How to survive 24x7 sale season
If you’re drawn to discounts (who isn’t?) it’s getting tougher to hold on to your resolve. What used to be an annual event is now a year-round medley of Festive, End of Season, Republic Day, Singles’ Day, Clearance and Flash sales. Join the resistance. Here’s how:
Anchor pricing: YouTuber Nick Kolenda, l who draws on psychological research to decode everyday behaviour, says context determines how we respond to a price tag. A common sales technique is to display “the cost of their products next to a higher alternative, often the original retail price or a more expensive variant,” he says, in a post.
Fight back: Use your own anchors. Measure the price of an item by what you earn per hour, or just what it’s worth to you. Suddenly, that calfskin jacket, marked down 50%, looks less tempting than a hotel upgrade on your next break.
Sensation-seeking: For many, the idea of l scoring a bargain is more attractive than the item itself.
Fight back: Only buy something if you wanted it before it went on sale. Alternatively, if something looks exciting, wait 20 minutes. That’s how long it typically takes for an impulse of this kind to fade.
Automation and algorithms: Online l pricing systems often raise or drop prices based on stocks and buyer data. Meanwhile, algorithms track which sites you visit most, how long you stared at that calfskin jacket, what else you looked at and how often you click on ads offering discounts.
Fight back: Analyse your buying patterns yourself. Do you tend to shop when you’re up at night? Distracted at work? After an argument? Just before breakfast? Use that data to determine if your next purchase is driven by need or habit. And beat algorithms at their own game. “Until October, all the ads I’d see were for shoes,” says Pramila J, a crafts professional with a weakness for party heels. “I took half an hour to visit every hardware site I could find. Now, all I see are ads for power drills, which I’d never want. I click on one every now and then, to keep fooling the bots.”