profile

Nudge Newsletter

Why ‘20,296 cups of tea’ beats ‘354kWh’ every time | Nudge Newsletter

Published about 2 months ago • 1 min read

Concrete Phrases

​Read online​

Which electric bus would stick in your mind?

It's not even a competition.
​
Copy that's easy to visualise is easy to memorise.

In 2021, Richard Shotton¹ showed participants a number of vague phrases, like 'innovative quality', and then some concrete phrases, e.g., 'money in your pocket'.

Shotton’s concrete phrases were 8.6x more likely to be remembered.

He’d proved the concrete phrases' effect, a phenomenon first discovered by Begg in 1972.²

And researchers Monnier & Thomas followed up with this 2022 experiment.³ ​
​
Across six experiments, participants evaluated the same products but saw different descriptions.
​
Some saw 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘤𝘳𝘦𝘵𝘦 units: "10 cookies", "6 servings", "two cups"
​
Others saw 𝘢𝘯𝘢𝘭𝘺𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘭 units: "10 oz", "140 g", "500 ml".
​
Turns out, those who saw the concrete units were 𝐬𝐢𝐠𝐧𝐢𝐟𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐥𝐲 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐨 𝐩𝐚𝐲 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐝𝐮𝐜𝐭𝐬.

Which is why the bus livery is so smart.
​
​"Powered by 354kWh of batteries" is factually true but entirely abstract.
​
​"Powerful enough to brew 20,296 cups of tea" is also factually true but instantly visible in our minds.
​
The lesson is simple.
​
To be remembered, use concrete language.

Want to use concrete phrases in your marketing?

​Check out VaultsGPT ↓​

The Vaults contains 452 insights like this and full access to VaultsGPT.

Preview your first 50 insights for free →

​

Hope you enjoyed today's newsletter — Phill​

P.S. I use the concrete phrases effect a lot on this page. See if you can spot it.

¹Shotton, R. (2023, April 11). To create strong memories, use concrete language. Marketing Week. https://www.marketingweek.com/strong-memories-concrete-language/​

​

²Begg, I. (1972). Recall of meaningful phrases. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 11(4), 431–439

​

³Monnier, A., & Thomas, M. (2022). Experiential and analytical price evaluations: How experiential product description affects prices. Journal of Consumer Research.

​

As a behavioural science practitioner, I believe in the peak-end rule.

​

​Tune into Nudge | Advertise with Nudge | Unsubscribe

Nudge Newsletter

Phill Agnew

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

Read more from Nudge Newsletter

Humor Effect Read online Are funny ads actually more 𝒎𝒆𝒎𝒐𝒓𝒂𝒃𝒍𝒆? That's what seven Californian¹ researchers set out to test in 2014. A group of participants were instructed to remember a long list of words. 50% of the participants then waited for 20 minutes in silence. 🤫50% of the participants then watched a funny 20-minute video. 🤣The researchers asked both groups to recall as many words as possible. Those who sat in silence remembered just 20% of the words. 🤫For those who watched the...

4 days ago • 1 min read

Barnum Effect Read online Why does the ad on the 𝐫𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 capture attention? Well, it might be down to the question.Rohini Ahluwalia and Robert Burnkrant's study¹ in 2004 tested two types of ads. Statement-based ads: "You haven't had a pear in a while."And... Question ads: "When was the last time you had a pear?" The researchers found that ads using questions are rated 14% 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐟𝐚𝐯𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐚𝐛𝐥𝐲 than statement-based ads. So, why not turn your statement into a question? I tested this myself in two...

11 days ago • 1 min read

The Country-of-Origin Effect Read online You’re thinking of buying a new pair of running shoes. Usually, you go with Nike. But this time, you’re considering Umbro (a lesser-known brand). Then you find out: Umbro makes their shoes in the UK. Nice. It's always good to find locally made brands. You’re willing to pay a decent price. But the next day, you hear Umbro are moving production to South Korea. Now, would you still pay the same? Probably not. That’s exactly what these researchers¹ found....

18 days ago • 1 min read