The Intuitive Customer

Consumers are unreasonable – but they're not stupid. We all like to think we make rational choices. But thirty years' of research has shown that what we actually do is make instinctive, 'gut' choices and then reverse engineer a set of rational criteria to justify that choice in order to fool ourselves into believing that we are not being unreasonable. The funny thing is that those gut choices consumers make are often better than the ones they make when they actively and rationally consider their options. In other words – consumers are sensibly unreasonable. The problem is that a lot of marketing is reasonable – but stupid.

Why does every marketing brochure include a list of features and benefits that are based on the assumption that consumers are making a logical, cognitive choice? We know that they are not, but we keep doing it! By concentrating on providing cognitive solutions to emotional needs, marketing is trying to solve the wrong problem. What matters is how customers feel. You need to understand what makes consumers behave a certain way and then use that knowledge to shape the experience you deliver to the customer.

This book is about Behavioral Economics and consumer psychology. Building on the work of Daniel Kahneman (Thinking Fast and Slow), Dan Ariely (Predictably Irrational) and others, Shaw and Hamilton unpack this new understanding of how people behave, explain what it means for organizations who really want to understand their customers, and show you what to do to create exceptional customer experiences.