Addiction isn’t always negative. The value proposition of products and the manner in which they are sold and used can be so compelling that many consumers willingly repeat the experience again and again, essentially becoming addicted to a brand. People with iPhones, for example, would likely go through intense withdrawal if they were deprived of their Apple devices without notice.
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Considered this way, corporate attempts to boost customer loyalty, or move customers to go to great lengths to repeat purchase behaviour, can be seen as creating a form of addiction without a pejorative connotation. Product addiction of the positive kind, of course, needs to be created. For many marketers, this requires significant change to how they operate. In Managing the New Customer Relationship: Strategies to Engage the Social Customer and Build Lasting Value, I discuss how companies can go beyond customer satisfaction, and even beyond loyalty, to develop intense bonds between their products and consumers. This article highlights the four main, inter-related areas in which brand addiction can be planned: product, rewards, price and communications.
Consumers are now spending more time playing online games and using new media than watching television. As a result, marketers are now focused on how to provide both short-term stimuli and longer-term recognition and rewards. Online loyalty programs let consumers use points for virtual rewards where the rewards are more or less without “real” value. For example, playing virtual games such as MyTown or Farmville allows users to obtain points and use the points within the game. Sometimes the points are awarded for game accomplishments, but points or benefits can often also be bought. The motivation for collecting the points is to improve a player’s score, performance or status within the game, essentially addressing a social need. By providing leader boards so that game players can see their status, games reinforce point-collecting habituation.
While “free” can be addictive for the consumer, there are often related costs. Consumers do not use money directly when they get something for free, but they may pay indirectly in ways that benefit the supplier. Here are 12 examples:
Reprint from Ivey Business Journal
Reprint from Ivey Business Journal
[© Reprinted and used by permission of the Ivey Business School]