Have you ever put the food you can't finish in the refrigerator and threw it away the next day if you don't want to eat the rest?

Have you ever wanted to practice yoga and got an annual fitness card, but you didn't go many times in the end?

Have you spent thousands of dollars on a high-end camera, but now you only use your mobile phone to take pictures?

Have you ever lost 20% in the stock market and didn't want to cut your meat and sell it, and then fell 30%?

Have you or your family ever been or are you addicted to mobile games such as Pesticide King?

If you have encountered the above situation, or have similar feelings, then it is necessary for you to spend 5 minutes to continue reading this article.

Let's make a choice first:

Remember your answer.

Let's make another choice:

In the first option, 90% people choose to continue investing, while in the second option, 85% people choose to cancel the investment. Almost all conditions are the same, so what caused the reversal of your 180 degree attitude? Careful, you must have found that the only difference between these two scenes is:

In the first scene, you have invested 800,000 yuan, while in the second scene, your investment is 0 yuan.

There is a concept in economics called "sunk cost". Simply put, the time, energy, money and feelings you put into one thing will make it difficult for you to give up. Xue Zhaofeng, a teacher in Peking University, cited an example to illustrate sunk costs. He said that spending 30 yuan on a movie ticket can guess the ending after watching it for 30 minutes, and he thinks that the movie is too bad and makes people sleepy. But at this time, most people will choose to stay in the cinema instead of leaving. Most people think that since all the money has been spent, it must be finished. But rationally speaking, the right choice is to give up 30 yuan's previous 30 minutes of investment and choose to leave instead of wasting 1-2 hours in the cinema.

The reason why we do so many irrational things, and even regret it, is quite due to the sunk cost effect.

Professor Axe and Professor brummer from the American Department of Psychology first studied the sunk cost effect. As early as 1982, they conducted a very interesting experiment. The experiment is like this: in the campus theater of Ohio University, tickets with three face prices are sold at random. They are:

1) 15 full-price ticket.

2) Discounted air tickets 13 yuan.

3) A ticket worth $8.

The ticket buyer doesn't know how many tickets are available at different prices. But in the next six months, the theater staff can determine what the audience bought at that time according to the color of the ticket stub. After summarizing the results, the professors found that the audience who paid $65,438+05 for the tickets watched the performances more often than those who spent $65,438+03 and $8. The audience of the three groups watched the performance 4. 1 1, 3.32 and 3.29 times respectively. The conclusion is obvious, the audience who bought the full-price ticket is the most motivated, because their sinking cost is the highest.

Costco is the second largest warehouse supermarket in the United States, second only to Wal-Mart. People like Costco because of its better quality and lower price. It can be said that small profits but quick turnover have reached the realm of not making money. Then the problem is coming. Because the quality and price are extremely low, what does Costco rely on to support itself? This set of data gives the answer: in 20 14 years, Costco's merchandise sales profit was only $65,438 billion, but its membership fee income was $2.4 billion! Yes, if you want to enjoy good quality and cheap goods in Costco, you must spend $55 a year to become a member of Costco.

Imagine if you spent $55 to become a member of a supermarket in 400 yuan, would you try your best to think about what else you might need and earn back the membership fee by buying more good and cheap goods through buy buy? Costco supermarket skillfully used people's psychology of sinking costs and created a commercial miracle.

In fact, we also make good use of the sunk cost effect.

For example, our annual fitness card is the best example of making good use of the "sunk cost".

At present, the annual card price of fitness card mostly ranges from 1000 yuan to 3000 yuan, which is not a small sum for wage earners. When we get the card, there must be an idea that the money has been spent and we will lose it if we don't exercise, so we will be urged to exercise.

Just as ordinary people, we tend to overlook a detail.

That is, in the gym, you will find that those members who have just paid the annual fee will be particularly active in going to the gym in the first month, but with the increase of time, the number of times members pay the annual fee will begin to decrease, and even they will not have time to go to the gym in the end. This is because the cost of silence has the greatest impact on us at first, but it will decay with time until it disappears.

In fact, the exercise motivation generated by sunk cost is not real exercise enthusiasm. People who really like sports will arrange time to do it even if there is no sunk cost, because the sunk cost of going to the gym is not just happiness, but more "should" do it than "want" to do it.

There is a fundamental contradiction between "should" and "want" in consumer behavior theory. The essential difference between the two is that "should" will decay with time, while "want" will be strengthened in every behavior.

Therefore, the key is to use the characteristics of sunk cost to transform "should" into "want".

Yes, take Costco supermarket as an example. If customers have been buying in buy buy, the idea of taking advantage of the sunk cost of people's good years will be frustrated, because customers have not changed from "should" in buy buy to "want" in buy buy Buy. As long as the annual fee is earned back, there is no need to come back, because coming to Costco has not brought more pleasant experiences to customers.

Imagine, if you have a fitness card, you can only go less than 20 times a year, will you continue to apply for it the next year? Probably not.

Think back, when your friend told you that he wanted to get an annual card, how would you introduce him?

"If you don't do it, you generally don't insist. The overall calculation is not as good as the second card ..."

So how to solve this problem?

If the gym also provides monthly card payment, it is more rational to choose monthly card.

Because the sunk cost will play a role in the monthly payment and eventually change your behavior. Therefore, when you are a monthly card member, you will exercise more times and last longer than an annual card member.

The monthly card has a greater chance of changing you from "should" to "want" during exercise. Even if the transition from "should" to "want" is not successful, the economic cost you pay will be much smaller than that of getting an annual card.

When we are gym owners, monthly payment will not recover the cost as quickly as annual cards and lifetime cards, but when it comes to renewing the contract, it is almost impossible for a customer who has only been to the next year's card several times or more, and it is impossible to recommend it to his friends. However, the renewal rate and recommendation rate of those who persist through the monthly card will be much higher.

Finally, if you are interested in this topic, you might as well apply what you have learned today to your life.

You can also share examples from your life.

Do you remember the experiences I mentioned at the beginning of the article?

Give your solution skillfully!

Let's learn a little truth together and live a good life.

——? It's over? ——