The unknown footballer who's book outsold Beckham | Nudge Newsletter đź§ 


A secret bestseller.

Do you recognise this football player?

Probably not. He's only played for England once.

And yet.

This fairly unknown English footballer sold more books than David Beckham, Michael Owen, Steven Gerrard, and Frank Lampard combined.

He did so using the curiosity gap.

He wrote under a pseudonym, "the Secret Footballer".

By hiding his identity, he could share hard truths, gossip, and uncensored stories, such as the drunken antics of a Chelsea striker or the binge-eating winger who hated the game.

I heard Harry Dry share this on David Perell's show.

It's a fantastic example of the curiosity gap. People are drawn towards the unknown.

One study in Cialdini's book Pre-suasion shows this nicely.

The study found that college women were more attracted to men whose opinions of them remained unknown, rather than those who rated them highly.

The unknown ratings dominated their thoughts a bit like this infamous meme.

Dave Kitson benefits from the same bias.

By hiding his identity, he made his book more intriguing, selling more than far more successful players.

So, next time you want someone's attention, consider withdrawing some information.

​

Cheers for reading,

Phill (the not-so-secret marketer)

Nudge Newsletter

I spend 18 hours each week turning marketing psychology into readable newsletters.

Read more from Nudge Newsletter

The Mere Exposure Effect Read online Loyal fans of Nudge will have heard me talk about the mere exposure effect. In 1969, psychologist Robert ZajoncÂą found that students rated unfamiliar Turkish words more favourably when they had seen them more often. It's not a revolutionary finding. We prefer things we're familiar with. And many great inventors knew this instinctively. Edison and the electric light bulb Thomas Edison understood that while the lightbulb was revolutionary, new inventions...

Specific Goals > Unspecific Goals Read online Unspecific goals don't work. Psychologists¹ Locke and Latham proved it. In 1975, the two researchers set up a real-world experiment at a logging company. Drivers were only loading trucks to 60% capacity. For the control, all staff members were given an unspecific goal: Unspecific goal = “Do your best.” Performance did not increase. The researchers then asked staff what a hard but fair goal would be. They said 94%. That became their new specific...

Differential Price Framing Read online Want people to go premium? Don’t show them the full price. Show them the difference. That’s the idea behind differential price framing. In 2019, David Hardisty¹ at UBC tested it with New York Times subscriptions. Group A saw this: – $9.99/month for web + app – $16.99/month for web, app, print, podcast, crossword Group B saw this: – $9.99/month for web + app – +$7/month for all the extras Same total price. Different framing. But in Group B, twice as many...