In today’s society, we’re inundated with choices. We’ve always assumed that more choices led to more freedom which led to more happiness, but there is strong evidence to the contrary. In fact, Barry Schwartz poses a compelling argument that when presented with too many choices, we often make the worst choice. And even when we make the right choice, we feel remorse about it.
I know the video below is a little old, but I still see way too many choices presented in registration forms, online shopping websites, and in day to day life. If you want to increase sales, consider either reducing the number of choices, or making intelligent choices by default so your visitors don’t have to.
And if you haven’t seen the video below, watch it. It’s excellent.
This blew me away. Erin and I have been talking about it for hours now. And it’s still on my mind. This really opened my eyes on my own behavior and it’s making me thing long and hard about the decisions I make when building things for users. I’m looking for some good books on this subject, especially for ways to combat the insane amount of choice we are faced with daily.
Right on target! My daddy used to say “make it easy for customers to buy”. Everything is way to complex, which just puts people off.