There are many ways that people can influence our behavior, but perhaps one of the most important is that the presence of others seems to set up expectations. In recent years there has been a necessary shift in the way businesses advertise themselves to consumers, thanks to the increasingly common information overload experienced by the average person. Alongside the growth in media spends is a growth in the sheer volume of products available, which is made possible by increasingly sophisticated technologies for sales, inventory, delivery and so on. Don't forget that this is just paid media advertising.
What does this mean? Well, simply that the strategy of 'just buy some ads and sell the benefits' isn't enough anymore: you'll be lost in the noise. How can a brand retain customers and create loyalty in an atmosphere where everyone else has a better offer? Through tapping into the psychology of building social relationships and adhering to social norms and acceptance.
First scenario: Imagine that you are at home for Thanksgiving, and your mother has pulled out all the stops to lovingly craft the most delicious, intricate dinner ever known to man. You and your family have enjoyed a wonderful afternoon of socializing and snacking on leftovers and watching football, and now it's time to leave. As you hug your parents' goodbye, you take out your wallet. "How much do I owe you for all the love and time you put into this wonderful afternoon?" you ask. "$100 for the food? here, have $50 more as a thank you for the great hospitality!" How would your mother respond to such an offer? I don't know about your mother, but my mom would be deeply offended.
Second scenario: You've gone to a restaurant for Thanksgiving dinner. It's the most delicious dinner you've ever had, the atmosphere is great with the football playing in the background, and best of all, your server is attentive, warm, and maternal. You feel right at home. At the end of the meal, you give her a hug and thank her for the delicious meal before leaving. She calls the cops and has you arrested for a dine-and-dash. And herein lies the difference between social norms and market norms.
The Thanksgiving dinner example is one which I've borrowed from a book by Dan Ariely, Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces that Shape Our Decisions.
We live simultaneously in two different worlds – one where social norms govern, and the other where market norms define the rules. Social norms are usually warm and fuzzy. They are the actions among friends that are not based on money. It is socially unacceptable to keep track of favors given and received when these are done based on friendship. Social norms are about relationships, community, and loyalty. There is an implied reciprocity on some level but it is not instantaneous nor is it expected that the action will be repaid on a financial level. These are the sort of relationships and interactions we expect to have with friends and family.
The business marketing world is the opposite. Market norms are very different. The exchanges are typically well defined (or should be). Here we only deal with people who can provide something to us and our measurement system is based on money. Actions are based on how much money is involved and everyone is clear on this. We try to keep these worlds separate and we act differently in them. When humans understand the boundaries of social norms and market norms and keep them separate, things move along relatively smoothly. We need to be careful to ensure that conflicts are not created by mixing social and market norms. This can spell trouble. Perhaps even land you in jail! It is a strange psychological quirk that 'once market norms enter our considerations, the social norms depart.' Recent 'advertising success stories' are based on and it's the whole premise behind many of the more recent trends in marketing: email marketing, personalization, SMS marketing, good social media marketing, and so on. Therefore, if the average brand wants to get out of the vicious cycle of undercutting competitors in order to gain business, they need to start focusing on relationships and community building instead of just super low prices. Some of the most popular brands are the ones which are able to find the perfect balance. Positive Social Norms Campaigns are one way to promote positive behavior and achieve that perfect balance. These campaigns aim to correct misconceptions by highlighting the actual truth through research. As a teen, it may seem that everyone smokes, but this is far from the truth. In order to change behavior and effect positive change, social norms campaigns can be both effective and eye-opening by pointing out the simple truth. Companies are uniquely positioned to drive change around social norms by using their brand credibility, marketing expertise, reach, and access to key influencers, among other assets. Companies can create significant, lasting social change by shifting harmful social norms. But why should companies invest in changing social norms? What happens when a company calls attention to the social norms attached to their product? Last year, Ariel, one of Procter & Gamble’s India-based detergent brands, launched a new ad campaign called “Share the Load.” The powerful ad, which asked, “Why is laundry only a mother’s job?” went viral in India, quickly receiving almost 3 million views. The ad not only sparked an important conversation in India about men and women’s roles at home—millions of men in India pledged to #SharetheLoad on social media. Dove soap made a splash when they celebrated “real” women in their campaign materials. They developed the campaign based on their study of young girls and the pressure they feel to “be beautiful.” They also developed a self-esteem campaign targeting parents and adults based on the research that 6 out of 10 young girls quit doing what they like because they are concerned about the way they look. Dove's goal is to establish a new social norm for female beauty. US-based TOMS Shoes created an out-of-the-box solution to its objective of helping people even while running a for-profit business. The company founded on the principle that it would give away one shoe to a poor child for free, for every shoe it sold. Their strategy contributed to its revenues and profitability. And they used social media for marketing. Nike's #FindYourGreatness campaign or WestJet’s magical Christmas surprise for their passengers are also great examples of how to tie in your values with your product.
But at the end we ask a simple question, why do these campaigns work? Why do we as humans, adhere to these norms? It’s because we do not expect people to behave randomly but to behave in certain ways in particular situations. Each social situation entails its own particular set of expectations about the “proper” way to behave. Behavior which fulfills these norms is called conformity, and most of the time roles and norms are powerful ways of understanding and predicting what people will do. There are norms defining appropriate behavior for every social group. Norms provide order in society. It is difficult to see how human society could operate without social norms. Human beings need norms to guide and direct their behavior, to provide order and predictability in social relationships and to make sense of an understanding of each other’s actions. There is considerable pressure to conform to social roles. Social roles provide an example of social influence in general and conformity in particular. Most of us, most of the time, conform to the guidelines provided by the roles we perform. We conform to the expectations of others, we respond to their approval when we play our roles well, and to their disapproval when we play our roles badly. But how far will conformity go? How far will brands take it? And are we being manipulated or simply confirming? We all say ‘I DO’ at some point, but the question we should really ask ourselves is ‘DO I?’
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