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Paradox of Choice for First-time Buyers
Paradox of choice for first-time buyers is a real problem. The average shopper is making around 35,000 choices in a day. That’s a lot. The problem is only compounded for first-time buyers.
First-time buyers are people new to your site who have never bought from you before.
My “western boot” story
I watch PBR so I see Ariat on TV a lot.
I’ve never worn a western boot. But want to.
So, I did a Google search for “western boot” …
… and landed on: https://www.ariat.com/men-western-footwear-cowboy:
There were 134 designs. Ain’t nobody got time for that.
We know from research shoppers struggle with more than 6 choices (Sheena Iyengar’s famous jam experiment).
After 30 minutes I settled on their Men’s Sport Wide Square Toe Western Boot.
There was a video at the lower half of the page. In the video, at the 1 minute mark, the boot expert said: “if you are new to western boots, and have never worn one, you need to this”
And I was like, “bingo, that’s me!”
This video solves a first-time buyer’s dilemma.
But here is the thing, I only serendipitously found this video. There was a 1 in 134 chance I would have found this page (that’s how many designs they show) and then, only a 10% chance I would have found the video buried way down on the page.
Let’s assume 10% of visitors to Ariat are new to western boots. For Ariat this a key demographic.
Why?
Because people who buy their first western boot will likely be buying more in the future. If Ariat can convert these folks it represents a significant opportunity to drive up customer lifetime value.
Our idea to solve the paradox of choice issue for new visitors.
On the landing page, they could have added a little “new to western boots?” call out. People who click it could be taken a custom-designed page 100% dedicated to helping shoppers see how Ariat is THE place to buy western boots. Once that pitch is made they could show their top 3 picks for the perfect western boot for a first-time buyer.
Why give 3 options?
Because of something called Single-option Aversion. The basic idea is that while shoppers do get overwhelmed with too much choice they also hate too little choice. 3 is the perfect goldilocks zone 🙂
Key lesson: avoid paradox of choice for first-time buyers at all costs. If you solve it it’ll magically improve your conversion rates.
A little about us
Thank you for reading this article about the paradox of choice. We are Frictionless Commerce and over the last 11 years, we’ve thought about just one thing: how do we get online shoppers to convert? We’re fascinated by buyer psychology. And once we understand how your site visitor thinks we use our 9 point copywriting process to convince and convert them.
If you’re on LinkedIn much you can should definitely connect with me. On LinkedIn, I post ecommerce conversion ideas every day, multiple times a day.
Other buyer psychology-based eCommerce conversion ideas
If you liked this article you’ll love our other ideas:
“Is My Marketing Working?” A Unique Product Page Design Idea
Product Reviews & Buyer Psychology
