Present Bias

Problem summary

What we want now is not what we aspire to in the future

Usage

• Use to boost sales by exploiting our bias toward instant gratification over future rewards
• Use to separate users present-self from their future-self to help them in making healthier long-term choices.

Solution

• Facilitate future lock-in Help users make healthier long-term choices and secure the best long-term consequences of their decisions by segregating making a decision from receiving the consequences. Encourage customers to order groceries several days in advance to separate their present self from their future self and in turn reduce impulse purchases.
• Optimize sales for the near-future It is more likely that customers will spend more money in the near future than in the more distant future.
• Boost impulse sales Using the Present Bias to boost sales, you could adapt product recommendations to include impulse purchases through time-restricted special offers.

Rationale

Our short-term desires (wants) and longer intentions (should) differ wildly. We tend to focus on and over-value immediate rewards at the expense of long-term wishes and benefits. Allow customers to perform “future lock-in” to help them make healthier “should” choices rather than caving in to here-and-now “wants”.