The Choice Factory - brilliant book on Behavioural Science
I confess.
I’m a Behavioural Science fanboy nerd.
I just love finding out about all the counter-intuitive psychological biases, that make you think, ‘Ah yes, of course!’.
Can’t really remember the exact moment that I became interested in the subject, but I’m pretty sure that it was something to do with Rory Sutherland and Youtube.
Shortly after gorging on Rory, the first book I read on the topic was The Choice Factory by Richard Shotton.
What a corker of a book!
It’s an excellent overview of how findings from Behavioural Science can be applied to advertising and marketing.
But delivered in an extremely accessible user-friendly format.
Why should I read The Choice Factory?
The book bounds along at a great pace in a rhythm of short chapters, as you follow a single person making everyday decisions..
Oh, and there’s a smart twist - the person that you follow through a typical day, is someone of great interest - it’s you.
You make thousands of decisions a day (from the the simple to the significant) and the book cleverly shows:
- Why you made a decision due to a bias
- Academic research that explains the bias
- Nuances of that bias
- Richard showing how his own experiments in 12 years of working experience have confirmed the bias
- How to apply that bias to your work
There are 25 chapters set out like this, each detailing a different cognitive bias, covering such gloriously sounding areas, such as: Wishful Seeing, Goodhart’s Law, Cocktail Party Effect, and 22 others!
What will I learn?
You’ll learn things like:
How your Attention is grabbed by Social Proof, and why a well-worded message in your hotel room changes towel usage by 26%
How to use charm pricing to increase sales
How to make your brand better value by changing the comparison set
Basically, every chapter is filled with wow moments that make you feel that you understand life and decision making a whole lot better.
Thanks for that, Richard!
Who should read The Choice Factory?
If you own a business, you need to read this book, to learn how to activate Behavioural Science biases to increase sales and profit margins.
While many marketers ignore the advice in the results of Behavioural Science experiments, if you harness the findings, you and your brand will be working with a competitive advantage.
And if you are a consumer of just about anything, you need to read this book to try and protect yourself from indulging in the heuristic decision making you don’t even know you are beholden to.
The Choice Factory won the World Cup of Books
The World Cup of Advertising Books, that is.
In 2018, BBH conducted a poll of nearly 5,000 marketers to find the best book ever written on advertising.
Despite the heavy competition including Ogilvy on Advertising, Thinking Fast and Slow, The Long and the Short of it and many more classics, The Choice Factory came out on top.
So, if you haven’t read it yet, get your skates on.
And if you’ve already read it, read it again!
Applying Behavioural Science Insights to Marketing - Workshop Event
Richard is hosting a 2-day virtual workshop event on 14th and 16th Sept, 2021.
It’s an introduction to the field of behavioural science which will give you a simple framework to apply academic research directly into your brand, specifically in how to make your marketing more effective.
Good news for 42courses students who are alumni of any of our 3 Behavioural Science courses…
- Behavioural Science for Brands with Richard Shotton
- Behavioural Economics with Rory Sutherland
- Applied Behavioural Science with Rory Sutherland, Dan Bennet and Ogilvy Consulting
… you can get a whopping £100 off the ticket price for Richard’s workshop.
Check your inbox for an email with the Subject Line, ‘Richard Shotton Behavioural Science Workshop’ for instructions on how to get the reduced price entry.
Follow Richard Shotton on social
Richard posts mega-interesting insights on LinkedIn to fill your brain with all good stuff.
Almost 267,000 followers on LinkedIn can’t all be wrong, can they?
Likewise, the 30,000 followers on Twitter must all be getting good value from Richard’s posts.
And here’s a lovely little podcast with Richard with 42courses founder, Chris.
