Predictably Irrational

1. We compare whatever we can, so give others easy comparisons to pick you.

2. Free is really just another price, but a powerful one.

3. You overvalue what you own.

We’re wired to compare things, and our brains do so in the easiest way possible.

We compare what’s right in front of us, not necessarily what we should think about or look at that might not be around at the time.

So if you give people options to compare yourself or your products to, which are slightly worse, they’ll pick you more often.

This has to do with our incredibly strong tendency to avoid losses wherever possible. If we buy something and it’s bad, we lose money. But if we get something for free, the potential downside is zero. It still might be good for us, though, so we value free items much more highly than we should.

We love what we own simply because of our memories and fantasies about it (“I loved wearing this shirt at work/I’ll have so much fun at the game”).

We hate losing things we own, whereas we don’t mind missing out on something all that much.

Usually, we expect others to think highly of the same things we do (“If I like this carpet, I’m sure all my friends will like it too).