be both attractive and functional for consumers on a product-by-product basis. Thompson and her colleagues provide a mathematical model in their research for balancing feature optimization with customer satisfaction. “Our argument was not that features are necessarily bad,” Thompson says, “but that companies need to calibrate, to find the optimal level of features, one that doesn’t hurt your usability and still makes you attractive to consumers in the beginning.” Limited Trial Offer — Act Now!
With that initial research as a foundation, Thompson and Hamilton dove deeper into the consumer’s mindset in their next paper, “Is There a Substitute for Direct Experience?,” published in December 2007 in the Journal of Consumer Research. This research deals with two very different types of consumer experience: direct and indirect. Direct experience comes in the form of a product trial or any other practical, hands-on time with a product. Indirect experience could mean reading a simple description of the product or product reviews, for example. Thompson’s basic theory, rooted in a concept called construal level theory, is that the further away from direct experience a consumer sits, the more likely he or she is to think about a product in abstract terms rather than concrete, practical terms. Abstract thinking leads people to pay more attention to desirability (comparable to capability) than feasibility (comparable to usability). The researchers tested this theory in another set of experiments. The results, simplified: • One group of participants had a direct experience with a product, but when tested two weeks later, they reverted to an abstract mindset and trended toward desirability over feasibility. • In another study, participants exposed to communications encouraging them to think concretely — to imagine using a
product in practical terms — were more drawn to feasibility than desirability. In this case, encouragement to think in concrete terms served as a substitute for direct experience. • When asked to shop for someone else instead of themselves, participants were much more likely to think abstractly and favor desirability over feasibility. “The bottom line is that the higher the direct experiential contact, the more effective you are going to be at shifting consumers’ mindset from abstract to concrete,” Thompson says. Likewise, the further away from direct experience a buyer gets — in time, proximity, or any other form of
“If we try to mimic or approximate this concrete mindset that consumers have after purchase, we can improve the quality of their decisions,” Thompson says. As such, the best option for companies to create satisfied customers often is a product trial. However, product trials are not always practical or even possible. Consider online shopping, for example. Online shoppers cannot physically touch or use a product, so companies might try to provide as concrete a mental picture as possible by encouraging people to think about how they would use a product once it arrives. Thompson mentions a successful Web campaign by Kodak in which consumers could rotate digital
Nearly everyone has a tale of a frustrating product they simply could not figure out. Thompson mentions a friend’s father who went so far as to place tape over the extraneous buttons on his remote control so he would not press them by mistake.
Georgetown University McDonough School of Business
sychological distance — the more they p return to abstract thinking. The paper points to several companies that have successfully integrated direct experience into their sales and marketing. Maytag, for example, has allowed customers to test washing machines by bringing their dirty laundry to the store. Outdoor retailer REI encourages people shopping for a tent to try setting it up in the store (or the parking lot, depending on space). The simpler the tent is to use, the more likely the customer will buy it. Bullet points on a box are mostly moot in the face of direct experience.
images of the company’s cameras on screen and simulate using their buttons with mouse clicks. Such an approach will not appeal to all companies, though. Some companies, particularly those with products that have long intervals between purchases, may be more concerned with the initial sale than with creating customer loyalty for future purchases, because customers are unlikely to come back for a repeat purchase anytime soon. “The less important repurchase is, usually the higher the optimal number of features will be,” Thompson says. For some companies, appealing to the abstract mindset by 29