It’s fair to say that for most people (outside of those who work for marketing departments or sell ad space) incessant promotion is annoying. This is especially true online, and increasingly so. Every click seems to lead to another amazing deal, an last-minute opportunity, or a limited-time offer that somehow never quite expires, or if they’re more brazen, just wall-to-wall ads for anything and everything.
For that reason, shopping online feels a bit like walking through a circus, with bright lights, loud noises, and plenty of people trying to grab your attention at once. The festive period is coming up, and so the worst time of the year for it all will be right on our doorsteps.
What makes this even more irritating is that some offers genuinely provide good value and are worth taking up! Of course, those who wrap their branding in layers of marketing speak hardly differentiate themselves from the more valid options just to let you know how to divide them.
Well, in the spirit of our content, let’s discuss how you can achieve that desired outcome with more success. With that in mind, please consider how to see through more upselling fluff online.
Reading Between The Lines
There’s a weird dance that copywriters are paid to perform, and that’s often curating marketing language with its own peculiar dialect. Words like “exclusive,” “premium,” and “elite” get thrown around so freely they’ve lost meaning. If you can, learning to identify between real sign-up benefits, like an actual no deposit bonus, or vague promises of credit if you start paying first is worth your time, and you can see that by how upfront they are with the terms and read the fine print. Good deals tend to be straightforward about what they’re offering, while questionable ones hide behind walls of fine print and complicated conditions that are cagey about the delivery.
Be Mindful Of Upgrades
Subscription services love their tiered pricing models, because if they can make you feel you’re missing something, you’ll always consider the top option. As such, basic packages often come deliberately stripped down, and that pushes people toward pricier options that include features that should probably be standard. Sometimes the middle tier exists purely to make the expensive option look more of a deal. A good rule of thumb is that if the basic version feels suspiciously limited, the whole pricing structure might be designed to manipulate rather than serve you, and that’s a good way to try and give your money to companies that respect your paying decision.
Don’t Feel Urgent Demand
Countdown timers and “only 2 left in stock” warnings want you to feel FOMO, and they do tap into something primitive in our brains. Even if we were only browsing, feeling that we have one chance to actually buy something makes us want to do it more. If you can, try to step back and question if you still want the item or subscription in two days. If you do, go for it! If you forget about it, and there’s not a seasonal sale with a distinct date, it can probably wait.
With this advice, we believe you’ll be able to see through that upselling fluff online, and all for the better.