In the next few hours, I'll be deleting this video.
So if you're watching this, you're one of the lucky few, who gets to see it.
Or... are you?
Let's talk about scarcity.
When we believe something has a limited supply, high demand or it exists only during a small
window of time, we tend to believe it has a higher value.
You might have clicked on this video, for this exact reason.
It's perceived to only have small window of time, before it gets deleted.
And it accomplished its purpose, which was for you to take action and get you to watch
it as soon as possible.
Now before you click away, let me explain why I wanted you to watch it.
Scarcity has become an extremely powerful tool for advertisers to manipulate you with.
As I said, if something is limited or scarce, our brains tell us it's more valuable than
if it were abundant.
The advertisers know this and they use this exact bias to get you to spend your money
and buy their products.
If you ever paid a visit to Amazon or Booking.com, you know exactly what I mean.
"Only 3 left in stock!"
"Limited time offer!"
"Sale ends on June 21st"
"Offer expires in 4 hours"
These are just some of the examples
you might encounter.
Advertisers use scarcity to inspire fear in you.
They want you to buy their product right away, so they make you believe that if you don't
buy it now, it might be gone by the time you come back.
When something is abundant, we have time to think it through and make a rational decision.
But when it's made out to be scarce, we throw all that logical reasoning out the window
and make emotional and irrational decisions.
Essentially scarcity removes an option to say "maybe I'll buy this later".
It forces you to take immediate action, otherwise you might miss out on the opportunity.
"Yes" or "no", are your only options.
"Maybe later" doesn't exist, because if you wait, the offer might be gone forever.
Take a look at this listing for a nice hotel room.
It looks good, right?
But it's not as convincing as it could be.
Advertisers will use scarcity to make it look more attractive and valuable.
This is the result: First, social proof is used.
It shows us that other people booked this hotel before and liked it.
They want to tell us that we will like it as well.
Second, the offer is made out to be exclusive.
It's like we stumbled upon a rare gem for a great price.
It's almost as if we got extremely lucky.
Third, competition is forced.
It shows us how many people are looking at the same offer.
This forces us to book a room, before someone else does it before us.
Fourth, limited supply is exposed.
This shows us that the there are only a few rooms left and the demand is high.
Someone else might steal the last room from us.
Fifth, there's a time limit.
The offer for this great price expires soon and we have to make a decision now, or the
opportunity is gone forever.
Obviously these two examples are an exaggeration.
But the point is, that it's the same room, for the same price.
However the second one looks way more valuable, as it seems like we're getting a great deal.
And it forces us to book it as soon as possible, since we don't want to miss out on this perceivably
amazing opportunity.
And the interesting thing is that all of this information could be completely made up.
There could be plenty of rooms left, there might be nobody else looking at that offer,
and you could have all the time in the world to make a reservation without the price ever
changing.
I have seen plenty of websites that use scarcity, to get us to buy their stuff.
They have amazing 50% off deals which expire in 30 minutes.
But when you check their website a month later, the same product has the same 50% off tag
and it still says it will expire in 30 minutes.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that the information is always made up.
Some websites use legit information and their products will actually soon be sold out.
But in either instance, we're convinced of the product's scarcity.
And we want that item more, because our brains tell us this is a golden opportunity we can't miss.
But why do we fall for this bias?
Well, if we look at it from an evolutionary point of view, this bias would benefit us
10,000 years ago.
At that time, things were actually scarce and limited.
If we got a chance to get our hands on food, water or shelter, we had to seize the opportunity,
or we might have died.
However, with a supermarket on just about every corner, this evolutionary bias now works
against us.
It's just abused by advertisers to get us to spend our money.
So how can we protect ourselves against it?
As with any other cognitive bias, recognition is the first step.
It's important to know that this bias exists.
Now there are many shapes and forms in which this bias can be used, but the next 3 are
the most popular.
1.
Limited number tactic.
This is the most common one.
It's when the customers are informed that a certain product is in short supply.
3 items left in stock, for example.
2.
Deadline or time limit tactic.
This is where some official time limit is placed on the customer's opportunity, informing
them that they have to make a choice in that time window.
If they don't, the opportunity will disappear in the given time.
It's commonly seen as: "the offer expires today".
This video's title is another example.
3.
High demand tactic.
The customers are informed that the product is hot and that other people want to get their
hands on it as well.
But it also creates a direct competition with those people, for the product.
Also whenever other people want something, we make the mistake thinking that it must
be good, just because everyone else wants to get their hands on it.
However, knowing the causes and workings of scarcity pressures, may not be enough to protect
us from them.
That's because because knowing is a cognitive thing, and cognitive processes are suppressed
by our emotional reaction to scarcity.
If we find ourselves in scarcity pressures, then, our best response would be to pause
and think.
Panicky reactions have no place in wise decisions.
We need to calm ourselves and regain a rational perspective.
Once that is done, we can move to the second stage by asking ourselves why we want the
item in the first place.
Do we really want this thing?
Or do we want it simply because it's made out to be scarce?
Only after asking ourselves this, should we make a decision.
In a lot of cases we'll realize that someone is just trying to sell us something.
Thanks for watching.
Tell me, did I get you click on the video because of it's title?
Let me know in the comments.
Anyhow, hopefully you learned something new and I made you better than yesterday.