Hey 👋 The Crew here.
You think your local marketing campaign slaps?
Ikea just opened a store in Brighton with a promotional campaign starring the town’s biggest public menace.
Tip: The most divisive locals can also be the strongest brand ambassadors.
Make of that what you will.
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Unit Bias
Ever finished a “family size” bag of chips… by yourself? Or sat down to a massive restaurant portion and felt compelled to clean the plate?
Welcome to the club.
What you’ve experienced is a prime example of Unit Bias.
Hear us out: We humans instinctively assume that whatever unit a product comes in is the right amount to consume. We see “one” bag or “one” plate and our brain codes that as a single serving.
This saves us the cognitive energy of making a decision. We don’t calculate the optimal amount, we just trust the unit. Psychologists call this Unit Bas.
What does science say? It confirms it. In a 2006 study, researchers offered people pretzels from a bowl using either a small or a large scoop. And they found something interesting:
The group with the large scoops ate wayyy more pretzels. Even with the same hunger level in both groups!
The takeaway: The scoop size influenced how much people ate, not their appetite.
We see this everywhere. Finishing a king-size candy bar because it’s one bar. Binge-watching one more episode to complete a season “unit,” or a few pages to finish a book chapter.
And you can see it in marketing strategy as well…
Three ways to leverage Unit Bias
1) Create Single-Serving Options
Guess what our brains can’t get enough of? Completion.
Breaking something into small, easily-manageable units makes consumption feel easy and satisfying.
What you can do: Instead of giving customers a large selection to choose from, present them with a simple, pre-portioned “unit” that feels like the correct amount to consume.
Brands like Nabisco took products like Oreos and Chips Ahoy and repackaged them into small, convenient portions of 100-calories.
This is a masterclass in Unit Bias. Consumers didn’t have to exert self-control and stop eating from a large bag. Instead, they only had to finish a 100-calorie bag to feel like it was a responsible choice.
Breaking stuff down into single units goes beyond D2C here:
- Use progress bars during onboarding so customers feel like they’ve completed a unit.
- Gamify your software into units using “levels,” like Duolingo does, for example.
… Definitely sounds like something you see often, right?
2) Anchor the standard unit
Another aspect of Unit Bias is that we assume whatever unit we have in front of us is the “right” or “normal” amount.
And it’s up to you to define that default unit, that your customers will perceive it as a natural choice.
For example, did you know that Starbucks served a “Short” size coffee?
If you didn’t, that’s fine. Because it was never on the menu.
Instead, Starbucks positioned “Tall” (12oz) as the default unit, which subtly nudged customers into believing that was the normal size of a coffee. If you wanted a short, you had to ask.
Brands do this all the time. In software, your “Pro Plan” can be positioned as the natural unit for most users, while smaller or larger tiers feel like deviations.
See how Notion highlights one plan as the “recommended,” framing it as a separate unit?
Unit Bias is why.
Further reading: This tip is closely related to the Decoy Effect, which we also covered before. It’s worth a read!
3) Bundle everything under one price
Who doesn’t love the simplicity of getting a complete unit?
This is why an all-you-can-eat buffet makes us happy. Even when we don’t eat much, we’ve consumed the complete unit—the buffet experience.
This is why brands bundle up their stuff in a single unit all the time.
Adobe sells a “unit” subscription to a wide range of apps. Netflix bundles hundreds of movies and shows in a single unit.
Even online game developers have figured that combining items into a unit can be lucrative and more appealing to their users:
What you can do: Bundle items, simple as. Package multiple services, products, or features into a single, complete offering that feels like one unified unit.
This leverages Unit Bias because the bundle feels like one complete, finished thing,
… Plus, it usually boosts your average order value. Which is always nice, right?
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MICROSOFT: Whoa. Copilot 3D is here, and it transforms 2D images into usable 3D models in just a few seconds. This certainly lowers the barriers of traditional 3D design, and could help with prototyping, education, gaming, and marketing. Tell your design team!
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ICYMI, last time we looked at Implicit Association Bias.
The “One and Done” Crew
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