How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things • Hacker News Board

Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things

#81

Post by reroute1 » Tue, Jun 25, 2019, 4:08 PM UTC

lotsofpulp wrote: post #79

reroute1 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People care more about feeling like they save money vs. actually saving money? If they found out they were just given the illusion of saving money vs. actually saving money who would choose the illusion? I sure as hell wouldn't it seems totally illogical.

People can search the price on their phone and compare, but many don't. There does exist a significant population that feels better getting a discount.

Businesses can set prices however they want, but that doesn't mean anyone has to buy it. But when shady pricing and sales come in the consumer feels better because they think they're saving and don't realize they are being deceived. Certainly there are lazy people, but that's entirely different no one would willingly pay more for the same service. They're only "happy" because they're being lied to. Why should we reinforce this kind of behavior?

Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things

#82

Post by lotsofpulp » Tue, Jun 25, 2019, 4:11 PM UTC

mcv wrote: post #73

lotsofpulp wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>So if a potential buyer sees something 70% discounted, that implies that originally, the market determined that higher price as a fair price: a price that at least some buyers would pay for this item. The buyer trusts the market that that is apparently a fair price, but today the buyer is in luck, because it's been discounted to below the usual market price! This whole paragraph is wrong in my opinion. A 70% discoun…

We're not talking about what the law says, we're talking about whether it's misleading. If the amount from which it was discounted is utterly meaningless, then why mention it at all? Because the seller wants the buyer to believe the item is more valuable than it really is. That's why it's misleading. The fact that the deception is legal, doesn't mean it's not deceptive. It is deceptive. It is very clearly, obviously,…

Real life shows there exists a population of buyers that would prefer store A than store B in the example below:

Store A: sells item X at 80% off for $10 Store B: sells item X for $10

It's Kohl's and Bed Bath and Beyond and JCPenney's entire business model. Some people love waiting for their coupons at home and figuring out where they can get the most "%" off.

Should we outlaw store A?

Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things

#83

Post by save_ferris » Tue, Jun 25, 2019, 4:18 PM UTC

SmirkingRevenge wrote: post #23

vmurthy wrote: post #6

An age old tactic I have encountered: Deep discounts (after raising the prices of course). For e.g. (Harvard research paper - WIP) https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Publication%20Files/18-113_16977... https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/11/how-ret... https://www.forbes.com/sites/camilomaldonado/2018/09/24/what...

Those seedy furniture stores that have "going out of business" sales that seem to last for years, are often running the same scam. Grocery also stores do this, with their shoppers cards discounts. Consumers are the other half of the problem though. At least some of the scummy tactics are psycological hacks to get around real irrational behaviors that actually work against both the consumer and the business. The rest…

I worked at my uncle’s shoe store as a kid, and he was a huge believer in marking down prices below the recommended MSRP. He even refused to set up an online store so his vendors wouldn’t know what he was doing. The only thing was that there were never any discounts whatsoever.

We lived in a military community and I literally couldn’t count the number of times a customer would walk in and ask for a military discount. We were trained to politely explain our pricing and encourage shoppers to price-check our offerings against any place else. And often customers would demand to give us a discount because they served in $MILITARY_CONFLICT.

No matter how much we tried pointing out that our shoes were effectively on sale in perpetuity, they simply wouldn’t believe us. The psychology of the sale is real.

Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things

#84

Post by Proven » Tue, Jun 25, 2019, 4:20 PM UTC

What is the point of that article?

Don't most EC sites make it possible to return the item no questions asked?

Will they one day write about how people manipulate e-commerce sites into selling things?

Or how guys manipulate girls (or vice versa) into falling in love with them?

Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things

#85

Post by gringoDan » Tue, Jun 25, 2019, 4:25 PM UTC

exergy wrote: post #19

2T1Qka0rEiPr wrote: post #18

> About 30 sites made it easy to sign up for services but particularly hard to cancel, requiring phone calls or other procedures. The Times requires people to talk with a representative online or by phone to cancel subscriptions, but the researchers did not study it or other publishing sites. Nice that the editor was at least allowed to point out that their own employer employs many of these "dark patterns".

Also, I'd actually been considering a Times subscription for a while. That's going to be a hell no from me now.

Citi credit cards (and maybe others) have a good feature where you can set a "virtual card number" with a specific credit limit and/or expiration date. Great way to ensure that your card can be charged once, then payment is denied when a company tries to auto-renew you.

Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things

#86

Post by lotsofpulp » Tue, Jun 25, 2019, 4:31 PM UTC

reroute1 wrote: post #81

lotsofpulp wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People can search the price on their phone and compare, but many don't. There does exist a significant population that feels better getting a discount.

Businesses can set prices however they want, but that doesn't mean anyone has to buy it. But when shady pricing and sales come in the consumer feels better because they think they're saving and don't realize they are being deceived. Certainly there are lazy people, but that's entirely different no one would willingly pay more for the same service. They're only "happy" because they're being lied to. Why should we rein…

We shouldn't, but the more efficient, cheaper, long term, structural way to fix it is to create more educated consumers. Teach children in school how to make proper comparisons, how to avoid sales tactics, how to figure out the bottom line for them.

How would you even police something like 80% off a "fake" retail price? Create a database of all transactions for all items and compare to the historical average in x amount of days? Force all sellers to maintain records of their sales to compare against, and then go around doing spot checks?

Why not just have the government buy up billboards and TV ad spots educating everyone not to fall for the discounts and to compare the bottom line number they pay, and reward sellers that offer price transparency with their business?

Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things

#87

Post by Toine » Tue, Jun 25, 2019, 4:33 PM UTC

RandomInteger4 wrote: post #52

There goes that nasty evil capitalism, "It wasn't my lack of will power and cognitive short falls that caused me to buy these things ... it was capitalism's fault. I'm completely innocent and would never make bad decisions of my own accord ..."

Humans are humans. Living creatures driven by emotions and irrational behavior. Each person has his/her own psychological weaknesses. You included. Hardcore capitalists included. These kinds of marketing techniques take advantage of those weaknesses to increase their revenue. I would argue that similar weaknesses drive sick people to do horrible stuff to increase their wealth and power.

Blaming consumers for their lack of self control is pure hypocrisy. Where do you think sellers got their desire to get so much money ? From their own lack of self control.

A rational mind does not need or desire millions of dollars. It needs what it requires to live a happy life : food, health, social interactions (quality & quantity). Anything else is pure irrational, pulsion driven excessive desires.

Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things

#88

Post by jimhi » Tue, Jun 25, 2019, 4:35 PM UTC

I run an international e-commerce site in several countries. We have been recommended all these dark patterns. Sometimes I see sites that apply all of them at once and a new user gets no less than 3 pop-ups within 10 seconds engaging them in different ways.

Many of these don't work long-term. These sites won't last long when they get one-time users who are deal seekers. This reminds me of back when all video sites had 10 ads and pop-ups or blogging sites. They all learned eventually.

I predict two dark patterns will stay with us. Making it hard to unsubscribe and designing the "YES" button to be more attractive to click than the "NO" button. They don't involve lying and they work surprisingly well.

Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things

#89

Post by jimbobimbo » Tue, Jun 25, 2019, 4:40 PM UTC

nicudad wrote: post #33

exergy wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, I'd actually been considering a Times subscription for a while. That's going to be a hell no from me now.

The hack I use for subscriptions is to pay with a money order, mailed to their location. This makes it impossible for them to autorenew. I started doing this after discovering to my dismay that one subscription used my checking account routing number to auto debit a subscription renewal the following year, at a significantly increased rate, direct from my checking account! I don't see how this isn't larceny or bank r…

I'm using virtual credit cards with a preset limit, that my bank generates on demand.

Like the idea of using fake name!

Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things

#90

Post by tomphoolery » Tue, Jun 25, 2019, 5:18 PM UTC

readbeard wrote: post #57

Not just e-commerce sites—change.org shows "### have signed," where the number is programmed to tick upwards at a somewhat randomized rate. This is simply dishonest—a lie designed to make you feel like you'll be missing out unless you sign. Example: https://www.change.org/p/target-stop-filling-the-world-with-...

It's also pretty common in event promotion. Sell tickets in tiers, but make the capacity of the first two tiers ridiculously small, like 10 or 15 in total. They'll sell out relatively quickly, and it feels like the ticket price is going to jump, so if you do it right, most people will buy their tickets at a slightly inflated rate, and you make more money.

Then you promote online saying stuff like "ABOUT TO SELL OUT! ONLY 50 TICKETS LEFT!" the week before to drive more sales. :P