Brands have been leveraging the power of social media to capture the hearts of their audience for a long time. But it’s not that plain simple. There are a lot of factors involved in creating a compelling campaign. One of those factors that play a vital role in making campaigns successful is psychology. Marketers don’t need to have a strong background in psychology. Being aware of some psychological tactics is enough to pull off a high-converting campaign.

Below are some examples of how some brands injected psychology into their campaigns to grow their business or sell their products or services.

Example 1: Facebook

A small company by the name of “Facebook” launched its social media network in 2004. They leveraged the exclusivity principle to increase their user base. When launched, Facebook was only accessible to limited people that included Ivy League and other elite schools. This feeling of exclusivity helped them to grow to up to 30,000 users in just 6 months. By building up a buzz that differentiated them from social networks of that time like Friendster and MySpace, they were able to hit their user goals easily.

How to use “Exclusivity”?
People are naturally more compelled to buy things that are not in everyone’s reach. This makes them feel special and deserving. If something is harder to get, its value increases automatically. But there’s one thing to keep in mind; exclusivity only works when you have something of worth to offer. People won’t buy things that they don’t need at elevated prices. You must provide a unique solution to a problem to capture people’s attention with exclusivity.

Example #2: Air BnB

“There is nothing more powerful than a good story,” said Tyrion Lannister from Game of Thrones, and this is 100% true for marketing. Branding is all about setting yourself apart from others and a good story certainly helps with that. People buy from brands because they love why they do something not because they make something good.

Air BnB increased its brand recognition by telling a touching story of two guards from opposite sides of the Berlin Wall, reuniting. This video went viral and generated up to 6 million views in the first month of its upload.

How to use storytelling? 
Stories are the most authentic way to capture your target audiences’ attention. This is because they are the most relatable content out there. People can put themselves in the storyteller’s shoes. This gives the customer an idea of what he/she might feel after purchasing a product or service. Creating a good story isn’t that hard. You can create compelling stories by using detailed imagery, suspense, excitement, and including techniques like irony and metaphors to leave a mark on the customer.

Examples #3: Starbucks

Who hasn’t heard of Starbucks, right? Starbucks once ran a campaign that allowed its users to provide a free cup of coffee to their friends. This was done by tweeting a hashtag that could be redeemed through the friend’s account of Starbucks. This provided a huge positive promotion for Starbucks. Starbucks here used the psychological principle of Reciprocity.

How can you use reciprocity?

Reciprocity means feeling obligated to do something in return for something done for you. In simple terms – returning a favor. The principle of reciprocity is widely used by marketers to get the most out of their customers. Customers don’t want to look bad when something good is done for them by businesses, like getting a free sample, etc.

A study found that servers who provided a mint along with the bill received a 3% increase in tips. When two mints were provided, the tip increased by 20%. This is huge! The bigger the favor, the bigger the reward from customers.

Example #4: iGrill

iGrill, an app, which tracks the temperatures of food sells cooking products of the same niche. The website was receiving normal traffic of 70,000 hits per month when all changed for the better. A Facebook post about the application by none other than Mark Zuckerberg skyrocketed the traffic of the website. This social proof generated the buzz of the application which made it a hit.

There are different types of social proofs, some of which are:

• Wisdom of the crowds social proof
• Expert social proof
• Celebrity social proof
• User social proof
• Word of mouth

How to use social proof – Now everyone might not be able to get Mr.Zuckerberg to promote their products but that is fine. No matter if your brand is small, you can still get social proof from your user base that will be as effective as any celebrity advertisement.

Example #5: Beardbrand

An e-commerce brand by name of Beardbrand promoted its products using the event of Movember, where men are encouraged to stop shaving. Beardbrand offered their products for one lucky winner, every day, for a whole week. This promotion worked like a charm. Beardbrand in just a week, doubled its email list, also recording the highest sales during that week. So how did they manage to do this?

Bear brand utilized the ‘foot in the door’ technique which involves making a low effort request like giving one’s email address for something greater in return. By tempting the audience with a free giveaway, Beardbrand increased its brand awareness and got many leads without making any sales pitch.

How to use a foot in the door technique:
By running a free giveaway or discount offer, you can convert your customers into leads easily. A buyer is usually skeptical of giving out his email or phone number but a chance of winning a product can surely change that. Make sure you have something that the consumer wants for this technique to work. Make the consumer picture their reward while you get their email or phone number with a breeze.

There are many other psychological advertising techniques used by brands to lure their customers into making the right choices for them. Whether it’s buying something by being obligated to do so or falling for a touching story - psychology is everywhere in advertising. Using it the right way can skyrocket your sales or brand’s presence but using it the wrong way can be detrimental to your brand.