directly from social platforms, when customers are often most receptive. We integrate seamlessly with CRM systems and continue to nurture them at every touch point, inspiring loyalty, testimonials, and word of mouth growth.
At Zenzi, we are so passionate about social commerce that we recently launched a proprietary consumer insights tool designed to accurately pinpoint inner values, attitudes and beliefs that are most closely linked to purchase behavior.
We’ll be presenting some of our latest findings at the upcoming Advertising and Consumer Psychology Conference in San Diego in June.
For more details, visit http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/~dimofte/acp2013.html
Think that all purchases are created equal? Think again. While splurging on material items like a new car or iPad might bring fleeting pleasure, spending money on life experiences such as concerts, vacations and dining creates a more lasting impression and ultimately greater happiness.
Why do life experiences make us happier? Because these purchases often have a social component, they satisfy a basic need for connectedness, resulting in people feeling more alive. While you might be hooked on Angry Birds for a few straight days after getting a new iPad, its presence in your life soon becomes routine. Experiences have the potential to live on forever, and they bring us happiness every time we reflect back on them.
Our friends at BeyondThePurchase.com help people make the connection between their spending habits and their happiness. Wondering what might be influencing how you think about and spend your money? Find out by going to http://www.beyondthepurchase.org, register and take the Spending Choices & Happiness survey.
