The Psychology of
Copywriting

Services feel more valuable in the present tense.

After inspecting a home, a contractor might say:

• Past: Faucet looked good.
• Present: Faucet looks good.

Each sentence activates a different mental image:

• Faucet looked good. Work is completed.
• Faucet looks good. Work is still happening. Even now.

In one study, people believed that John painted more houses when they read an ongoing action (John was painting houses) instead of a completed action (John painted houses; Matlock, 2011).

Ongoing frames depict a mental image of the labor:

It also happens with customer reviews.

Researchers analyzed 2 million Amazon reviews, and they confirmed that reviews get more helpful votes when they're framed in the present tense (Fang & Maglio, 2024).

• ...was great. Benefits have stopped.
• ...will be great. Benefits haven't happened yet.
• ...is great. Benefits are still happening.

Takeaways:

• Check Your Service-Related Copy. When possible, frame completed actions in the present. Check service reports, sales calls, outreach messages, and customer support.

• Fang, D., & Maglio, S. J. (2024). Time perspective and helpfulness: Are communicators more persuasive in the past, present, or future tense? Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 110, 104544.
• Matlock, T. (2011). The conceptual motivation of aspect. Motivation in Grammar and the Lexicon, 27, 133.

Copy should flow seamlessly.

How can you tell whether copy is flowing? Read it aloud.

Copy is read through inner speech: You speak these words in your mind (Yao & Scheepers, 2015).

Thus, copy that is hard to say will be hard to read.

Add variety too (e.g., different words, sentence lengths). Eating the same food becomes repetitive and boring without variety (Rolls et al., 1981). Copy is no different.

What to Diversify

• Starting Phonemes. I found a patio set on Target that described “sling-style seating” and “space-saving storage" which are tongue twisters. Alliteration can be persuasive in branding and advertising, but it can be a detriment in long-form copy. People are slower to read sentences with repeated sounds: The sparrow snatched the spider swiftly off the ceiling (McCutchen et al., 1991).
• Ending Phonemes. Likewise, replace “sling seating” with "sling chairs."
• Adjoining Phonemes. It's hard to read “chairs sling” because of the adjoining “s” phoneme.
• Word Length. It's hard to read many small words (e.g., free you up to do the things you love).
• Sentence Length. Read these short sentences. The writing might seem fine. Heck, it might seem engaging. But soon you’ll notice something. This writing is becoming repetitive. Your brain wants a change. It's bored with short sentences. It wants a long sentence. So let’s add a long sentence. Notice how this new sentence feels refreshing and invigorating because of its lengthy prose; it feels like a breath of fresh air that your brain has been seeking.
• Emotional Content. Movies and written copy are more successful when they shift unpredictably between different emotions (Berger et al., 2021).
• Bold and Italics. Especially on emotional words—like exciting or frustrating. Readers internally speak these words with stronger emotionality, intensifying their engagement (Yao & Scheepers, 2015).

Related Applications

• Sequence Words in Alphabetical Order. Customers preferred the slogan Bufferil eases pain because each word was positioned in alphabetical order. Something felt right (King & Auschaitrakul, 2020)

• Berger, J., Kim, Y. D., & Meyer, R. (2021). What makes content engaging? How emotional dynamics shape success. Journal of Consumer Research, 48(2), 235-250.
• King, D., & Auschaitrakul, S. (2020). Symbolic sequence effects on consumers’ judgments of truth for brand claims. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 30(2), 304-313.
• McCutchen, D., Bell, L. C., France, I. M., & Perfetti, C. A. (1991). Phoneme-specific interference in reading: The tongue-twister effect revisited. Reading Research Quarterly, 87-103.
• Rolls, B. J., Rolls, E. T., Rowe, E. A., & Sweeney, K. (1981). Sensory specific satiety in man. Physiology & behavior, 27(1), 137-142.
• Yao, B., & Scheepers, C. (2015). Inner voice experiences during processing of direct and indirect speech. Explicit and implicit prosody in sentence processing: Studies in honor of Janet Dean Fodor, 287-307.

Are emojis persuasive?

They can be. AirBnb hosts increase their bookings when they include smiling emojis in messages (Shuqair et al., 2024).

But you need to be careful.

Emojis Should Be

• Supplemental. Don't replace copy (e.g., it's so 😂). You should be to remove emojis without reducing comprehension (e.g., it's so funny 😂). Indeed, supplemental emojis get more likes, retweets, clicks, and purchases (Maiberger et al., 2023).
• End of Sentences. Use them as a supplement conclusion. Keep this in mind 🧠.
• Facial. Smiling faces activate contagion — viewers are triggered to smile because their facial muscles become activated. Indeed, anthropomorphized emojis induce more engagement (Shuqair et al., 2024).
• Positive. Facial emojis activate whichever emotion is depicted. Researchers confirmed this effect in a text exchange with AirBnb hosts. Compared to no emojis: Happy emojis increased satisfaction while confirming the booking, whereas sad emojis decreased satisfaction while mentioning a delay (Shuqair et al., 2024). No emojis are better than sad emojis.

Other Applications

• Use Many Emojis to Grab Attention. Based on 200k AirBnB listings, new sellers increase their bookings when they insert multiple emojis in their listings because they stand out (Orazi et al., 2023). But the emojis needed to be supplemental; substitutive emojis reduced conversions.
• Don't Mix Emojis and GIFs. Including both reduced app subscriptions and usage because the UI looked cluttered (Bashirzadeh et al., 2022).

• Bashirzadeh, Y., Mai, R., & Faure, C. (2022). How rich is too rich? Visual design elements in digital marketing communications. International journal of research in marketing, 39(1), 58-76.
• Maiberger, T., Schindler, D. & Koschate-Fischer, N. Let’s face it: When and how facial emojis increase the persuasiveness of electronic word of mouth. J. of the Acad. Mark. Sci. (2023).
• Orazi, D. C., Ranjan, B., & Cheng, Y. (2023). Non-face emojis in digital marketing: Effects, contingencies, and strategic recommendations. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 51(3), 570-597.
• Shuqair, S., Pinto, D. C., Herter, M. M., & Mattila, A. (2024). Emojis as heuristic cues: The multifaceted role of emojis in online service interactions. Journal of Consumer Behaviour.

Do you know what zal means? Me neither.

Researchers found that meaningless descriptions (e.g., zal fried chicken) reduced sales. These products seemed more expensive, yet worse in quality (Baskin, & Liu, 2021).

It’s not just zal. Marketers sprinkle impressive words (e.g., industrial, disruptive, esoteric) in their copy, yet these words remain meaningless to many customers.

Exceptions might exist, but you could probably remove these words from your materials:

• full-bodied
• artisanal
• industrial
• disruptive
• esoteric
• opulent
• eco-friendly
• avant-garde

• Baskin, E., & Liu, P. J. (2021). Meaningless descriptors increase price judgments and decrease quality judgments. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 31(2), 283-300.

Customers group nearby objects.

Two nearby objects can fuse into a single object.

Same with words.

Customers translate clusters of words, not individual words. A small $5 fee seems cheaper than a $5 fee because smallness infuses with the price (Rick et al., 2008).

Or compare these descriptions:

• Customers find that the chair is comfortable.
• Customers find the chair comfortable.

The second version conveys more comfort because chair and comfortable are closer together (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980).

Embrace Assurances

You can depict actions to be more desirable by including positive words nearby.

See a purchase button? A positive statement (e.g., Instant Access, 100% Secure) can infiltrate this mental imagery, depicting this behavior as more pleasant.

Which assurance is best? Try to validate the purchase.

Researchers tested different types of assurances at the largest fashion retailer in China.

Pressure Messages

• Supply - Only X products left
• Time - Deal ends in X hours
• Social - X people bought this item in the last 24 hours

Assurances

• Choice - Won't it be your best choice?
• Style - This item especially fits your casual style
• Fit - Check out the perfect size for you

Pressure messages boosted short-term sales, but they reduced long-term profit due to a sharp increase in returns:

Pressure-driven nudges slightly outcompete the assurance-initiated equivalents, as the former increase sales by 2.2 times, and the latter do so by 1.9 times… However, assurance nudges reduce product returns by more than 69.3% relative to the levels achieved with the former (Ghose et al., 2024, p. 519).

Avoid Negative Frames

In addition to keeping positive words near brands and actions, you should also push away negative images.

Sometimes copy will depict the absence of something harmful. Our product:

• Doesn’t leak.
• Has no BPA.
• Won’t scratch your car.

Yet customers need to imagine these negative events to understand the meaning (see Béna et al., 2023). Replace any negative images (e.g., won't damage skin) with a pleasant image (e.g., soft and gentle on skin) to maintain positive emotions.

Even healthy food should probably relocate fat free or low sodium to be further away because of these negative connotations (Mai & Hoffmann, 2015).

Or try morphing negative words into positive frames:

• Leak-proof
• BPA-free
• Scratch-free

Doesn’t leak implicitly conveys something leaking, but leak-proof conveys durable material.

But you can still include regular negations:

• Nike: There is no finish line.
• Coke: Can't beat the feeling.
• Google: Do no evil.

Brands get more social engagement with negations because these statements seem powerful and truthful (Pezzuti & Leonhardt, 2023).

• Béna, J., Mauclet, A., & Corneille, O. (2023). Does co-occurrence information influence evaluations beyond relational meaning?. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 152(4), 968.
• Coulter, K. S., & Coulter, R. A. (2005). Size does matter: The effects of magnitude representation congruency on price perceptions and purchase likelihood. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 15(1), 64-76.
• Ghose, A., Lee, H. A., Nam, K., & Oh, W. (2024). The effects of pressure and Self-Assurance nudges on product purchases and returns in online retailing: evidence from a randomized field experiment. Journal of Marketing Research, 61(3), 517-535.
• Rick, S. I., Cryder, C. E., & Loewenstein, G. (2008). Tightwads and spendthrifts. Journal of consumer research, 34(6), 767-782.
• Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M. (1980). The metaphorical structure of the human conceptual system. Cognitive science, 4(2), 195-208.
• Mai, R., & Hoffmann, S. (2015). How to combat the unhealthy= tasty intuition: The influencing role of health consciousness. Journal of Public Policy & Marketing, 34(1), 63-83.

Most behaviors involve a motor action.

Therefore, try activating the muscles in this behavior.

In one study, participants were asked to turn a knob once they understood a sentence, and they turned the knob faster when this rotation matched the sentence (e.g., Katie opened a water bottle) because their muscles became activated (Zwaan & Taylor, 2006).

In fact, any motor action should induce more physical actions.

Customers who type their query into an ecommerce website are more likely to buy than customers who speak their query (King et al., 2022). If you're already typing, it feels easy to type a credit card. Vocal interactions would require a larger mental shift to imagine this behavior.

How to Apply

• Say Click, Tap, or Type. Merely reading these words can ease these behaviors.

• Tell Retail Passerbys to Walk In. Replace "we're open" with a more direct "Walk in, we're open."
• Show Hands. Add hand graphics on tip jars, donation bins, vending machines, or any medium where customers insert money. Customers feel ownership of these hands (Luangrath et al., 2022).

• Show Graspable Cues Near Writing Tasks. Shoppers were 3x more likely to write their contact details for a loyalty program when the tabletop poster showed a vegetable peeler with the handle on the right, which primed the motor action of writing for right-handed shoppers (the majority of the population; Maille et al., 2020).

• Insert Textures Near Buttons. Customers can imagine this bumpy texture, and they blame this imageability on their desire to touch.

Caveats

• Prime Speaking in Sales Scenarios. Most people renew an insurance contract by talking to a sales rep. In these scenarios in which speaking is a key modality, vocal bots convert higher than motor interactions (Zierau et al., 2023).

• King, D., Auschaitrakul, S., & Lin, C. W. J. (2022). Search modality effects: merely changing product search modality alters purchase intentions. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 50(6), 1236-1256.
• Luangrath, A. W., Peck, J., Hedgcock, W., & Xu, Y. (2022). Observing product touch: The vicarious haptic effect in digital marketing and virtual reality. Journal of Marketing Research, 59(2), 306-326.
• Maille, V., Morrin, M., & Reynolds-McIlnay, R. (2020). On the other hand…: Enhancing promotional effectiveness with haptic cues. Journal of Marketing Research, 57(1), 100-117.
• Zwaan, R. A., & Taylor, L. J. (2006). Seeing, acting, understanding: motor resonance in language comprehension. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 135(1), 1.
• Zierau, N., Hildebrand, C., Bergner, A., Busquet, F., Schmitt, A., & Marco Leimeister, J. (2023). Voice bots on the frontline: Voice-based interfaces enhance flow-like consumer experiences... Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 51(4), 823-842.

Buttons shouldn't impact a purchase.

But they do.

Customers evaluate purchase decisions by imagining two scenarios:

• Consuming a product (outcome)
• Acquiring a product (process)

Easy-to-click buttons can strengthen process simulations. Customers can easily imagine themselves completing the next step, blaming this vivid imagery on their desire to complete the next step.

Place Buttons In These Locations

• Bottom. Bottom locations feel physically closer to us (Vecera et al., 2002). On mobile devices, purchase buttons should usually be located near the bottom of the screen. But it can vary on desktop. Interestingly, in a pilot study with a desktop mockup, I confirmed that short people prefer buttons at the bottom, while tall people prefer buttons at the top.
• Right. My pilot studies also confirmed that right-handers prefer buttons on the right, while left-handers prefer buttons on the left. Right-handers comprise most of the population, so these locations will usually convert better. That's why product pages typically place buy buttons toward the right side.
• Foreground. Insert something behind buttons so they look physically closer to the user.

• Vecera, S. P., Vogel, E. K., & Woodman, G. F. (2002). Lower region: a new cue for figure-ground assignment. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 131(2), 194.

Reading triggers inner speech.

You speak these words in your mind (Alderson-Day & Fernyhough, 2015).

Since buttons represent a 1st person declaration, they should produce inner speech that feels natural. Otherwise, something will feel wrong. And users will blame this negative emotion on the requested action.

How to Apply

• Mimic Their Tone of Voice. Avoid cutesy text (e.g., Count Me In) and exclamations (e.g., Buy Now!).
• Mention the Immediate Next Step. The text Buy on Amazon can feel weird because this step isn't immediate. After clicking this button, users would still need to read the product details and evaluate the purchase. The text View on Amazon feels more natural and less effortful.

Caveats

• Measure Conversions in Later Stages. Even though Buy on Amazon might reduce click-through rates, this text could increase conversions in later stages by extracting more commitment. Clicking this button will spark a battle of cognitive dissonance that requires users to reject this commitment to the purchase.

Imagine a selection of options.

Like these investments:

• Stocks
• Mutual Funds

People distribute resources equally:

…[for] decision tasks in which people are called on to allocate a scarce resource (e.g., money, choices, belief) over a fixed set of possibilities (e.g., investment opportunities, consumption options, events)…they are biased toward even allocation (Fox et al., 2005, p. 338)

Investing $10k? You might invest $5k in stocks and $5k in mutual funds.

But if you see a third option — treasury bonds — your dispersion will be further diluted:

• $3.3k in stocks
• $3.3k in mutual funds
• $3.3k in bonds

Or consider two trays of food:

• Healthy
• Unhealthy

You can influence people to choose more healthy food by partitioning this category into more units:

• Healthy—Vegetables
• Healthy—Fruit
• Unhealthy

Now more healthy food will be chosen merely because of the larger ratio of options.

Follow this strategy for ratings or self-assessments. Provide a greater selection of positive ratings so that people are biased to rate positively and reinforce this attitude toward your brand.

For example, Netflix offers three ratings for their content:

• Not for me
• Like this
• Love this

Two ratings — Not for me and Love this — would cause more people to choose Not for me, leading them to infer that Netflix isn't as valuable as they believed because they keep disliking their content. And their middle rating — Like this — implies more positivity than a more realistic average like Meh.

• Fox, C. R., Bardolet, D., & Lieb, D. (2005). Partition dependence in decision analysis, resource allocation, and consumer choice. In Experimental business research (pp. 229-251). Springer, Boston, MA.

I categorized all behaviors by valence and agency.

I call it the equity scale or decision scale.

Basically, there are 4 behaviors:

1. Misdeeds—You do something bad
2. Mishaps—Something bad happens to you
3. Obligations—You do something good
4. Enrichment—Something good happens to you

Every behavior tilts the scale, requiring any opposite behavior to regain balance.

This scale is ingrained into the criminal justice system. Someone who commits a misdeed (e.g., crime) will typically suffer a mishap (e.g., prison, fine) or perform an obligation (e.g., community service). The victim (who suffered a mishap) might receive enrichment (e.g., money) to rebalance their scale.

See my book The Tangled Mind for applications with morality. See my other book Imagine Reading This Book for applications with self-motivation.

Be careful with empty space.

Even though it can optimize visual layouts, it can also reduce persuasion.

Across 7 studies, messages were less persuasive when they were surrounded by empty space (Kwan, Dai, & Wyer, 2017).

Empty space is most harmful below arguments. Readers infer that you were unable to fill this space with additional reasons, so your message seems less credible.

"a communicator who intends to convey a strong opinion is likely to use all of the space available to elaborate his or her position, whereas a communicator who is less confident... may leave space unused." (Kwan, Dai, & Wyer Jr, 2017, p. 450)

Plus, it triggers an anchoring effect. Your benefits might "feel smaller" if they consume a small fraction of available space.

Try shrinking this canvas so that customers receive 100% of potential benefits.

• Kwan, C. M., Dai, X., & Wyer Jr, R. S. (2017). Contextual influences on message persuasion: The effect of empty space. Journal of Consumer Research, 44(2), 448-464.

People like new stuff.

It's a recent finding called the mere newness preference (Jie & Li, 2022).

How does it work? 

Well, I just called it a “recent” finding. Based on this mere newness, you think the study is more important. Even though it could be garbage.

And it's been replicated: The same headphones seemed more innovative when they were a week old (vs. a year old; Min, 2023).

Innovative ideas are likely to be the most recent ones…  this observation is so prevailing that its reverse causality (i.e., recency  is innovative) may also seem to be the case (Min, 2023)

Why It Works

• Evolution. Researchers argue that it stems from evolution: "Over millennia of evolution, humans have developed a taste for fresh foods due to their greater nutrition content and disgust toward decaying foods due to their possibility for illness (Jie & Li, 2022, p. 2)"
• Proximity. New products feel subconsciously closer to you in the present. A study from 20 years ago might seem boring, while a new study – even the same finding – would seem relevant because it’s closer to you.

How to Apply

• Frame Products With the Most Recent Date. Production date, release date, purchase date, etc.
• Always Mention Products That Newly Arrived. Fresh cars at a dealership seem better than identical cars that have been sitting on the lot, even if nobody has driven them.
• Embrace the Word Today. An ice cream shop could mention "Today's Flavors" even if they're permanent.
• Reframe Scarcity For Fresh Products. Only 2 left can boost sales for limited editions. But in other scenarios, this message could imply leftover options that nobody wanted. Perhaps try the opposite framing — newly arrived 2 days ago — to motivate customers to buy fresh options that won’t stay fresh much longer.

• Jie, Y., & Li, Y. (2022). Chronological cues and consumers’ preference for mere newness. Journal of Retailing, 98(3), 527-541.
• Min, B. (2023). Because it is brand new! Recency heuristic for product innovativeness evaluation. International Journal of Consumer Studies, 47(3), 1023-1041.

Help readers imagine using your product.

Stronger simulations wil induce stronger emotions (and desire).

Therefore, replace vague copy with concreteness:

• Features. Replace ounces or grams with bags or pieces (Monnier & Thomas, 2022).
• Actions. Replace sign up for an account with create a username and password.
• Benefits. Replace easy to use with a specific reason. Minimal features? Beautiful interface? Quick 2-min onboarding? Automates tasks? Same with durable: Can drop it? No tearing? Heavy? Long-lasting? Other vague culprits: quality, powerful, high-performance, fast, reliable, premier, best.

If a customer is trying a shirt, a salesperson could say:

• THAT looks great!
• That TOP looks great!
• That SHIRT looks great!
• That GREEN T-SHIRT looks great!

Each subsequent example is more concrete.

And this imagery is persuasive. Customers imagine themselves using your product, so this imagery intensifies their emotional response because they can simulate the benefits (Packard & Berger, 2021).

Replace any vague placeholders:

• This service can…
• This makeover can…

Or consider support messages.

• I can’t add a new product to your order. But you can cancel the current order, then add a new item.
• I can’t add those jeans to your order. But you can cancel the shoes, then add the jeans.

How to Apply

• Fill Sentences With Semantically Related Words. Your brain is a web of knowledge. Reading the words DEEP, SALTY, FOAM will activate the related concept SEA because of spreading activation (Collins & Loftus, 1975; Topolinski & Strack, 2008). Try fueling these flames of activation. Selling a coffee brewer? Replace make coffee with brew coffee so that these related words — brew and coffee — merge their activation into a stronger burst, resulting in more vivid imagery.
• Suggest Relevant Ideas For Your Product. A life insurance plan was preferred when it covered death by terrorism compared to death by any reason. Even though any reason was objectively better, people struggled to imagine possible scenarios (Johnson et al., 1993). Help people imagine buying food containers by providing specific examples of food they can store: soups, sauces, stews, meats, fruits, veggies. Sell copywriting services? Replace broad services of marketing or emails with specific applications of product launches, newsletters, etc.

• Monnier, A., & Thomas, M. (2022). Experiential and analytical price evaluations: How experiential product description affects prices. Journal of Consumer Research, 49(4), 574-594.
• Packard, G., & Berger, J. (2021). How concrete language shapes customer satisfaction. Journal of Consumer Research, 47(5), 787-806.

Should copy be rational or emotional?

The best copy is aligned with the brand.

An emotional drink converted better with Vitamin C, but its scientific equivalent Ascorbic Acid converted better for a rational drink (Tok et al., 2024).

Scientific rationales can feel weird for emotional products:

• Our rigorous scientific development process ensures that Zoza cookies taste delicious, indulgent, and gooey.

That blurb converted better without the scientific preface (Philipp-Muller et al., 2023).

Perhaps Brooklinen should reword dual-core structure in their pillow copy:

How to Apply

• Reconsider AI Features in Emotional Niches. Do you really need them?
• Explain Why Science is Necessary. A brief disclaimer minimized backlash.
• Use Informal Pronouns for Warm Brands. Address customers with informal pronouns (e.g., tu in Spanish) if your brand is relatable (Leung et al., 2023).
• Write Emotional Copy for Infrequent Buys. Customers rely on feelings for rare purchases (e.g., homes, birthdays, furniture) because they feel justified in deviating from the norm of rational decisions. A rational ad for tea bags converted better with everyday shoppers, while an emotional ad converted better with infrequent shoppers (Cheng et al., 2024).

• Cheng, Y., Zhang, K., & Zhuang, X. (2024). Follow your heart or your mind: The effect of consumption frequency on consumers’ reliance on feelings. Journal of Business Research, 175, 114543.
• Leung, E., Lenoir, A. S. I., Puntoni, S., & Van Osselaer, S. M. (2023). Consumer preference for formal address and informal address from warm brands and competent brands. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 33(3), 546-560.
• Markowitz, D. M., & Shulman, H. C. (2021). The predictive utility of word familiarity for online engagements and funding. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 118(18), e2026045118.
• Philipp-Muller, A., Costello, J. P., & Reczek, R. W. (2023). Get Your Science Out of Here: When Does Invoking Science in the Marketing of Consumer Products Backfire?. Journal of Consumer Research, 49(5), 721-740.
• Tok, D., Chen, X., Chang, C. T., & Chu, X. Y. (2024). “Ascorbic Acid” or “Vitamin C?” When and how scientifically or commonly named ingredients enhance product evaluations. Psychology & Marketing, 41(10), 2537-2550.
• Wadhwa, M., & Zhang, K. (2015). This number just feels right: The impact of roundedness of price numbers on product evaluations. Journal of Consumer Research, 41(5), 1172-1185.

Most products do [something] for [someone].

Imagine a course on writing.

Which side is more persuasive: A course...

• ...on writing?
• ...for writers?

I'd argue that roles are more persuasive than actions.

1. Roles Are Permanent

Compare these:

• Jennifer enjoys dogs a lot
• Jennifer is a dog person

Both seem similar, but Jennifer seemed more enamored with dogs when she was described as a dog person (Walton & Banaji, 2004).

Same with these examples:

• ...is a coffee-drinker VS. drinks coffee a lot
• ...is a night person VS. stays up late
• ...is a baseball fan VS. watches baseball a lot

Verbs are fickle — they depend on the day, time, and more.

But nouns? They're permanent.

Therefore, a course "for writers" will convey permanent benefits.

2. Implicit Social Proof

Consider each mental image:

• ...on writing: Prospects imagine the act of writing.
• ...for writers: Prospects imagine a group of writers taking your course.

Roles contain social proof. And these hypothetical people belong to the same ingroup as prospects, so this effect is further magnified.

3. Validation for Newcomers

Some purchases can validate a role.

If writers are buying your course, they will inherit this designation (i.e., become an official writer) by merely purchasing it.

Takeaway

• Sprinkle Roles Throughout Copy. You can still mention actions too. Just don't forget to include roles.

Caveats

• Foster a Growth Mindset. Customers were less likely to sign up for a training program for "leaders" because it seemed difficult (Savani & Zou, 2019). But this hesitation was resolved by describing leadership as a skill that could be developed.
• Harder With Diverse Segments. You might need action-framing if your product caters to many types of people.

• Savani, K., & Zou, X. (2019). Making the leader identity salient can be demotivating. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 25(2), 245.
• Walton, G. M., & Banaji, M. R. (2004). Being what you say: The effect of essentialist linguistic labels on preferences. Social Cognition, 22(2), 193-213.

Attitudes are plagued with uncertainty.

Customers are unaware how they truly feel in many scenarios, often determining their attitudes by judging their behavior: Hmm, I'm eating. So I must be hungry.

You can influence attitudes by orienting attention toward these behaviors. For example, Netflix provides three ratings for their content:

• Not for me
• Like this
• Love this

All ratings are positive because any negative sentiment (e.g., Dislike This) would create a self-fulfilling prophecy: Hmm, guess I hate Netflix content. So why am I subscribed?

Replace Sorry With Thank You

Imagine that a contractor is 1-hour late. You might hear:

• Sorry for for the wait.
• Thank you for waiting.

Sorry reduces satisfaction because customers infer that something negative has happened to them, whereas thank you implies that customers are forgiving and patient. So they act forgivingly. This example has been replicated across dozens of scenarios (You et al., 2020).

Frame New Customers as First-Timers

WiderFunnel boosted conversions for a nonprofit by asking visitors to select an option. I'm a:

• Regular donor
• Occasional donor
• First-time donor

New visitors affirmed their identity as a first-time donor, which compelled them to donate. An option like "I've never donated" would have reinforced this passive inaction.

Rationalize Negative Behaviors

You always hear: It doesn't hurt to ask.

Well, it can hurt. If you reject or ignore a call to action, you might convince yourself that you dislike this brand: Hmm, why didn't I share their message? Guess I don't like them (Gvili & Levy, 2024).

Always rationalize inaction with a positive spin. If customers scroll to the end of your catalog without clicking any products, show a link to your Product Quiz. Blame their inaction on indecisiveness, not apathy.

Same with skipping behavior. Users who skipped an option to contribute to their savings account were less likely to contribute in the future because contributions seemed less important. Users needed to see a follow-up message that reinforced the importance of savings (Reiff et al., 2023).

Highlight a Customer's Loyal Behavior

Customers feel loyal to a brand if their actions resemble a loyal customer. Perhaps mention competing alternatives they've ignored:

...if a salesperson identifies a consumer who is likely to purchase an Apple iPhone, making them aware of a Samsung promotion could cause them to experience resistance toward that offer and result in the purchase of supplemental services like insurance as well as branded accessories (Pratt et al., 2023).

• Gvili, Y., & Levy, S. (2024). Vive la résistance: a boomerang effect of resisting incentivized eWOM on consumer trust. International Journal of Advertising, 1-23.
• Pratt, A. B., Robinson, S. G., Voorhees, C. M., Wang, J., & Giebelhausen, M. D. (2023). Unintended effects of price promotions: Forgoing competitors’ price promotions strengthens incumbent... Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 51(5), 1143-1164.
• Reiff, J., Dai, H., Beshears, J., Milkman, K. L., & Benartzi, S. (2023). Save more today or tomorrow: the role of urgency in precommitment design. Journal of Marketing Research, 60(6), 1095-1113.
• You, Y., Yang, X., Wang, L., & Deng, X. (2020). When and why saying “thank you” is better than saying “sorry” in redressing service failures: The role of self-esteem. Journal of Marketing, 84(2), 133-150.

Time is categorized into brackets.

Customers prefer a more expensive UberX if it arrives within the same hour (e.g., 1:58pm). Crossing a time bracket (e.g., 2:01pm) feels longer even if the difference is trivial (Donnelly et al., 2022).

Therefore:

• Minimize brackets for negative events (e.g., layovers).
• Maximize brackets for positive events (e.g., lunch break).

Why It Works

• Anchoring. This effect resembles just-below prices in which $4.99 feels cheaper than $5.00. Much like a one-cent difference, a one-minute difference can be deceptively powerful because your brain overemphasizes the unit difference.

How to Apply

• Shipping. Imagine that today is August 23. Free shipping feels worse if the product arrives in September, while expedited shipping feels enticing if the product arrives within the same month of August.

• Store Hours. Perhaps extend store hours from 8:30pm to 9:00pm so that you reach a new time bracket. This extra 30 minutes will feel like 60 minutes.
• Length of Benefits. Access to customer support might end on the final day of a month (e.g., August 31). Why not shift this timeline a single day (e.g., September 1) so that it feels like an extra month.
• See Results By. Frame results within the current time bracket (e.g., end of the month, quarter, or year).
• Meetings. A 45-minute meeting is preferred from 1:00pm to 1:45pm (vs. 1:30pm to 2:15pm). However, meetings seem more productive when they span more time brackets. People estimated they could accomplish more tasks during seemingly larger time windows.

• Life Decisions. Would a 17-year old be tempted to pursue a 2-year degree that finishes in their teens? Would an 18-year-old be less intimidated with a 4-year degree since both programs end in their twenties?

• Donnelly, K., Compiani, G., & Evers, E. R. (2022). Time periods feel longer when they span more category boundaries: Evidence from the lab and the field. Journal of Marketing Research, 59(4), 821-839.

Customers believe that:

150% more than [number] = 150% of [number]

But these variations are different:

• 150% of 100 = 150
• 150% more than 100 = 250

Customers equate these statements, but they differ by a full 100 percent. That’s why it’s called the Off by 100% Bias (Fisher & Mormann, 2022).

Therefore, be careful with percentages that depict a relative change. Suppose that you increased a product’s battery life from 4 hours to 9 hours.

• Don’t say: Battery lasts 125% longer.
• Say: You doubled the battery life.

The latter is technically smaller, but it sounds bigger.

• Fisher, M., & Mormann, M. (2022). The off by 100% bias: the effects of percentage changes greater than 100% on magnitude judgments and consumer choice. Journal of Consumer Research, 49(4), 561-573.