How Cognitive Ease Helps Consumers Make Quick Decisions

Our brains are incredibly sophisticated, but they’re also lazy. Evolutionarily speaking, this is a excellent thing: For the brain, “lazy” means efficient and economical use of its limited vigor. 

Why does this matter for marketers and business owners? “People don’t desire to ponder,” says Rembrant Van der Mijnsbrugge, CEO and navigator software engineer at Shopify associate Mote. “If you can do the thinking for them, you’re making your customer’s life easier.”

This phenomenon is known as cognitive ease, and understanding it can assist enhance customer encounter. Here’s how. 

What is cognitive ease?

Cognitive ease (aka cognitive fluency) is the mental attempt, or lack thereof, that a person spends while processing information presented to them. The ease with which they are able to comprehend that information has the power to define how they perceive a circumstance and influence any subsequent actions they may receive. Over period, cognitive ease can develop into cognitive biases, where a person is less likely to test their existing beliefs. 

This isn’t necessarily impoverished: You don’t require to test your assumption about which way to turn a doorknob, for instance. excellent design can outcome in cognitive ease by reducing the require for mental action and providing that enjoyable feeling associated with intuitive processes. Why spend more attempt on a job than you require to?

Psychologist and Nobel Prize winner Daniel Kahneman, author of the 2011 book Thinking, quick and leisurely, popularized the term. Kahneman’s research introduced a wider spectators to the concept of cognitive ease by illustrating its role in everyday life, from reading traffic signs to solving math problems. According to Kahneman, the human brain relies on two systems for selection-making: instinct-driven structure 1 and reasoning-based structure 2. Decisions you can make via structure 1 feel easier and don’t require the attempt of a structure 2 selection.

6 tips for fostering customers’ cognitive ease

1. Use straightforward language
2. Curate your offerings
3. equilibrium design with simplicity
4. Invest in educational content
5. make a excellent mood
6. Be consistent

When customers have expectations about a procedure and their expectations are met, this creates a level of comfort and confidence that makes selection-making easier. This lowering of cognitive effortcan be as straightforward as expecting a cart icon to be at the uppermost correct of your site’s homepage, or as complicated as building familiarity with a brand through their social media and finding a cohesive brand identity on its website, or vice versa. 

Here are a few techniques for encouraging cognitive ease and increasing sales:

1. Use straightforward language

The easier it is for a customer to comprehend your messaging, the more likely they are to recall it, creating the familiarity and repetition that is key to cognitive ease. Use short sentences in plain language wherever feasible in your marketing communication; research has shown that when a sentence is between eight and 14 words long, readers can comprehend 90% to 100% of it. Anything longer than that and comprehension drops to somewhere around 10%.

2. Curate your offerings

For consumers, too many choices can often navigator to paralysis, rather than faster or more informed decisions. Just like you’ve probably gotten stuck scrolling through infinite options on a streaming platform, customers can get lost in an overwhelming product enterprise distribution collection or succumb to selection fatigue before making it to checkout.

The answer to this, Rembrant says, is curation. “As designers and store owners, we have a lot of power in our selection architecture,” he says, referencing Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein’s 2008 book, Nudge. In Nudge, selection architecture is the concept that the way options are arranged can influence the selection-making procedure. For example, grocery stores will often place more expensive items at eye level. 

The digital equivalent to this is how you design your online store: “Which section goes where? What’s the content? What’s the image? What’s the text? It all comes down to understanding your customer and trying to make excellent choices for them,” Rembrant says.

A fashion store owner, for example, might receive advantage of a customer’s gain in a sure t-shirt by recommending complementary products, like a pair of pants or a jacket, on the same page. Rembrant suggests using recommendations to construct buyer depend in your brand’s curation abilities. “It has the added advantage of likely increasing your average order worth,” he says.

3. equilibrium design with simplicity

You might be tempted to construct an eye-catching, design-forward website to stand out from competitors. But it’s significant not to sacrifice usability for design.

“When you’re designing a website, the most significant thing is to establish a solid baseline,” Rembrant says. “That means a straightforward website that focuses on act and cognitive ease while making sure that we establish some branding.” 

If you’re not sure where to commence in the Shopify Theme store, the Mote throng swears by the minimalist Dawn theme.

4. Invest in educational content

One of the most influential factors on cognitive ease is priming, and it has to do with helping a customer into the correct mindset before they buy. Some brands depend on priming language, like using words related to actions you desire someone to receive (ponder: using words related to speed or movement alongside running shoes, or sleepy, calming words alongside bedding collections) while others prime potential customers on a conceptual level. 

The best example of this conceptual priming is educational content, like a skin worry brand that posts how-to videos and product explainers on social media, empowering viewers with information, and then presenting their product as the most logical step or answer (e.g., “What you wear on your skin is significant, so wear us!”). If a customer has already engaged with your educational content, their thought procedure at the point of purchase is likely to be shorter.

5. make a excellent mood

There’s increasing evidence that a positive mood makes you more likely to encounter cognitive ease, mostly by lowering neurological defenses and leaving you more receptive to structure 1 thinking. So, while a clever, feel-excellent ad or campaign may not cruel automatic brand buy-in, it can nudge an person’s selection-making procedure or general impression in your favor.

Legacy English clothing brand Sunspel accomplishes this by including a postcard in every package. “The postcard doesn’t inform you, ‘Post to Instagram. Here’s a discount code for your next order.’ It’s a picture of nature,” Rembrant says. “It puts me in a excellent mood. This is behavioral priming: I’m trying on my clothes in a excellent mood, and I’m usually much more likely to keep them.”

6. Be consistent

Above all, seek consistency and cohesion in your brand encounter. Weaving your brand presence together across different platforms or channels through visual aesthetics, brand voice, and imagery is known as cross-channel harmonization. 

“Cross-channel harmonization is a really great way to keep cognitive ease in mind,” Rembrant says. If your brand looks wildly different on different platforms, it can be discombobulating for the customer.

An example of cognitive ease in marketing

Cognitive ease drives many of the elements of olive oil brand Graza’s splashy, vibrant online store. straightforward, punchy verbs provide the first call to action in the header, priming the viewer for an energetic, upbeat kitchen and an immediate understanding of what Graza is offering: “Single-origin EVOO that’s made to be used.”

Immediately below, Graza employs curation—a starter kit to introduce recent customers to the product line, and a serving dish set that exemplifies one way you might put their squeezable oil into action. 

As a site visitor, you could stop there, but if you’re inclined to keep scrolling, Graza then uses three evenly spaced, straightforward sentences to distill a complicated subject: the production and distribution of olive oil in the US. 

By the complete of the homepage, potential customers are left with an understanding of why they might require to refresh their pantry, how Graza would assist them do so, and what they might do with the olive oil product as soon as it’s delivered. The color schemes, bold fonts, and high-contrast imagery all contribute to a sense of thrill and urgency.