Conversion Rate Optimization Minidegree — CXL Institute Review #5
Introduction to Social Proof and Emotional Content Strategy
It’s a Saturday afternoon and you’re walking down the street looking for a place to try for diner. seven out of ten of the restaurants have people inside eating. The other three are completely empty. Are you more likely to go to one of the restaurants with people inside, or one of the empty ones?
If you’re like most people, you’re likely heading into one that has people in it. You’ll probably even do it without even giving it a second thought. It’s not just a coincidence that we choose the restaurant with customers in it. It has to do with a little psychological phenomenon called social proof.
According to Robert Cialdini, who studied the principle of social proof in-depth, “we view a behavior as more correct in a given situation to the degree that we see others performing it”. So often in situations where we are uncertain about what to do, we would assume that the people around us (experts, celebrities, friends, etc.) have better knowledge about what is going on and what should be done.
Alfred Lua in his blog explains social proof in a very clear form: We often make judgments based on our overall impression of someone — A.K.A. the halo effect (named by psychologist Edward Thorndike). For example:
- We think anything that experts use is great because they are probably more knowledgeable than us in their area of specialization.
- We buy products endorsed by celebrities because we want to look like them.
- We trust user reviews because they have experienced the product or service, unlike ourselves.
As I mentioned in my first few blog posts, in this series, I am going to talk about conversion rate optimization (CRO). This blog is part 5 of the 12 reviews that I would be publishing based on my learnings from the CXL Institute’s Conversion Rate Optimization Minidegree program. This post is all about Social Proof and Emotional Content Strategy.
CXL Institute offers some of the best online courses, mini degrees, and certifications in the field of digital marketing, product analytics, conversion rate optimization, growth marketing, etc. I am a part of the Conversion Rate Optimization Minidegree program. Throughout the series, I would be discussing the content of the course as well as my learning and thoughts about the same.
Social Proof
Let’s talk about what social proof means — Social proof is any third party, unbiased proof that is outside of a claim that your company would make.
Social proof is a psychological phenomenon where people assume the actions of others in an attempt to reflect correct behavior for a given situation
Social proof is always going to be unique to a customer’s situation and circumstances. A few common examples of social proof are:
- Case Studies
- Testimonial
- Reviews
- Data
- Customer Interviews
- Security Icon
Case Studies and Testimonials
Case studies and testimonials are two of the most common form of social proof on websites. These forms of social proof allow customers to self-select, establish empathy, and can act as an interest point.
One needs to pay attention to specificity, reliability to the audience, the ability to support an actual claim.
Customer Interviews
A strong customer interview is the backbone of a compelling testimonial. Even more, a bad quote or the wrong choice of the interviewee can actually have a profoundly negative impact on trustworthiness.
Where to include social proof?
A great testimonial is worthless if it is not seen at the right time. There are several viable locations for social proof on a website. With a little strategic placement, you can address areas of friction specific to your website. These are the areas where social proofs should live.
Social proof doesn’t have to exclusively consist of glowing reviews and accolades. Allowing space for negative feedback can often add a nice layer of authenticity and build trust.
Shanelle Mullin from CXL in her blog mentioned that trust in online advertising and branded websites is actually increasing. According to Nielsen, word of mouth recommendations are still the most trustworthy at 84%. As much as 69% of respondents trust advertising on branded websites, and 68% trust consumer opinions posted online.
The good news is that your copy isn’t as untrustworthy as some outdated statistics have led you to believe. Still, you can’t beat good old fashioned word of mouth.
Finding a new way to package that marketing power via social proof and use it on your landing pages can pay off if you do it right.
Nine experts, nine opinions… It seems they still agree that social proof really is that important. But how you use it is what will make or break your landing page. Move away from the standard uses if you want to move beyond the “banner blindness syndrome” and really tap into the power of social proof.
There’s one more great thing about using social proof in your marketing that I want to close with. Sure it’s powerful, and it can be easier and more cost-effective than traditional advertising. But a big reason so many startups love demonstrating social proof is that it’s a more genuine way to market what you’re offering.
While advertising and product descriptions must convince people of the value of your product or service, social proof shows them. True, it’s not always pure altruism driving it. But if you’re doing it right, and your company is doing great work, there’s no better feeling than having gained the appreciation of other people, and holding that up as proof.
Introduction to Emotional Content Strategy
Humans love to think of ourselves as rational people, every decision that we take has a logical reason for it. However, most of our decision making is emotion-based. Big brands have been using emotions to sell products for many many years.
Iriana Weber in her blog mentions that everyone knows that emotional marketing is difficult to do right. Marketers tend to focus on conversion rate, impressions, bounce rates, and bids, and we forget about the emotional appeal in the advertising.
According to the research from PsychologyToday, people respond to the emotional part of the ads a lot more than the text itself.
On the other hand, ads that convey strong emotions often go viral and produce awesome results. The study from HubSpot revealed that the most-shared ads relied on emotional content, including happiness, friendship, and inspiration.
In particular, Mariano Rodriguez from LawRank pointed out that “If you want to make people share and buy, improve your PPC campaign through the use of emotional advertising. This is an effective way to drive your campaign goals”.
The process to develop and test an emotional content strategy
- Emotional competitor analysis
- Emotional SWOT
- Building an emotional content strategy
- Testing
Review —
I find the CXL CRO Minidegree very insightful. The instructors are champions in their fields and they know exactly what they are talking about. Being an experimentation analyst, I understand the importance of experiments (A/B testing) and I have seen numerous examples where the outcome of the test was contradictory to public opinion. The emphasis on testing and learning from it is something that I admire the most about the course.
The material that I went through for the fifth week helped me understand the basics of social proof and how emotional content strategy plays a vital role in optimizing the conversion of a website.
The concept of social proof is explained in so many details and so is emotional strategy. It is hard to put it in one blog. Everything about the course is so descriptive. Something, that can be easily implied in real-world scenarios/ and business problems.
The detailed walkthrough of performing user experience research and quantifying the results into actionable insights. I am eager to learn more about Neuromarketing during my week #6.
That’s all folks. See you next week!
