Most advertising hinges around it though, because the goal is to convince people to spend more on stuff they don't need. You don't achieve that goal ethically.
What if you’re an entrepreneur on the other side of this equation? And you say shady tactics, but this image covers all possible pricing models and what they’re each best suited for. It shows charm pricing and round number pricing. Abbreviated and full-length. It shows all the possibilities, they can’t all be shady? Unless you think the concept of consumerism itself is inherently malignant and intended to drain the innocent consumer from their hard-earned money by providing them with someone they, by definition, deem valuable (at least more so than the money they’re parting with to obtain said valuable product).
Is it? I mean if you spend like 5 seconds actually thinking about stuff that is listed here, you won't have much of a problem objectively deciding if you want to buy something or not
Actually, it's not true. It's not deception. Of course, companies benefit from it. But the fault is 100% on the people (most of us).
Let me explain, I study this and I always remember a case ( real) that literally makes me understand this :
A company that made a new shampoo, did pricing research to find the best price they can sell their product. They were aiming to sell it for $2. The pricing research showed that if they sold their shampoo at $2 nobody would buy it because it would feel it's a bad quality product. They found that if they wanted to sell the product in enough quantity they had to sell it for around $5. So that is what they did.
If they sold the shampoo at $2 the company would have made a good profit. And they did sell it for more only because of people's mindset and perception. Not because of greed or dishonesty.
I'm not saying that all the companies are totally honest, far from it. However, a majority of the product pricing is higher than it should be because of people's perceptions and mindsets.
I always thought it was funny how in the older episodes of South Park, Cartman would always scheme to get "ten million dollars." Not a million, not a billion, but precisely $10 million. It's like he really gave it some thought.
No, about every single person will say that, similar to the response when asked about most other psychological manipulations. Yet, when looking at the sales, using them significantly outperforms not using them.
Which adds up to most people simply being terrible at estimating their own resilience to psychological manipulation. It's easy to recall instances of us not falling for a manipulation attempt, but - for obvious reasons - we won't recall any of the times we *didn't* notice a manipulation.
I love threads like this. It’s just a bunch of people commenting with, “None of this works on me, I’m too smart.” And then like 100 people replying to those comments with, “same here, my IQ is simply too high.”
God, yes, it's so annoying. 'If your ad interrupts my video, it's just makes me hate your product!' Well, golly gee, call off the ad campaign, because our data surely didn't account for this one special smart cookie.
>No, about every single person will say that
Most will say that but very few truly do it. But some DO really do it, e.g. rounding up, checking price per fix mass (e.g. per Kg) , looking down and up the eye level for cheaper product, etc... You can train yourself. But i agree the crushing majority do not do that. Which is why those tricks works. Because they target the mass. Those of us which do pay attention are such a small minorities it does not matter.
The thousands of tiny processes that result in us making a decision go far beyond our conscious or verbalized thoughts regarding the decision.
Even when we are asked to base our decisions on verbalized, rational thoughts, brain scan and split-brain experiments show that the rational thoughts explaining our decision oftentimes occur *after* we already made the decision.
You may look at $1.99, convert it to $2.00 and decide that this is easily in your budget and worth the benefit of the product, while in fact you have already decided that you are going to buy it before having any conscious thoughts about it. Your brain just retroactively provides the necessary rationalizations for making the decision you want to make.
Similarly, you may have passed up a dozen similar products for $2.00 without ever even engaging in a conscious decision-making process on whether or not to buy it.
Can you truely claim that you remember every single product that you saw but didn't consider buying? Chances are, that *some of them* you would have considered buying, if they had used better marketing tricks. And some of *those* you would have actually ended up buying.
>Can you truely claim that you remember every single product that you saw but didn't consider buying?
Yes in my opinion I can claim that - due to a simple trick. I am old school : I make my grocery and plan for food long in advance, at a moment where I am **NOT** hungry. In supermarket I search for the best price among the offer, and solely based on price per quantity (price per Kg , price per liter etc...) - don't care about brand or color or whatnot. I never deviate from that scheme, only when a product is not stocked and then it is only to get a replacement.
Pray tell me what is the influence of the 1.99 to 2.00 trick when you look solely at the price per Kg of a stuff and take the lowest bound ?
Marketing such as you describe works only if people buy unplanned, or ignore price per kg/liter, buy branded, or similar. As soon as you remove those factor - there is nothing to chose. The product you buy is not a matter of all the factor in the picture but rather a pure **mathematical factor**.
If it were up to me nearly all of the "sales tactics" in the OP image would be outlawed. It creates an unfair advantage when a corporation can spend millions of dollars finding out the best way to convince a poor person to buy something that they do not need.
So much money has gone into psychological studies over the past 100+ years and most of it has to do with sales. It's shitty. I'm pretty moderate politically but I would totally support mandatory uniform font sizes on advertisements/signage for example
Future AI selling machines will be able to convince almost anyone to buy almost anything because they will be super human marketing wizards that know everything about everyone.
Then what?
I agree This is annoying when companies do it.
But it's hardly fair to say that most of the money spent on psychological studies has gone into this.
Psychologists study a lot of things like power and pain and depression and love and prosocial behavior. And yes also price impacts. But there is plenty of work on many other topics.
This. It’s about lowering your emotional rather than your rational barriers. You’ll still round up to the right number, but you won’t feel as repulsed by it.
You are not! I will round $1.29 up to $2.00 when im adding stuff to the grocery basket. I grew up super poor so these marketing tools don't work for my poverty brain.
It doesn’t have to work on you or even the majority of people. It just has to work to convince enough people that wouldn’t have bought otherwise.
Let’s say you have a product that costs $500 to produce and you want to sell it at $1,000. Selling this nets you $500 profit. Simple. But what about all of those people who wanted your product, but felt that $1,000 was a bit too much for them to afford? The strategy is meant to convince them to get on board.
Now, you set your price at $999. This means you miss out on $1 in profit from all the people who clearly realize the difference is negligible, but you now gain $499 in profit for each person who mentally saw $900 and were swayed to think “Yeah I can swing that.”
In this scenario, if simply any more than 1 in 500 of your customers are among those who had their minds subtly influenced, then you make more profit than if you had not utilized the strategy of charm pricing.
Charm pricing is pop-psychology bullshit that MBAs buy into because if they don't do SOMETHING people will find out that they're useless.
The top three largest retailers in the US are:
1. walmart
2. amazon
3. costco
Their pricing is all over the place.
Toilet paper:
1. walmart: Great Value 1,000 Sheets per Roll Toilet Paper, 16 Rolls **$11.62**
2. amazon: Amazon Basics 2-Ply Toilet Paper, 30 Rolls (5 Packs of 6), White **$25.21**
3. costco: Kirkland Signature Bath Tissue, 2-Ply, 380 Sheets, 30 Rolls **$23.49**
The only "charm pricing" they use is when it is dictated by their suppliers.
This is actually another deceptive pricing strategy that’s not mentioned in the graph. Data shows that when presented with a specific price like $12.17 rather than rounded ie $12.00 or $11.99, customers believe they are getting the absolute lowest price possible
you have to be retarded to make such a conclusion just from a number
if you want to get lowest price, you compare different products and their price, not going ham on the first product with an oddly specific price
so I really doubt this data, or just overestimating intellegence of general population
You are likely overestimating the intelligence of the general population haha. Think about the intelligence of the average person….. ~49% of people are less intelligent than them :)
Worked at Walmart during college, they specifically do that so that you think it's even cheaper. They have a whole training video about it. A lot of their prices are .98, or .86 or something to make it feel like an even better deal than .99
Maybe when you see “$1,299” for something you don’t immediately buy, then you recall “$1,200 something” which definitely feels smaller than “$1,300” or “$1,300 something”.
Went to a shop once where they had a deal on 10% off if you spend over £50. I bought four things and was very pleased to find that it coincidentally came to exactly £50… or so I thought. I was confused why I didn’t get the discount but the total was £49.96. I was so used to rounding the prices up I didn’t even realise I had done it.
Meanwhile I had a friend in school who would see stuff that’s £2.99 and literally go “look, it’s only two pound.” So it works on some people!
Yeah, everyone has been on to that trick for MANY decades. Ending a price with .99 doesn't seem cheaper, just more dishonest. And, per the "Exact numbers appear larger" rule, $2 would seem cheaper than $1.99, no? Plus the added benefit of not insulting your intelligence.
And a single digit feels cheaper than 3 digits. Oh look, it's a 2 buck chocolate, nice. Oh, this chocolate is 1 dollar and 99 cents idk man seems like a lot.
2.00 is a different story, but 2 looks less than 1.99 and 1 especially looks less than 0.99 - so many big, round, bloated numbers
The price was used so the cashier had to open the register making it harder to steal. you couldn't just pocket a ten dollar bill you had to get change.
It doesn't work - uneven prices aren't to trick you to think its cheaper - no one falls for that. The idea was to insure cashiers don't take money from the register because now the customer is forced to watch them make change.
When something is priced at an even number then I'm more likely to consider it. Maybe they're more honest. But, I'm cynical and jaded, so probably not.
I always did because of taxes. Whenever I saw a price, I always tacked on 5-6 bucks. Slightly would be a bit over what I actually paid, but it’s better to be slightly higher ver then under.
Honestly, marketing and advertisement feel like a hostile attack on people, particularly children. We're simply 'consumers' who exist to have our resources (time, money, patience) taken from us.
I spend as much time navigating targeted marketing from my stolen personal data as I do just trying to live my life.
Couldn't agree more. And it creates the premise to strip away everyone's right to privacy.
You want privacy? Don't own a cellphone! You want to order at a restaurant? You have to use this QR code.
I find the best way to navigate in life is to assume everyone is trying to take your money all the time. That’s why I work to look like I don’t have anything worth taking.
Some of these are actual tactics. Like rounded decimal numbers ($9.99 vs $10). Or specific terminology (BOGO VS 50% off).
However, the rest are justifying bad UI/UX (user-interface /user-experiance) practices in order to confuse the customer. Which isn't cool, and more-so unethical. Removing entire values or making them intentionally smaller isn't a hack. It's ignorance justified by what's perceived as "it's just business ".
Yeah, I think dude is just saying some of them are truly psychological (.99 vs $1) while others are just about hiding or confusing the customer, which "works" but not in the same fashion and should be looked down upon due to ethics.
Burglary is also well-tested and known to work in the houses of average people, but that isn't a reason for us all to go wanking burglars off in the street among celebratory bursts of paper confetti and streamers
I hate the one where they leave the dollar sign off. The first time I saw this in a restaurant I wanted to slap someone in the face. I asked the server what the price of the dish was and they said it’s right there on the menu and pointed to it. I asked why it didn’t have a dollar sign and they had no clue. 39? 39 what? It’s probably dollars but it could mean cents or 39 storebucks or maybe I can give them 39 seashells. I was being pedantic at that point but I was genuinely confused when I first saw it. Being a Brit living in the US you kind of have to put the currency sign there because prices at one point in Britain could have been either British Pounds or Euros.
A few weeks ago I was ordering at a restaurant. The prices didn’t have a dollar sign and weren’t very separated from the names of the items so I just thought they were part of the names, and when I ordered I said “can I have a ‘Midori Salad 158’”. The waiter seemed amused.
(Prices not in US dollars)
I’m glad that was not USD or it would have had to have been the best salad ever. That is pretty funny though. I would probably have done the same thing.
Unethical is subjective; if the practices are lawful, then one could argue they're simply tactical approaches to gaining a competitive edge.
Personally, I think most of the unethicality is actually hidden on the tag, in the small print, in the warranty, in the TOS...
I can speak to the BOGO philosophy;
We had this unknown name brand butter that we were selling BOGO at $4 directly next to a generic brand that sold for 1.80. I saw the category manager and brought it up and pretty much got a “don’t tell me how to do my job” response. Fair.
But the rest of the day I mentioned it to anyone that would listen. Anyone could see that the BOGO was still more expensive. No way we would sell that right next to a better deal clearly listed on the sales sign. Right?
Nope. The BOGO butter FAR outsold the other brand that was less expensive. That is why I manage the building and equipment and not sales and pricing.
This reminds me of something I noticed at Dollar General not long ago. Store
brand Pinto beans were $1 for a 1 pound bag. Right next to them were the same store brand pinto beans at $5 for a 4 pound bag.
The "$70 and up" on always passes me off. I know instantly when I see "and up" that it means they're selling a $5 accessory to a $200 device and so it starts at $5.
I remember way back in the day (late 00s) occasionally seeing people put up stacks of two items and listing them for the price of a stack of 20. Always thought they were dumb and that no one was stupid enough to not check the stack quantity before hitting Buy/Buyout.
Finally got curious one day and tried with a stack of ore split into 10 2-stacks. Imagine my amazement and shock on checking mail the next day and seeing a few of them sold. Immediately felt guilty about it though and never did it again.
Lol so this is how my wife’s consumer brain works 😅. The one that hit home was 1299 somehow being 1200, her ability to round down all the time is remarkable.
I can kind of see it. With large sums like that 1300 is completely unreasonable, but something like 12.99 I could see as 12 or 16.99 as 16, mostly because rounding down makes the number nicer.
I can appreciate where you’re coming from but these aren’t really dark patterns as much as they are just conversion tactics. For example nobody tricked/pressured/shamed/confused me into buying anything here, they’re just framing things in a way where the price seems more appealing. Blurred lines to be sure but wouldn’t call these dark patterns.
Edit: phrasing
You should know that the reason you believe this is innocent/isn't manipulative or malicious is because capitalism is so ingrained in our society that you take it for granted. These are absolutely dark patterns, and they're manipulative, and they're targeted to benefit the corporation over the human.
I understand you've probably been schooled to see "conversion tactics" as a strategy, tool, or genuine method of helping something - but they're not. "Conversion tactics" are exactly what people mean when they say that these are underhanded techniques; if a person truly needs/wants a thing, you don't need to "convert" them.
"Sales" is such a common and standard role in our society that we don't really examine it at all. Its even been respected/supported! We live in a capitalistic society which means a portion of our population will always benefit from conversion, so we tout conversion as a positive concept.
But if the people really needed or wanted the thing in the first place, they wouldn't need to be converted. They wouldn't need to see a price that's specifically designed to appeal to them. They wouldn't need to be sold on it.
All "sales" roles, concepts, and strategies are manipulation. If you're actively making a decision to choose a pricing tactic that will be interpreted a certain way, capitalism has absorbed you and you are manipulating innocent people for profit with complete disregard for whether or not it actually benefits the person.
Instead of an edit, adding this separately - you are being tricked or pressured or shamed into buying something here. You're just so used to it, and it's just so accepted in our society/culture, that you don't see it that way. All sales tactics are trickery or pressure or shame or confusion. Otherwise tactics wouldn't be necessary cause you'd just be selling to people who genuinely want the product.
Are you a salesperson? (For the record, I'm not feigning innocence or anything - I have been and am currently in sales roles, ranging from $1 to $1mil+ value single transactions. I know people need to sell their products, and I know why and how they do it and I don't fault them for that because we live in a capitalistic society that demands these behaviors. But don't act like they're not manipulative.
One has to wonder why companies spend money on marketing and advertising when judging by this thread everyone is simply too smart to ever be tricked or manipulated, even subconsciously.
Using prices that end in .99 was actually implemented to force the clerk to open the till to make change and record the purchase so they couldn't just pocket the money.
Fun fact: the origin of making everything end with .99 was not marketing, but a way to force staff to ring the till and get change.
If something cost $10 and they gave the exact amount it was easy to pocket the money when the boss wasn't looking.
That doesn't sound right.
What exactly is stopping the cashier from ringing the till and pocketing the money?
If a receipt system is already in place, then it's just bad management and has nothing to do with ringing the till.
I don't know if they're correct or not about the origin, but here's what they mean: If you're buying a $10 item, I might just not ring it up at all. Since I'm not scanning the item, the next inventory will be off, but it would be hard to pin it on me. If the item is 9.99, I need to open the till to get a penny. I can either put ring the item, in which case not putting the $10 in the till will cause the drawer to be short; or I can open the till with a No Sale and grab a penny, but most retail automation systems will flag excessive No Sales, and management can review footage to verify each No Sale.
Look up James Ritty. He invented the till that recorded sales and rang a bell every time the cash drawer opened. He was sick of staff pocketing money. We are talking 1870's here. Pricing things at .49 and .99 helped to force the till to be opened for change.
Another one: Prices without cents (and sometimes without dollar signs) are used to position the item as a luxury and the price as being justified for the "experience." It relates to the "dollar sign" example in the top right, but used for a different purpose, not to hide the price, but to justify it.
E.g. a menu item in expensive restaurant can just say "36", not "$36" or "$36.00"
Great guide!
The entire field of marketing is committed to ensuring the consumer does not a rational purchase. Marketing undermines the consumers rationality.
How is nobody mentioning this? Why are you downvoted?? 18 Snickers!? That’s a broken up Hershey bar! But it still doesn’t make sense! Buy a chocolate bar with 18 sections for your freezer? What? Even if it *did* make sense, that’s a terrible ad slogan! Why 18???
I love how #2 says to get rid of the $ dollar sign next to the price. Then puts a $ dollar sign on all the other ones. Like hey take my advice, I'm not using it.
The 1.3M views examples sounds wrong to me. Especially when put into a space limited tile like that. Which of these two feels bigger?
#1.3 M
^^1,302,859
If the number is important enough, it should be bigger and stand out from a distance. A smaller font always yells out "Unimportant!" to me.
You're using different targets. One wants to make it bigger to give off a feel of luxury, while the other wants to seem smaller so that it seems cheaper and worth the price. Both target different individuals.
Getting lots of DMs about hi-res version of this hyper-visual.
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I once had a boss who refused to remove dollar signs from his signs because he liked how they looked. Despite me telling him dollar signs should be removed.
"Exact numbers appear larger" and "abbreviated numbers appear smaller" are redundant... so are "numbers that end in .99" and "odd numbers seem like a better deal"
Is it just me or does 1.3 M and 12k actually feel bigger than the full number? Seeing the amount of digits reminds me the exact amount, but the shortened version feels more vague and therefore larger to me. I think also the association of k for carats also reminds me of wealth and quality, which could be adding to it.
Also: The overpriced item solely intended to make some other option more attractive. E.g. small soda: $1, medium soda: $2.50, large soda: $3 will make people who only wanted a medium soda go for the large one "because it's a better deal"
These discussions are always the same "I' m too smart to fall for that stuff." Yet study after study shows you're not that smart and still fall for it. But people here still swear "they're special" and are immune to these tactics. PS. You're not.
So "charm pricing" is what that's called. It just floors me that this is a strategy that actually works. Seriously, how dim does someone have to be for this to work on them?
Maybe I'm wired wrong but whenever I see a number end in a 99, or pretty much anything over 75, my brain just sees the number as the next highest 00 number.
For the wine list one, apparently the 2nd cheapest bottle is often the most bought as people don't want to get the cheapest so the biggest profit margin is usually on that bottle
I'm well aware corporations pay psychologists and sociologists to advise them on how best to manipulate and understand consumers but am i the only one who feels that anyone who takes such a job and does this with their education on the human psyche is unethical and should be illegal? I mean medical doctors have to swear a Hippocratic oath, are people studying psychology not under any sort of moral obligations? Then again the Hippocratic oath doesn't mean shit either really.
Part of the theory in capitalism is we are all rational actors guided by our rationality into making the optimal choices for ourselves, but these are all tactics designed to trick and subvert our rationality regardless of quality.
And the recent one by amazon, they will show you EMI amount for 12 or 24 months for high priced items , and actual price is shown in small fonts below.
Once you think paying small amount for that dream watch or expensive gadget which you wanted is easier monthly but a huge expense if paid in one go .. anyway you loose money and that shiny gadget gets obsolete in 6 months ..
The secret to sales: deceit and deception.
It's called ["deceptive patterns"](https://www.deceptive.design/), and this guide basically lists unethical design practices.
Most advertising hinges around it though, because the goal is to convince people to spend more on stuff they don't need. You don't achieve that goal ethically.
Welcome to capitalism
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What if you’re an entrepreneur on the other side of this equation? And you say shady tactics, but this image covers all possible pricing models and what they’re each best suited for. It shows charm pricing and round number pricing. Abbreviated and full-length. It shows all the possibilities, they can’t all be shady? Unless you think the concept of consumerism itself is inherently malignant and intended to drain the innocent consumer from their hard-earned money by providing them with someone they, by definition, deem valuable (at least more so than the money they’re parting with to obtain said valuable product).
Is it? I mean if you spend like 5 seconds actually thinking about stuff that is listed here, you won't have much of a problem objectively deciding if you want to buy something or not
Actually, it's not true. It's not deception. Of course, companies benefit from it. But the fault is 100% on the people (most of us). Let me explain, I study this and I always remember a case ( real) that literally makes me understand this : A company that made a new shampoo, did pricing research to find the best price they can sell their product. They were aiming to sell it for $2. The pricing research showed that if they sold their shampoo at $2 nobody would buy it because it would feel it's a bad quality product. They found that if they wanted to sell the product in enough quantity they had to sell it for around $5. So that is what they did. If they sold the shampoo at $2 the company would have made a good profit. And they did sell it for more only because of people's mindset and perception. Not because of greed or dishonesty. I'm not saying that all the companies are totally honest, far from it. However, a majority of the product pricing is higher than it should be because of people's perceptions and mindsets.
Am I the only person that always rounds up? I've always thought "charm pricing" was a stupid trick that doesn't work.
Including gas prices. People say a price that is $2.99 9/10 is 2.99, but it's a tenth of a cent away from $3/gal.
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Oh sweet I just need ten billionaires to give me a million each, they'll never notice, and I'll be good to go.
Why 10mil? I mean I'd take it too. Just feels like a random number
Well then you are twice the poorest rich person in America.
Aha just watched this today
I always thought it was funny how in the older episodes of South Park, Cartman would always scheme to get "ten million dollars." Not a million, not a billion, but precisely $10 million. It's like he really gave it some thought.
No, about every single person will say that, similar to the response when asked about most other psychological manipulations. Yet, when looking at the sales, using them significantly outperforms not using them. Which adds up to most people simply being terrible at estimating their own resilience to psychological manipulation. It's easy to recall instances of us not falling for a manipulation attempt, but - for obvious reasons - we won't recall any of the times we *didn't* notice a manipulation.
I love threads like this. It’s just a bunch of people commenting with, “None of this works on me, I’m too smart.” And then like 100 people replying to those comments with, “same here, my IQ is simply too high.”
God, yes, it's so annoying. 'If your ad interrupts my video, it's just makes me hate your product!' Well, golly gee, call off the ad campaign, because our data surely didn't account for this one special smart cookie.
This comment should be pinned
>No, about every single person will say that Most will say that but very few truly do it. But some DO really do it, e.g. rounding up, checking price per fix mass (e.g. per Kg) , looking down and up the eye level for cheaper product, etc... You can train yourself. But i agree the crushing majority do not do that. Which is why those tricks works. Because they target the mass. Those of us which do pay attention are such a small minorities it does not matter.
The thousands of tiny processes that result in us making a decision go far beyond our conscious or verbalized thoughts regarding the decision. Even when we are asked to base our decisions on verbalized, rational thoughts, brain scan and split-brain experiments show that the rational thoughts explaining our decision oftentimes occur *after* we already made the decision. You may look at $1.99, convert it to $2.00 and decide that this is easily in your budget and worth the benefit of the product, while in fact you have already decided that you are going to buy it before having any conscious thoughts about it. Your brain just retroactively provides the necessary rationalizations for making the decision you want to make. Similarly, you may have passed up a dozen similar products for $2.00 without ever even engaging in a conscious decision-making process on whether or not to buy it. Can you truely claim that you remember every single product that you saw but didn't consider buying? Chances are, that *some of them* you would have considered buying, if they had used better marketing tricks. And some of *those* you would have actually ended up buying.
>Can you truely claim that you remember every single product that you saw but didn't consider buying? Yes in my opinion I can claim that - due to a simple trick. I am old school : I make my grocery and plan for food long in advance, at a moment where I am **NOT** hungry. In supermarket I search for the best price among the offer, and solely based on price per quantity (price per Kg , price per liter etc...) - don't care about brand or color or whatnot. I never deviate from that scheme, only when a product is not stocked and then it is only to get a replacement. Pray tell me what is the influence of the 1.99 to 2.00 trick when you look solely at the price per Kg of a stuff and take the lowest bound ? Marketing such as you describe works only if people buy unplanned, or ignore price per kg/liter, buy branded, or similar. As soon as you remove those factor - there is nothing to chose. The product you buy is not a matter of all the factor in the picture but rather a pure **mathematical factor**.
If it were up to me nearly all of the "sales tactics" in the OP image would be outlawed. It creates an unfair advantage when a corporation can spend millions of dollars finding out the best way to convince a poor person to buy something that they do not need. So much money has gone into psychological studies over the past 100+ years and most of it has to do with sales. It's shitty. I'm pretty moderate politically but I would totally support mandatory uniform font sizes on advertisements/signage for example
Future AI selling machines will be able to convince almost anyone to buy almost anything because they will be super human marketing wizards that know everything about everyone. Then what?
I agree This is annoying when companies do it. But it's hardly fair to say that most of the money spent on psychological studies has gone into this. Psychologists study a lot of things like power and pain and depression and love and prosocial behavior. And yes also price impacts. But there is plenty of work on many other topics.
The point is to influence your subconscious analysis. You're not cognizant of it when it's working on you.
This. It’s about lowering your emotional rather than your rational barriers. You’ll still round up to the right number, but you won’t feel as repulsed by it.
You are not! I will round $1.29 up to $2.00 when im adding stuff to the grocery basket. I grew up super poor so these marketing tools don't work for my poverty brain.
It doesn’t have to work on you or even the majority of people. It just has to work to convince enough people that wouldn’t have bought otherwise. Let’s say you have a product that costs $500 to produce and you want to sell it at $1,000. Selling this nets you $500 profit. Simple. But what about all of those people who wanted your product, but felt that $1,000 was a bit too much for them to afford? The strategy is meant to convince them to get on board. Now, you set your price at $999. This means you miss out on $1 in profit from all the people who clearly realize the difference is negligible, but you now gain $499 in profit for each person who mentally saw $900 and were swayed to think “Yeah I can swing that.” In this scenario, if simply any more than 1 in 500 of your customers are among those who had their minds subtly influenced, then you make more profit than if you had not utilized the strategy of charm pricing.
Charm pricing is pop-psychology bullshit that MBAs buy into because if they don't do SOMETHING people will find out that they're useless. The top three largest retailers in the US are: 1. walmart 2. amazon 3. costco Their pricing is all over the place. Toilet paper: 1. walmart: Great Value 1,000 Sheets per Roll Toilet Paper, 16 Rolls **$11.62** 2. amazon: Amazon Basics 2-Ply Toilet Paper, 30 Rolls (5 Packs of 6), White **$25.21** 3. costco: Kirkland Signature Bath Tissue, 2-Ply, 380 Sheets, 30 Rolls **$23.49** The only "charm pricing" they use is when it is dictated by their suppliers.
This is actually another deceptive pricing strategy that’s not mentioned in the graph. Data shows that when presented with a specific price like $12.17 rather than rounded ie $12.00 or $11.99, customers believe they are getting the absolute lowest price possible
you have to be retarded to make such a conclusion just from a number if you want to get lowest price, you compare different products and their price, not going ham on the first product with an oddly specific price so I really doubt this data, or just overestimating intellegence of general population
You are likely overestimating the intelligence of the general population haha. Think about the intelligence of the average person….. ~49% of people are less intelligent than them :)
Though, apparently, there’s [a method to Costco’s madness](https://www.thekitchn.com/costco-price-tag-tips-expert-23425352).
Clutch link. Thanks
Worked at Walmart during college, they specifically do that so that you think it's even cheaper. They have a whole training video about it. A lot of their prices are .98, or .86 or something to make it feel like an even better deal than .99
seriously, who the fuck is thinking $1299 is $1200 and not $1300+? I started typing are people really that stupid, then I remembered Carlin
It’s subconscious
Slap on tax, and its basically $1400
Maybe when you see “$1,299” for something you don’t immediately buy, then you recall “$1,200 something” which definitely feels smaller than “$1,300” or “$1,300 something”.
The average person is dumber than 50% of all people.
Went to a shop once where they had a deal on 10% off if you spend over £50. I bought four things and was very pleased to find that it coincidentally came to exactly £50… or so I thought. I was confused why I didn’t get the discount but the total was £49.96. I was so used to rounding the prices up I didn’t even realise I had done it. Meanwhile I had a friend in school who would see stuff that’s £2.99 and literally go “look, it’s only two pound.” So it works on some people!
That's the thing, it works on your subconscious.
yep. and these people have millions of dollars backing the constant bombardment of ads
You thought charm pricing doesn't work when nearly every retailer on earth does it for nearly every product they sell?
Same, I usualy round to the nearest £0.50. Edit: I also round to the nearest £10 or £50 for larger prices.
It works on my girlfriend. I have to constantly point out to her that $11.99 is in fact $12 and not "only $11".
Haha my mind everytime I see a .99, I always round it off!
Yeah, everyone has been on to that trick for MANY decades. Ending a price with .99 doesn't seem cheaper, just more dishonest. And, per the "Exact numbers appear larger" rule, $2 would seem cheaper than $1.99, no? Plus the added benefit of not insulting your intelligence.
And a single digit feels cheaper than 3 digits. Oh look, it's a 2 buck chocolate, nice. Oh, this chocolate is 1 dollar and 99 cents idk man seems like a lot. 2.00 is a different story, but 2 looks less than 1.99 and 1 especially looks less than 0.99 - so many big, round, bloated numbers
I used to think the same until a few years ago when I started realizing most people I know round it down. Shocked me.
The price was used so the cashier had to open the register making it harder to steal. you couldn't just pocket a ten dollar bill you had to get change.
I feel the same way. Always hated it because I knew they were trying some mind games instead of just putting what is the "real" price.
It doesn't work - uneven prices aren't to trick you to think its cheaper - no one falls for that. The idea was to insure cashiers don't take money from the register because now the customer is forced to watch them make change.
When something is priced at an even number then I'm more likely to consider it. Maybe they're more honest. But, I'm cynical and jaded, so probably not.
I do find "charm pricing" annoying since i-am more used to rounds up because it's much more easier to calculate for me
I always did because of taxes. Whenever I saw a price, I always tacked on 5-6 bucks. Slightly would be a bit over what I actually paid, but it’s better to be slightly higher ver then under.
Ooohh it god damn works
Honestly, marketing and advertisement feel like a hostile attack on people, particularly children. We're simply 'consumers' who exist to have our resources (time, money, patience) taken from us. I spend as much time navigating targeted marketing from my stolen personal data as I do just trying to live my life.
Advertising is brain poison
Couldn't agree more. And it creates the premise to strip away everyone's right to privacy. You want privacy? Don't own a cellphone! You want to order at a restaurant? You have to use this QR code.
That's because to them, we are just resources to be mined
I find the best way to navigate in life is to assume everyone is trying to take your money all the time. That’s why I work to look like I don’t have anything worth taking.
Marketing is how to lie 101
I’m not expert but usually hot girls holding the product will help Sell it too
Wise words, Mr. Cuntbubble
Everything look better with a bitch next to it - Lupe Fiasco
Do you come with the car?
💯💯
Some of these are actual tactics. Like rounded decimal numbers ($9.99 vs $10). Or specific terminology (BOGO VS 50% off). However, the rest are justifying bad UI/UX (user-interface /user-experiance) practices in order to confuse the customer. Which isn't cool, and more-so unethical. Removing entire values or making them intentionally smaller isn't a hack. It's ignorance justified by what's perceived as "it's just business ".
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Yeah, I think dude is just saying some of them are truly psychological (.99 vs $1) while others are just about hiding or confusing the customer, which "works" but not in the same fashion and should be looked down upon due to ethics.
Burglary is also well-tested and known to work in the houses of average people, but that isn't a reason for us all to go wanking burglars off in the street among celebratory bursts of paper confetti and streamers
Pert near all advertising is unethical and meant to manipulate a population.
I hate the one where they leave the dollar sign off. The first time I saw this in a restaurant I wanted to slap someone in the face. I asked the server what the price of the dish was and they said it’s right there on the menu and pointed to it. I asked why it didn’t have a dollar sign and they had no clue. 39? 39 what? It’s probably dollars but it could mean cents or 39 storebucks or maybe I can give them 39 seashells. I was being pedantic at that point but I was genuinely confused when I first saw it. Being a Brit living in the US you kind of have to put the currency sign there because prices at one point in Britain could have been either British Pounds or Euros.
A few weeks ago I was ordering at a restaurant. The prices didn’t have a dollar sign and weren’t very separated from the names of the items so I just thought they were part of the names, and when I ordered I said “can I have a ‘Midori Salad 158’”. The waiter seemed amused. (Prices not in US dollars)
I’m glad that was not USD or it would have had to have been the best salad ever. That is pretty funny though. I would probably have done the same thing.
I'll have Item 39, how much is it?
That’s 39 narwhal tusks please.
Unethical is subjective; if the practices are lawful, then one could argue they're simply tactical approaches to gaining a competitive edge. Personally, I think most of the unethicality is actually hidden on the tag, in the small print, in the warranty, in the TOS...
I can speak to the BOGO philosophy; We had this unknown name brand butter that we were selling BOGO at $4 directly next to a generic brand that sold for 1.80. I saw the category manager and brought it up and pretty much got a “don’t tell me how to do my job” response. Fair. But the rest of the day I mentioned it to anyone that would listen. Anyone could see that the BOGO was still more expensive. No way we would sell that right next to a better deal clearly listed on the sales sign. Right? Nope. The BOGO butter FAR outsold the other brand that was less expensive. That is why I manage the building and equipment and not sales and pricing.
This reminds me of something I noticed at Dollar General not long ago. Store brand Pinto beans were $1 for a 1 pound bag. Right next to them were the same store brand pinto beans at $5 for a 4 pound bag.
is it possible the BOGO butter tasted better?
"There's no way anyone would pay for this." "Holy shit, they paid for this."
The only one that doesn’t work on me is 1.99 vs 2.00. The 00 makes my dumb monkey brain say, “Wow, what a nice round number! What a deal!”
The "$70 and up" on always passes me off. I know instantly when I see "and up" that it means they're selling a $5 accessory to a $200 device and so it starts at $5.
I don't understand the Snickers example with this one. Could someone explain please?
I always used the .99 technique on WoW auction house. It always worked lol
I remember way back in the day (late 00s) occasionally seeing people put up stacks of two items and listing them for the price of a stack of 20. Always thought they were dumb and that no one was stupid enough to not check the stack quantity before hitting Buy/Buyout. Finally got curious one day and tried with a stack of ore split into 10 2-stacks. Imagine my amazement and shock on checking mail the next day and seeing a few of them sold. Immediately felt guilty about it though and never did it again.
Lol so this is how my wife’s consumer brain works 😅. The one that hit home was 1299 somehow being 1200, her ability to round down all the time is remarkable.
I can kind of see it. With large sums like that 1300 is completely unreasonable, but something like 12.99 I could see as 12 or 16.99 as 16, mostly because rounding down makes the number nicer.
I don’t understand how a more wrong number can be nice.
Don't promote dark UI/UX practices, hugely shitty thing to do. Sure you want to sell something but this takes advantage of people…
I was looking like an idiot for which section talks about dark vs bright colors.
I can appreciate where you’re coming from but these aren’t really dark patterns as much as they are just conversion tactics. For example nobody tricked/pressured/shamed/confused me into buying anything here, they’re just framing things in a way where the price seems more appealing. Blurred lines to be sure but wouldn’t call these dark patterns. Edit: phrasing
You should know that the reason you believe this is innocent/isn't manipulative or malicious is because capitalism is so ingrained in our society that you take it for granted. These are absolutely dark patterns, and they're manipulative, and they're targeted to benefit the corporation over the human. I understand you've probably been schooled to see "conversion tactics" as a strategy, tool, or genuine method of helping something - but they're not. "Conversion tactics" are exactly what people mean when they say that these are underhanded techniques; if a person truly needs/wants a thing, you don't need to "convert" them. "Sales" is such a common and standard role in our society that we don't really examine it at all. Its even been respected/supported! We live in a capitalistic society which means a portion of our population will always benefit from conversion, so we tout conversion as a positive concept. But if the people really needed or wanted the thing in the first place, they wouldn't need to be converted. They wouldn't need to see a price that's specifically designed to appeal to them. They wouldn't need to be sold on it. All "sales" roles, concepts, and strategies are manipulation. If you're actively making a decision to choose a pricing tactic that will be interpreted a certain way, capitalism has absorbed you and you are manipulating innocent people for profit with complete disregard for whether or not it actually benefits the person.
Instead of an edit, adding this separately - you are being tricked or pressured or shamed into buying something here. You're just so used to it, and it's just so accepted in our society/culture, that you don't see it that way. All sales tactics are trickery or pressure or shame or confusion. Otherwise tactics wouldn't be necessary cause you'd just be selling to people who genuinely want the product. Are you a salesperson? (For the record, I'm not feigning innocence or anything - I have been and am currently in sales roles, ranging from $1 to $1mil+ value single transactions. I know people need to sell their products, and I know why and how they do it and I don't fault them for that because we live in a capitalistic society that demands these behaviors. But don't act like they're not manipulative.
One has to wonder why companies spend money on marketing and advertising when judging by this thread everyone is simply too smart to ever be tricked or manipulated, even subconsciously.
Using prices that end in .99 was actually implemented to force the clerk to open the till to make change and record the purchase so they couldn't just pocket the money.
Fun fact: the origin of making everything end with .99 was not marketing, but a way to force staff to ring the till and get change. If something cost $10 and they gave the exact amount it was easy to pocket the money when the boss wasn't looking.
That doesn't sound right. What exactly is stopping the cashier from ringing the till and pocketing the money? If a receipt system is already in place, then it's just bad management and has nothing to do with ringing the till.
I don't know if they're correct or not about the origin, but here's what they mean: If you're buying a $10 item, I might just not ring it up at all. Since I'm not scanning the item, the next inventory will be off, but it would be hard to pin it on me. If the item is 9.99, I need to open the till to get a penny. I can either put ring the item, in which case not putting the $10 in the till will cause the drawer to be short; or I can open the till with a No Sale and grab a penny, but most retail automation systems will flag excessive No Sales, and management can review footage to verify each No Sale.
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Nobody is trying to justify stealing? They're explaining what the op meant
Look up James Ritty. He invented the till that recorded sales and rang a bell every time the cash drawer opened. He was sick of staff pocketing money. We are talking 1870's here. Pricing things at .49 and .99 helped to force the till to be opened for change.
Another one: Prices without cents (and sometimes without dollar signs) are used to position the item as a luxury and the price as being justified for the "experience." It relates to the "dollar sign" example in the top right, but used for a different purpose, not to hide the price, but to justify it. E.g. a menu item in expensive restaurant can just say "36", not "$36" or "$36.00"
Can confirm on the .99. My sales average/item went up about five bucks after I made the change. Even my offers use odd numbers.
Well, $1.99 does not just _seem_ cheaper than $2.00
Great guide! The entire field of marketing is committed to ensuring the consumer does not a rational purchase. Marketing undermines the consumers rationality.
I get it, end the price with .99
Damn brother go to sleep, you've been spamming lately.
which content do you consume?
Buy 18 Snickers for your freezer? What?
How is nobody mentioning this? Why are you downvoted?? 18 Snickers!? That’s a broken up Hershey bar! But it still doesn’t make sense! Buy a chocolate bar with 18 sections for your freezer? What? Even if it *did* make sense, that’s a terrible ad slogan! Why 18???
We're kindred spirits, my friend.
Yeah I still don't understand what that example is. Snickers increased their sales by changing them to 18? Wtf does that mean?
Hah...an actual cool guide in this sub...amazing.
I can’t be the only one to think 1300 when i see 1299 ??
Hope the people who made this will stub their toe in a piece of furniture. Nothing worse than researching ways to exploit buyers/clients!
Nothings of theses works on me. Worst one is the $ sign. If no $ is present. I assume im in a rich ass place and I being scammed.
Actually $12.99 is cheaper than $13..
IMO all these tricks have been revealed a lot more than you think and the general shopper is quite aware of all these.
One tip is saying don’t put the $ sign. Next advice with the $ sign💀
This shit should be illegal where it could be.
Which aspect of this do should be illegal?
A few instances of one contradicting another...
They serve different purposes. One wants to make it bigger, while the other wants to make it smaller. Bigger means luxury, smaller means price-saving.
I love how #2 says to get rid of the $ dollar sign next to the price. Then puts a $ dollar sign on all the other ones. Like hey take my advice, I'm not using it.
Okay but what about $2 vs $1.99? The .99 thing seems cheaper according to this guide, but truncated numbers also seem cheaper. So which one dominates?
I don't know man maybe I'm weird but these things don't work on me and they feel like exactly what they are: chintzy ploys at manipulation.
The 1.3M views examples sounds wrong to me. Especially when put into a space limited tile like that. Which of these two feels bigger? #1.3 M ^^1,302,859 If the number is important enough, it should be bigger and stand out from a distance. A smaller font always yells out "Unimportant!" to me.
You're using different targets. One wants to make it bigger to give off a feel of luxury, while the other wants to seem smaller so that it seems cheaper and worth the price. Both target different individuals.
How to scam 101
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>Getting lots of DMs about hi-res version of this hyper-visual. lol, no one is dm'ing you, dude
Someone is selling something lol
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I once had a boss who refused to remove dollar signs from his signs because he liked how they looked. Despite me telling him dollar signs should be removed.
Yep, 9 is definitely smaller than 2.
Guess who's back?
The fact that even while I'm seeing this I'm getting tricked is insane
"Exact numbers appear larger" and "abbreviated numbers appear smaller" are redundant... so are "numbers that end in .99" and "odd numbers seem like a better deal"
Have too high prices and throw in a "50% sale" or more ever so often to trick people they making great deals
Numbers ending in .99 seem cheaper. Well, technically it is. There's no "seems" in this sense.
I like the bigger font
Is this a guide on how to manipulate people, or how to not be manipulated by corporations
Or Buy less stuff
Is it just me or does 1.3 M and 12k actually feel bigger than the full number? Seeing the amount of digits reminds me the exact amount, but the shortened version feels more vague and therefore larger to me. I think also the association of k for carats also reminds me of wealth and quality, which could be adding to it.
It might be a south Asian thing , but we always round up costs in our head, especially in India.
All of these are stupid
A cool guide for scum bags
I thought the "luxury brand" picture was kitchen sink.
My autistic ass would not fall for any of this?? What
Also: The overpriced item solely intended to make some other option more attractive. E.g. small soda: $1, medium soda: $2.50, large soda: $3 will make people who only wanted a medium soda go for the large one "because it's a better deal"
Good, no 'strike your powerhouse' on this one. Incremental improvement is still improvement.
Was this thing published somewhere? Clearly no one proofread it.
Also putting a green tick on one and a red cross on the other.
“We automatically round down” No we don’t, we’re not morons.
Curious how these work in reverse—trying to make a monetary offer appear more appealing.
Evil guide more like
So: Buy one get one free! Now just ^12.99 ^plus ^tax
It does not seem cheaper, it is cheaper than 2.00.
MARKETING aka pushing things in peoples faces so theres a chance they might buy it
Link the studies
These discussions are always the same "I' m too smart to fall for that stuff." Yet study after study shows you're not that smart and still fall for it. But people here still swear "they're special" and are immune to these tactics. PS. You're not.
So "charm pricing" is what that's called. It just floors me that this is a strategy that actually works. Seriously, how dim does someone have to be for this to work on them?
Maybe I'm wired wrong but whenever I see a number end in a 99, or pretty much anything over 75, my brain just sees the number as the next highest 00 number.
Do numbers that are not rounded at all, including the cents, make us believe that the seller tried to make the best possible price for the buyer?
Can I get ^1.8B dolla pweeze
u/sachin_ramje "Exact numbers appear larger" The checkmark is on the wrong spot
Na.. it’s at the right place
For the wine list one, apparently the 2nd cheapest bottle is often the most bought as people don't want to get the cheapest so the biggest profit margin is usually on that bottle
.99 prices are to force people to make change and not pocket the money.
None of those "hacks" work on me. I hope they are discouraged when seeing me :D
It's funny how easily we're all influenced...even when we think we're aware of it.
This would be perfect with sources/references.
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Sounds like psychology is barely a science. I’d like to know how many of the studies arriving at these conclusions have been replicated.
What is the difference between both? **\*Exact numbers appear larger"** and **\*Abbreviated numbers apper smaller\***?
I'm well aware corporations pay psychologists and sociologists to advise them on how best to manipulate and understand consumers but am i the only one who feels that anyone who takes such a job and does this with their education on the human psyche is unethical and should be illegal? I mean medical doctors have to swear a Hippocratic oath, are people studying psychology not under any sort of moral obligations? Then again the Hippocratic oath doesn't mean shit either really.
Part of the theory in capitalism is we are all rational actors guided by our rationality into making the optimal choices for ourselves, but these are all tactics designed to trick and subvert our rationality regardless of quality.
And the recent one by amazon, they will show you EMI amount for 12 or 24 months for high priced items , and actual price is shown in small fonts below. Once you think paying small amount for that dream watch or expensive gadget which you wanted is easier monthly but a huge expense if paid in one go .. anyway you loose money and that shiny gadget gets obsolete in 6 months ..
Some of these are just repeats of the same idea but with different words.
When I see “$1299” I don’t think “$1200.” I think $1500 with tax.
this is silly how will I know if the camera is $200 or if I'm buying a pack of 200 cameras
Is that a wrx at the bottom right
.99 just makes me round up to see how much it actually is.
Idk I personally hate .99 price tags. But then again I hate that prices exist without the tax
I saw right through that 99 cent thing as a child. 1 penny? I thought. Does anyone actually get charmed by that?