You’re on a road trip and you roll into a nondescript little town. It’s late evening, your stomach is growing loud as a pack of Sabertooths, and you soon discover there are only two restaurants open.
The first restaurant has one of those menus as long as the Harry Potter books, with hundreds of options for you to choose from. The second has a clean list of half-a-dozen entrees.
Which do you choose?
Most people will go with the latter, and that’s because of the Paradox of Choice: a long-standing psychological principle that states people struggle to make decisions when there are too many options.
What does Paradox of Choice mean for marketing?
Here are some ways it applies to marketing:
- Urgency should have an inverse correlation with choices. Think back to the restaurant example. You needed food fast, hence you didn’t want to think about ordering from a 200-item menu. The more urgent the problem your product solves, the fewer choices you should give people.
- People should feel like they’re seeing all their good options. While slimming down your offering is nice, do it in such a way that people don’t feel that other options are being hidden from them. Give them a concise, comprehensive menu.
- Limiting customization can help prevent abandoned carts. Because the idea of customizing a product often sounds better than it feels.
Bottom line
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