IKEA Effect: How Co-Creation Builds Emotional Bonds Buyers Don't Want to Break

Co-creation builds emotional bonds buyers don’t want to break.

The Betty Crocker baking brand was in big trouble.

They’d just introduced a brand new invention to the market - instant cake mix.

The product seemed like a winner.

You just add water and boom, you have a delicious cake.

But sales were struggling.

Parent company General Mills knew exactly who to call -

Ernest Dichter, a well-known marketing psychology consultant.

Dichter did a ton of research with real 1950s housewives and discovered something interesting…

The “instant” cake mix was actually too easy to make.

You see, the people buying and using the cake mix were professional housewives…

And they felt like the instant cake mix was so easy,

That it undervalued the skill involved in making a cake.

Baking from scratch was a point of pride and a demonstration of love for their families.

So this “instant” mix made them feel unnecessary in their own kitchens.

(And for a homemaker in the 1950s, this felt like an attack on their identities.)

So Dichter told General Mills to remove the powdered egg from the Betty Crocker cake mix, and instead ask customers to add a fresh egg to the mix.

General Mills was confused, but they’d try anything to save the struggling brand.

So they changed the recipe and suddenly their failing product was a huge hit.

Why did this work?

Because when bakers added a fresh egg, they felt more involved in the process.

They were co-creating a recipe - not just following instructions.

The success of the “fresh egg” strategy is down to a psychological principle called the IKEA Effect.

It says that people attribute more value to products they've helped create.

The effect is named after the original academic study, where researchers split the study participants into two groups:

• One was given a fully assembled IKEA chair

• The other was asked to assemble the IKEA chair

Then both were asked to bid on their items in a fake auction.

The participants who’d built their furniture bid more for their chairs.

Because their hard work had created an emotional bond.

So to them, it felt like the item was worth more money.

The IKEA Effect is a marketing psychology principle that comes up a lot in my Choice Hacking Pro community and one-on-one coaching.

For example, I had a client who runs a personal coaching business in the fitness space (MB).

Before working with me, MB struggled to get clients to stick with his programs for more than 30 days.

He couldn’t figure out what the problem was -

He’d made everything as easy as possible:

• Detailed meal plan

• Minute-by-minute workouts

• Automated habit tracking systems

But the problem was…

It was too easy.

His clients weren’t invested in the process.

So they couldn’t get emotionally invested in their success.

To fix this issue, we restructured his program to include co-creation at key moments in the process.

And that small change made a huge difference in getting clients to stick to the program.

It also gave a big boost to his client retention -

MB’s average client engagement now lasts about 25% longer than it did before these changes.

Which translates into happier clients with better results and more money in MB’s pocket.

The key to including moments of co-creation like MB did is to make them big enough to create emotional investment…

But small enough that they don’t trigger emotional resistance.

Every day I help my Choice Hacking Pro community (now full) and one-on-one coaching clients (also full) use marketing psychology to get their businesses to $20k a month and beyond.

Using the same tools and frameworks I’ve leveraged to help my clients add $250M+ in sales and $10M+ in investment - from solo businesses, SMBs, and agencies…

All the way up to Fortune 500 brands like McDonald’s, Microsoft, Starbucks, T-Mobile, Adidas, Unilever, and more.

I can help your team figure out what makes your buyers tick with marketing psychology and behavioral science corporate training.

Minimum engagements start at $10k (plus travel if required) and can be customized for any size team, market, business, or industry…

With the majority of my training clients being Fortune 500 brands in the US, Canada, and Europe.

To learn more about my corporate training offers, click here.

Fill out the contact form at the bottom of the page to reach out when you’re ready to take the next step.

(Or just reply to this email with the word “TRAINING” and I’ll share the details.)

Until next time,
Jen