Habit: The 95% of Behavior Marketers Ignore

Sales Promotion

In many ways, sales promotions have been impacting customers’ habits for decades. Sales promotions are marketing activities that provide extra value to the sales force, distributors, or the ultimate consumer to stimulate immediate sales. Sales promotions are highly effective because they can trigger automated scripts that customers use to shop or break down established habits. However, sales promotions often result in customers learning to expect a promotion, creating deal-sensitive purchase behavior.

Sales promotions can be seen as push, getting products into distribution channels, or pull, getting end-use customers to go looking for the product. Under both conditions, companies are sweetening the pot to stimulate behavior, ...