Week 6- Habit Forming Products

During week 6 we discussed habit forming products and applying this to our own app and brand development.

Eyal (2014) offers the Hook Model.

This model keeps consumers coming back to the product to receive the award that they crave and receive every time. External triggers can take the form of a call to action, such as a ‘like’ button, or ‘log in’ boxes that are commonly seen on social media and apps. Eyal (2014) speaks how these external triggers should be displayed using bright colours and bold fonts as the less thinking that is required, the morel likely it is that the user carries out the action.  

He goes on to describes the elements that make an action simple and easy to perform. The first one is Time. If an action is likely to take a long time, people are less likely to take action. Number 2 is Money. People are concerned with how much things cost, so if they think an action will cost money they are less likely to do it. Third is effort. Does the action take too much effort, such as physical effort, movement or travel? Mental Effort is another actor, which described how much mental effort is needed to partake in the action, Sociability is the acceptability of the action, and finally, Non-routine, which asks to what extend can the action fit in or disrupt the normal routine of the user?

People expect rewards from actions, which Eyal (2014) gives three different types of reward. The Tribe, the Hunt, and the Self. The tribe are rewards based on co-operation, networking and competition, The Hunt are rewards based on the desire to seek out and gather, such as gambling. And finally, the self, which satisfies desires for personal fulfillment, and gives rewards to acknowledge the user’s achievement.

We applied these to our own app idea, discussing how we can apply Eyal’s model of Habit Forming Products to our own app. We talked about how can include external triggers including a log in box, with some kind of image or bright colour alongside it to bring the user into it. For a reward, we thought that the user could receive notifications depending on how well they are sticking to their budget, or offering some kind of notification when there is a new deal available near to them. This would satisfy the self and gives rewards to acknowledge their achievement, if they have stuck to their budget throughout the week. These fit our sector as they offer deals to the user that are local to them, which would ultimately help them save money and will form a habit of visiting the app for more deals. As the app is a budgeting app, a notification letting the user know if they are running low on money would be effective at fulfilling the app’s purpose.

References:

Eyal, Nir. (2014) Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products. London, Penguin.