Applying scarcity in e-commerce campaigns can be a powerful way to persuade potential buyers to act. “Sold out”, “only 2 items left” and “only available today” are statements you often see. Not surprising, as there are various studies that show that this type of statement increases conversions.
But does scarcity, the persuasion principle from Dr. Robert Cialdini, always and for everyone work? In this blog, we’ll take a deeper look.
Travel websites like Expedia, Booking.com and Hotels.com use scarcity statements a lot. For years, they have tried to persuade their website visitors with the ‘scarce’ availability of rooms. A while ago, it turned out that these statements were not always based on facts. In the meantime, the platforms also admit that these claims are not always linked to actual figures. Having said that, we will continue with the question, how do you use scarcity in the most effective way possible?
What doesn’t work
Many companies think that all website visitors are, by definition, sensitive to scarcity. Experience shows that this is not always the case. Mainly visitors who are further along in their buying process are shown to be sensitive to scarcity. Visitors who are still at the beginning of their customer journey can even experience a scarcity statement as something coercive. This can result in a visitor becoming irritated or even leaving the website and continuing the purchase elsewhere. Applying scarcity to the masses does not work.
We will illustrate the above with an example. A visitor is looking for a summer vacation. He is looking at different islands near the equator on a travel website. From this, it can be concluded that the visitor would like to go to the sun and visit an island. But we do not have any more information than this so far. We do not know which specific island he wants to visit, whether he wants to stay in the city or outside the city, and in which price range he is looking for accommodation.
Understanding purchase intent
To apply scarcity effectively, it is essential to understand the purchase intent of website visitors. If you know which phase of the buying process a visitor is in, you can use persuasion principles to play on this. But how can you find out the purchase intent?
The purchase intent can be found out by mapping out the click, surf, search and scroll behaviour. But also adding or removing filters, selecting brands and entering a departure date can be taken into account. All behaviours can be stored in an individual customer profile within a Customer Data Platform (CDP) for every visitor.
Segments
Then, the customer profiles can be divided into different segments. Visitors who end up in the same segment are very similar to each other based on their behaviour on the site. The chances that this group is sensitive to the same persuasion principle, in this case scarcity, are high. Different segments that are used are based on the phase of the customer journey in which the visitors are located. For example, you have viewers (orientation phase), reviewers & comparators (comparison phase) and funshoppers (decision phase).
Reviewers, comparators and funshoppers are more sensitive to scarcity than viewers. This information can be taken into account in statements on a website. By dividing visitors into different segments, persuasion principles can therefore be applied very specifically. This makes the statements that you set up with a CDP more relevant for a certain segment.
Back to that visitor who is looking for a summer vacation. In the meantime, he knows what he is looking for, and visits the travel website for the third time. He fills in various filter options, such as his desired location Ibiza, travel company of 4 people (of which 2 adults, 2 children) and a hotel in the centre of Ibiza city. He then views a number of specific detail pages. Based on this behaviour, the CDP algorithm concludes that this visitor is in the decision phase and is therefore sensitive to scarcity statements.
Smart persuasion
As mentioned above, one statement is not like the other. It is important to adapt scarcity statements to your segments and assortment. What works best can be investigated by conducting A/B tests.
In addition to applying scarcity, visitors can also be encouraged by persuasion principles such as authority, social proof and reciprocity. The authority of your website can be strengthened, for example, by placing seals of approval, social proof is applied by showing purchases or reviews in a certain period, and reciprocity is used, for example, by giving a discount in return for an email address.
In addition to applying scarcity, visitors can also be encouraged by persuasion principles such as authority, social proof, and reciprocity. The authority of your website can be strengthened, for example, by placing seals of approval, social proof is applied by showing purchases or reviews in a certain period, and reciprocity is used, for example, by giving a discount in return for an email address.
Book a personal demo
Are you curious about how scarcity and other persuasion principles can be applied to your website using segmentation? Request a free demo of Spotler Activate now. Together, we will look at the personalisation possibilities for your company.
