Persuasive Advertising - J. Scott Armstrong [97]
The next principle seems similar, but it involves encouraging customers to think about their own behavior, not about the behavior of sellers.
5.11.4. Encourage customers to make predictions about their behavior
The U.K. police force had been suffering from declining applicants and low respect for its officers. Starting in 2000, it ran an “I couldn’t. Could you?” campaign which showed celebrities facing actual police problems. One ad showed Lennox Lewis, the boxer, as he struggled to restrain himself from punching a wife beater. The celebrities’ admissions led many people to agree that being a cop was difficult, so that they decided not to apply for police jobs. Others decided they could. For example, one applicant said, “Lennox Lewis, for all his fame, talent, and money, couldn’t do that job, whereas I reckon I could.” The campaign led to a 50 percent increase in the number of applicants, and to an increase in the quality of recruits. It also improved police morale and public perceptions of the police. The campaign won an IPA effectiveness award (Rimini 2003).
As indicated by the above example, advertisers sometimes use vignettes as a means of encouraging people to imagine how they would act in given situations.
Self-predictions (also referred to as self-prophecies) are especially effective in situations involving ethical or socially approved behavior (such as healthful behavior). This effect occurs when people are requested to make a self-prophecy even without requiring a direct answer.
People become upset when they do not live up to their promises to others or fulfill their own standards. They feel guilty.
The question for you is, “Will you apply principles for persuasive advertising on your next campaign?”
Evidence on the effects of asking people to predict their behavior
Self-predictions can lead people to adopt health-related behaviors (e.g., “Ask yourself: Will you work out at the Student Recreation Center?”). A meta-analysis found consistent results in seven experiments: Self-predictions increased success in performing the desired behavior from 37 percent without self-predictions to 63 percent with them. In addition, subjects “systematically over-estimated the likelihood of performing socially desirable actions, as compared to those in the absence of self-prediction” (Sprott et al. 2006).
Another meta-analysis, this one with 15 studies, found that self-prophecy of behavior led to behavioral changes in a socially desirable direction (e.g., increased voting) in all studies. For example, when undergraduates were asked to predict their behavior with respect to cheating, the majority said that they would resist the temptation to cheat. In a follow-up experiment in which they were presented with an opportunity to cheat, two-thirds of the students in control group cheated; in contrast, half of the students in the self-prediction group cheated (Spangenberg and Greenwald 1999).
The following experiments are representative of the research that supports this principle:
Ads calling for self-prophecies increased compliance. Spangenberg et al. (2003) conducted a series of experiments. In a field experiment on recycling, an electronic reader board, flyers, and wooden stop signs were placed at the entrance of a university classroom building. They said, “Ask yourself … will you recycle?” The percentage of cans recycled (of those sold in the building) was 16 percent prior to the campaign; it was 28 percent during the campaign and in the four weeks after the campaign ended.
The same researchers also conducted a study on charitable