Brand psychology

Member lesson

Social proof and where it backfires

Lesson 7 of 12 in Brand psychology.

Lesson

People use other people as evidence, particularly when they cannot judge for themselves. Reviews, customer counts and visible popularity all work, and they work strongest in categories where quality is hard to assess in advance.

An ink drawing of two market stalls, one with a small chatting queue and mixed star ratings, the other empty and covered in identical gold star cards, with a passer-by joining the queue.
A real queue earns trust while a wall of perfect stars loses it.
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Members answer these 3 questions and keep the ticket for this lesson. Every lesson has one.

  1. Question 1, locked

    Which of these words means this? “Using other people's behaviour as evidence. Reviews, counts, testimonials.”

    • Descriptive norm
    • Social proof
    • Price-quality inference
    • Decoy
  2. Question 2, locked

    Which of these words means this? “What people actually do. Powerful, and dangerous when the norm is bad.”

    • Descriptive norm
    • Recall
    • Recognition
    • Retrieval
  3. Question 3, locked

    Which of these words means this? “Fake social proof. Illegal in several markets and increasingly prosecuted.”

    • Astroturfing
    • Emotional advertising
    • Availability
    • Switching cost

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