#180 – The Truth About Pricing with Melina Palmer of The Brainy Business Podcast

Shannon Mattern (00:01.262)

Hello everyone and welcome back to the Profitable Web Designer podcast. And I am so excited to introduce you to my guest today, Melina Palmer. Melina is a leading behavioral economist, host of the Brainy Business podcast, three-time bestselling author, global keynote speaker and consultant who helps the world's top brands understand why and how people make buying decisions. So Melina, welcome to the show.

Melina Palmer (00:26.51)

Yes, thanks so much for having me.

Shannon Mattern (00:28.716)

I'm so excited you're here as I was telling you before we hit record. So before we dive in to your background and all my curious questions about what led you to becoming one of the leading voices in applied behavioral economics, advising some of the world's top brands, which I have found fascinating to read about in your books. Can you tell our listeners what behavioral economics is?

Melina Palmer (00:53.84)

Yeah, yes, believe it or not, that's a pretty common question that I get. you know, essentially I like to just say that if traditional economics and psychology had a baby, you know, we've got behavioral economics. And so the reason that the field came about is because traditional economics assumes logical people making rational choices in everything they do all of the time. And like, you know, we're human, we know that's not really how it works.

Right. And so what would happen is you have models that don't accurately predict behavior. Like it predicts what someone somewhere thinks people should do, but not what people actually do. And so over time you had people from psychology and neuroscience and philosophy and all sorts of other areas come together and work with those economists and kind of crossover into fields and say like,

Are there ways we can actually predict what humans will really do in these scenarios? Can we find those threads in the brain? and good news, you know, they did. And that is how the field of behavioral economics was born. And so really it relies on like how humans really make decisions. And what I do as an applied behavioral economist is help people to communicate in a more brain friendly way so that customers buy and employees buy in.

Shannon Mattern (02:17.474)

love how you say that because when I was reading your book and you explained what that is and it's like, expect people to be rational and make decisions. And it's so logical to me that this is the equation of A plus B equals C and this makes so much sense. And then you do the thing and you get completely the opposite outcome of what you would expect.

Melina Palmer (02:36.348)

Right.

Shannon Mattern (02:46.33)

I feel so validated in knowing that it's because I'm expecting logical decisions when that is not as what is happening for the people on the other side.

Melina Palmer (02:48.793)

you

Melina Palmer (02:58.618)

Right. Yeah. What is, what's really fascinating to me about the field and what like really got me jumping into it, right? Is this realization that like we all buy in a certain way, right? Like, you know, that you get that like email from somebody or that LinkedIn connection request, or you look at someone's website or you see the ad and you're like, bleh, like, you know, that is spam. Yuck. Get out of here. Nice try. No thanks. Right.

And then like when we get into work mode, we like forget that we're human. forget how people like to buy stuff. And it's like, people should want this. Like, of course they're going to think through all of this and they're going to want to know this detail of that. Like you don't buy that way. Like, so why do we, it feels like you just like shut that whole part of you off when you go and do this type of work.

And really that's where the research shows that, our brains operate in two systems. I just talk about them as conscious and subconscious, cause it's the easiest way. They're running all the time, but we like to think that that conscious logical brain is doing most of the stuff, right? Supercomputer is computing. We got it all going on, but really the subconscious is doing the vast majority of the work. And that's when it comes to buying. So much of what we do is built on habit.

Shannon Mattern (03:53.944)

Yeah.

Melina Palmer (04:23.419)

Research shows that humans make an average of 35,000 decisions each, every single day. Maybe if I asked you how many decisions you remember making yesterday, people would be like, I don't know, two, 10? If pressed, I could give you 50, but definitely not in the thousands that you remember. And it's because that subconscious is just doing all the work, right?

Shannon Mattern (04:38.623)

Right.

Shannon Mattern (04:50.359)

Yeah.

Melina Palmer (04:50.957)

And so when you can communicate to it and know like when you want to go with the flow, when it is better to disrupt something and how you might do that. And you know, the rules that it's using to make decisions, which is what behavioral economics is all about. It just makes it that much easier to communicate with humans in a human way.

Shannon Mattern (05:09.165)

So the reason that we're even having this conversation right now is that I work with a woman named Elise Scott. has an agency called Zainatang Consulting. She's all about conversion rate optimization based in behavioral economics and creating like the lowest friction, most brain friendly experiences for moving someone from stranger to sale. And

I'm hosting a summit in a few months at the time of this recording. And I was, you know, we're talking about, you know, there has been just a shift in how people are even discovering a website, you know, because of AI and everything and like what, what people need, like what web designers need to consider. What's not different, what is different, all of those things. And so I reached out to Lee and I said, you know, who do you recommend?

to talk about this. she was like, Melina Palmer, the Brainy Business Podcast, I learned everything I know from her, all of the things. And I've worked with Lee for about 18 months now to really take a lot of the things that I was doing that I thought were logical things to do that were actually creating the opposite of the result that I ultimately wanted. And she's really helped me implement a lot of the.

Melina Palmer (06:14.875)

Yay!

Shannon Mattern (06:35.437)

a lot of the things that you talk about in, I know you have three books. The two that I've read are what your customers want and, can't tell you, which is fascinating. And the truth about pricing, both of which I'm so excited, to dig in with you on this podcast. and so I share all of that to say that, you know, as web designers for your clients, you have so.

much more influence than maybe you realize you do to help your clients make decisions that are going to actually help them get the outcomes that they want instead of letting them call the shots and making decisions that might create the opposite outcome of what they're trying to create. And that's why I'm so excited to like have you here and have you speak at the summit to really shed some light on those things. So.

Melina Palmer (07:30.468)

Yay!

Yeah.

Shannon Mattern (07:33.974)

yeah, I want to like take a few steps back though, before we get into all of that. And I'd love to hear your journey into like what led you to, you know, pick this lane and what your early career experiences were like. And you're doing consulting and speaking and podcasting now. Like, I just love to hear that story of how you got to where you are now.

Melina Palmer (07:50.021)

Yeah.

Melina Palmer (08:02.051)

Yeah, well, in the, what I think is useful when we think about the speaking podcasting, all that stuff, right? And where I love being on a stage. So as a kid, I did a lot of acting. I also was a vocalist. so, you know, forever the plan was like, I was going to go to school for musical theater. Like I used to compete singing opera. love being on stage. I've done some like different like improv and, that sort of stuff. and

being in front of an audience is something I really love to do. At some point, I decided like, totally loved my own high school choir teacher, but everyone I knew that got a degree in music ended up teaching high school choir. You go, well, maybe I don't wanna do that. And so I was kind of looking around to find the right space for me. And I ended up actually getting a degree in business with a focus in marketing.

And the psychology of that human decision-making was in there, but like a little bit, right? There were like glimmers and hints of it. And there was one section of one book in one class, like this little tiny thing that was talking about buying psychology and why people do the things they do. And I knew it was like, my gosh, it's so cool. I want to go get a master's in this, it's amazing. And I spent the better part of 10 years calling universities saying like,

That's not a thing. We don't have a program for that. There's like nothing to do. So I ended up working in industry, kind of put that on the shelf. I worked at an advertising agency. I had started a different company back then. And then I ended up running a marketing department for a financial institution for about six years. And in that, I was always asking questions, right? Like, but why? And what if we tried it this other way? And like looking at all these different ways to kind of...

you know, intuitively figure out some of this stuff about human behavior. and you know, through various programs and things, I stumbled upon behavioral economics. as a marketer, I was like, no, no, that's not the thing I'm looking for that economics. No, that's not what I want. but lo and behold, it is the right program. I ended up getting a master's in it. and when I started in that, like I knew I was early.

Melina Palmer (10:19.957)

Ish, right. because I had spent such a long time looking for a program and on the academic side, there had been a lot there, still early, but nowhere near as much as on that applied side. Right. And so thankfully actually, because I had been working in industry, there's stuff where I was able to say like, but this applies to like my marketing communication and what we're doing on our website and how that ties in with our call center. And what about how we're talking about things, internal communication and how we're pricing stuff. It's just like.

not in any of what we were learning in school. And so, you know, through happenstance, met someone who had a successful podcast. They said, like, I never tell anyone to start with a podcast, but you need to do this thing yesterday. And so I said, all right, let's do that thing and jumped in. And it ended up being just the right time. I started the Brainy Business podcast in July of 2018. And it was

right before everybody really started looking into behavioral economics, psychology. was the first podcast of its kind really in the world, which helped it to be found. And I've also learned, you my superpowers helping to explain these things in a way they don't feel super academic, right? Even if I'm reading the academic papers, it's not like I'm reading them to you. I don't think you understand how to use it and what that might mean as you start to do that work. so...

You know, that led to downloads in over 170 countries. now have over 1.6 million downloads and over 500 episodes. So, yeah, it's been a cool journey. And then like I've always done speaking, but then there's more of that and all the, all the things. that led to teaching and books and whatever else you want to ask about on the journey, but that's kind of the original history.

Shannon Mattern (12:06.697)

It makes so much sense that you are a vocalist and a stage person because I watched your Ted talk and I was like, I want to be her when I grow up because your presence was just so like, your presence was a presence and it was just very impressive. like, of course she's a global keynote speaker in this area.

Melina Palmer (12:14.095)

Yay. Aww.

Melina Palmer (12:24.795)

Thank you.

Yeah.

Shannon Mattern (12:33.709)

I, you so graciously sent me your two books, The Truth About Pricing and What Your Customer Wants and Can't Tell You. And I am obsessed with pricing. This is what we help our Web Designer Academy students do. I work with women web designers to package, position, and sell premium web design services because they historically undercharge, over-deliver, overwork,

Melina Palmer (12:47.483)

Mm-hmm.

Melina Palmer (12:57.999)

Mm-hmm.

Shannon Mattern (13:03.181)

and they try lots and lots of things to fix that, to like make more money, everything, but raising their prices. when I, I opened this book and like right in the very first, you know, couple of pages, you share the truth about pricing.

Melina Palmer (13:16.155)

Right.

Shannon Mattern (13:31.118)

And I'm like, felt so, I was just like, I feel so seen and heard right now. But I just, would love to dive into that with you because, know, web designer, women web designers, especially, but all web designers, any service providers, like, how can I possibly charge that much, whatever that much number is when there are 150 other web designers with my exact same skill.

Melina Palmer (13:31.279)

Yeah.

Melina Palmer (13:36.463)

Yay.

Shannon Mattern (14:01.013)

set my exact same this, know, charging wildly different numbers. So I would just love to dive into that from your perspective and talk about the truth about pricing.

Melina Palmer (14:14.723)

Yes, which I think I give the answer of what the truth is on page three, like you were saying, it's like right there, right there, which is whether or not people buy from you is really not about the price. So everything that happens before the price matters much more than the price itself. And so you have to be thoughtful about the psychology and the experience that will make it so someone feels like ready to buy the thing. so some things that are important to know are, you know, for one, not everyone is your buyer. So

Shannon Mattern (14:19.347)

Yes. Yeah.

Melina Palmer (14:44.623)

like releasing that need to have everyone say yes is a really key thing, especially if you want to be charging premium prices. I talk about brands having to choose between whether you're going to be of quality or value. Both are great strategies for various differences, but, or sorry, businesses, but you can't live in the middle of those things, right? And so for your audience, assuming everybody here wants to be on what I would say is that quality side,

you shouldn't have a lot of discounts. You shouldn't probably round down your prices, right? So something like 499 feels very different than 500. We can associate 499, that's a deal, right? That's a discount. And there are a lot of things that happen in my brain when that number comes up to me and what I associate that to mean about your brand. So even just saying, like, I'm gonna just hold firm. It feels a little bit weird, but I'm gonna say it's

5,000 instead of 4,999.99 or whatever you have on there. Just like own it. That penny, that dollar, like own the difference and see how even that little bit of a shift can make a difference. Owning that and not running a bunch of sales, not feeling like you have to give away a bunch of free stuff, but to say we are a quality brand and this is what that means, right? You can weave that into

the language and the way that you talk to people, the imagery that you use on your own website or other materials and make it to where it feels quality. So I like to give the example of, so Costco is a value brand and an amazing one. I love Costco as does most everyone, but they have...

the concrete floors and they don't do a bunch of ads or marketing, they don't invest in flashy signage, their website is simple from a like, we didn't spend money on this sort of way, right? To help all just reinforce that they are there to provide value to their members, that's what they do, right? But if you then look at something like Tiffany or...

Melina Palmer (16:58.725)

Cartier or anything that doesn't have to be jewelry, right? But a luxury brand, you go in there and it's like velvet seats and they give you a glass of free champagne and it's this like over the top experience and things are presented with beautiful lighting. Their websites are simple in a different way, right? It's that you can tell they invested in that simple luxury, right? And they're both simple, but.

choices presented in a very different way and how they're investing in the photography and the experience that you have with them, that it's setting the stage for the price and experience and what you expect before you even get to the prices, right? And you either say, hey, yeah, like I'm here for that. That's, what I wanted. Or you go, hmm, like maybe I need to go to Costco to buy that ring actually instead.

Ha!

Shannon Mattern (17:55.831)

I love that example. I think about, you know, a lot of the things we talk about here at the Web Designer Academy are like, if you have not, and we don't say it like this, but I'll use the language that I'm learning from you as I like read, read your books is like, if you

If you want to run a profitable, sustainable business as a solo service provider, web designer, and you have a certain income that you want to make, you do get to make the decision. Are you going to be the value one and your price is lower and you're trying to put as many clients through that product ties experience as possible? That is absolutely one way to do it. If you

Melina Palmer (18:34.64)

Mm-hmm.

Shannon Mattern (18:45.867)

want to serve less clients at a higher price and serve them deeply in a different way. that's absolutely, you know, that's a different business model. And the challenge that I see people run into is that they want to charge those higher prices, but everything about their website, the experience, the booking a call with you, the consultation speaks to

the value and not the quality. And they're really, I don't know whether they're afraid to step into the leader that leads the quality brands, but they're finding so much friction there because then they're like, well, people are telling me they can't afford me. it's because you set them up unintentionally to not expect the price that you're putting in front of them. And there's a mismatch there.

Melina Palmer (19:25.103)

Yep.

Melina Palmer (19:41.263)

Yeah. Yeah. And what is nice though about the quality side, right? Is there can be an expectation there of like, so you have some version of customization that might be expected there, but it's also like, I'm going to take care of this for you. Right. And for most people doing web design, knowing I've done many a website in my day, like things get messed up.

when the client tries to do work for you. Like that's when it gets really bad, right? It's like, gosh, just don't touch anything. Like just trust me that this is the way to do it, right? And you can like embrace that in the way that you talk about it when you have that confidence to say like, hey, I know, like the thing is like most of the clients that you're gonna want also, they don't wanna have to be doing that. One big mistake I see people make like as we're trying to in a quality business, you need to get away from

Shannon Mattern (20:13.452)

You

Shannon Mattern (20:18.028)

Yes. Yeah.

Melina Palmer (20:39.95)

hours for dollars, like your time, right? And, but it's like, well, how else do I do this? How do I raise a price if I don't know these sorts of things, right? And so, but what you end up saying is like, and then you get 75 one hour calls with me where we're gonna meet every Monday for four hours and then we're gonna do this and whatever. like,

Shannon Mattern (20:41.376)

Yes.

Melina Palmer (21:06.412)

On the other side, like we're talking about like being a human, right? It's like, I hate that. I do not have time. Like if I had these 75 hours to spend on it, I'd just do the website myself, right? Like I don't want to do any of that. And so it's like some permission to say actually like, Hey, like your time is valuable. You don't want to have to deal with this. I have the experience with people like you. So humans are a hurting species for one. So they want to know that other people like them.

have trusted you, that's where like social proof reviews and star ratings and those testimonials and things to feel safe in that buying and to trust you with that you're a good bet, right? A good buy-in. There's good value for you. People like you trust me to do this and like you can just kind of let go and I'll just present, give you the things where there are important decisions for you to make so you're all over it. But I ask some important questions upfront to help determine that persona or the color or whatever it is.

but we handle the bulk of this for you so that you don't have to make sure you're not missing pages. You don't have to worry about if the brand scheming is off and we have different fonts all over the place and knowing if this is a subhead or a full header or a third or whatever, right? Because nobody wants to get into tertiary font choices, right? Like, I know you like that, but most of you, yeah.

Shannon Mattern (22:25.868)

Spare us. Yes. Right. Yeah.

Melina Palmer (22:31.802)

Right. so like capitalization on the blog posts and whatever, like we'll just handle all of that for you. Like people will pay to not have to do that work or talk to you. And actually that's like a win in a lot of ways, because you can get through the work faster. They feel more confident in what they're getting, you know, and you're able to move forward. And so just thinking about how you frame that, giving yourself the permission to be able to like,

Know that you're good at what you're doing. And there's a reason that people are coming to you is a really big deal. And one other, as we look at some of these concepts, another one being scarcity, right? So it's a, another weird thing. We feel like guilty that you can only work with so many people. And like you said, you kind of hedge or try to like squeeze people in or make it work. And it's like, you're apologizing for how few people you can work with and that.

is not going to help you sell for one. And then it feels like you're having to chase things, right? But if instead you're able to say, Hey, we devote ourselves to our clients when they choose us, right? Like think about some of the framing I'm using in these words here, right? And how that's different, right? So we devote ourselves to our clients when they choose us. And that's why we can also turn around a website for a client in three months where, someone else that might be taking them

Shannon Mattern (23:46.091)

Yeah.

Melina Palmer (23:57.455)

you know, six months is going to drag on. Like we're able to work with you. leading that so we can guarantee a launch date. Maybe not, you you know, but like, long as you do your work. Yeah. Yikes. Right. Lots of disclaimers maybe on that, but we're able to do this and to do that, we can only take on and accept one new client a month, or we only work with six people in a year and companies.

Shannon Mattern (24:06.292)

Depending on the human on the other side.

Melina Palmer (24:23.694)

to be able to invest in them in the way that we know they deserve. And to do that, you can sign up now to start in July. We have this deposit that you move forward, or you can get on a wait list if you're not ready yet, and that's totally fine. And we can work with you then. Like, how would you like to move forward? What feels like the right fit for you? Does this sound like it's gonna work out, whatever, right? You ask that question.

leaning into the scarcity and saying, hey, we've selected to do it this way because that's better for you. You care about that. I can make it so you're not living out in limbo land forever. People appreciate that. And they think, well, like I better jump on this opportunity now before I have to wait six months or I don't want the person that's going to be dragging on or whatever else. So reframing that where that scarcity is something that

helps establish value for people and you can like really own that can be a huge difference maker too.

Shannon Mattern (25:26.294)

So I'm super curious about like the concept of loss aversion that you talk about in the truth about pricing and how we're like, it's not about the price. You can charge whatever number that you can, you didn't say it like this, but basically that you can like back up and position and frame and signal and like create the experience of.

Melina Palmer (25:32.13)

Yeah. Mm hmm. Yes.

Shannon Mattern (25:49.289)

the value of this is more than the number that you're paying. And one of the things that we talk about at the Web Designer Academy, when we're talking you through, you're not selling a 10 page website with a email opt-in and technical SEO. And that's not what you're selling. You're selling outcomes and results and also the cost of not moving forward.

Melina Palmer (26:17.7)

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Shannon Mattern (26:18.398)

And like really switching the language, you talk about the concept of loss aversion in this book about how people care less about what they're going to gain and more about what they could lose. Could you share more about that? Because if people are like, well, it's not, they try to be like, I got to give them the most I can possibly give them for the price. And if I want to charge this much, have to give them this much stuff to justify it.

And what I heard you say in this book is like, that's not the case at all. So

Melina Palmer (26:52.792)

Yeah, yeah, and I love loss aversion and I have another perfect, I'm glad you brought this up because I have something specific that I do for websites that I have a tip related to loss aversion that we'll say after this. So when we look at how we frame something, it, people feel the pain from a potential or actual loss twice as much as they feel the joy from a gain, right? So this being,

Like if you found $20 and you put on a new jacket or a jacket this morning you haven't worn in a year because it's cold or whatever you put it on and go, whoa, $20 amazing, right? Yay me. Like maybe you tell one person about it, but you're probably not talking about it a week from now or six months from now. Like, you know, this is the jacket with Narnia pockets. I'm so excited, right? Like it's just a thing that happened. It was kind of cool. And then you're over it, right? But if you lose,

Like let's say you go to the ATM and you get some cash, cause you're going to one of the few events these days that only takes cash and you take out a hundred dollars and you go to park and you see that you only have four $20 bills and you're like scouring for it and you lost $20. Like will you remember forever about losing?

that $20, right? It's like, you'll talk about the ATM, maybe you blame the financial institution every time you drive past that lot, it's like, that's where the universe stole $20 from me, right? Like you feel it so much more. And so what people tend to do or think, cause you think, I don't want to lose stuff. So people must want to get things and we just are like wired to want to add to stuff, right? But actually if you're looking to motivate someone,

creating a little bit of discomfort that they want to overcome and avoid is actually good. So by leaning into not wanting to lose out on something and that it will actually go away is important in getting someone to take an action. if you do have a sale, which potentially you don't need to do with like we're saying as a quality business, but just for the example of it, if it has no end date and like it could even be that you're giving away a gift free

Melina Palmer (29:08.91)

bonus session or something, you don't have to discount things. But if it's like, hey, like forever, this is what we have. It's not the same as, hey, and when you sign up within the first hour or something, or you have the countdown clock, like FOMO is a real thing, right? So if you can lean into that loss aversion, it can make it so people want to buy. As an example, when I bought my wedding dress, you know, we're...

kind of accustomed to thinking you're supposed to go to a million places and try on all the stuff. And when I went to this place and I found a dress I really loved and they had said, so if you buy before you leave the store on your first appointment only, you can get 10 % off of this dress. And they had an accessory credit based on whatever the designer was. And think it was like a three or $400 accessory credit that I was gonna get to use in the store. But they said like, if you like,

step one foot out and say, no, I actually want it. Like that discount's gone. Like, so no worries if you don't want it, but if you do, there's a good reason to buy right now. Like, do you think I bought that dress in that moment? Yes, I did. Right? 10 % off of a wedding dress is a lot of money. Um, and it was so worth it. And I was so happy. I didn't have to go to other places. It's like one decision made. helps with overwhelm.

Shannon Mattern (30:21.472)

Yeah.

Melina Palmer (30:28.12)

Lots of good stuff, but that is leaning in and loss aversion in a way that feels like a gift they're giving me versus like I'm upset with them about it. Right. And so you could also use that same kind of thing when you're doing, when you're selling, right. To say, Hey, like I'm going to give you this proposal. Like, and like, know that, and maybe it's not like decide in the call, right. But maybe it's like, if you can choose, you know, within 24 hours, if you move forward, we give a 10 % off.

or you get this bonus thing or something for moving forward, and being, you know, ready to go, like, no worries if it's not a fit for you, right? I get it. But that's the option that we have, right? and that's where someone can feel like, cool. Like, yeah, I do want to do that. Right. It helps to move that choice forward.

Shannon Mattern (31:17.664)

That's exactly what we teach in our program to where we're like, one, we have an expiration date on the proposal. And that's for many logistical reasons, but like one, so they don't come back a year later once your prices have increased and whatever. to really put a timeline on that decision and.

Melina Palmer (31:19.884)

Yay.

Shannon Mattern (31:42.975)

I love, and we also incentivize the decision. That's what like we're incentivizing. Like if you really do want this, it's in your best interest to move forward because, you know, we will incentivize you to say yes. And I love, like I wasn't even thinking of that example when I was, when I was reading the loss aversion chapter in your book, but,

Melina Palmer (31:47.098)

Mm-hmm.

Shannon Mattern (32:07.964)

I was just thinking of it as like, if you want it, you're going to get a little bonus. You're like, you're making them think about what they're going to miss out on if they don't move forward. And that's why that works. So it's so funny as I was reading through this, I was just like, that's why that thing that I used to do when I was running my web design business never worked. And then I suddenly stumbled upon something that seemed to work all the time. And I don't know why it worked, but it did. now I'm like, as

Melina Palmer (32:15.566)

Right. Yeah. Yeah.

Melina Palmer (32:27.694)

Hahaha!

Melina Palmer (32:32.462)

Right. Right. Yep.

Shannon Mattern (32:35.41)

as I teach women in the web designer academy, it's like now I'm teaching that I'm like, now I understand why things work, why things don't work. It feels like I have like the, the secret codes or something to like why to do certain things and why not. And, and, and like in an ethical way, I think that that's something that you mentioned in the book is like all of these things can be used for good and for evil and

Melina Palmer (32:49.59)

Yeah. Yeah.

Shannon Mattern (33:04.672)

I'm going to assume that we're all ethical people here and that we're going to use it for good. So yeah, I love that. I love how you shared that. Yeah.

Melina Palmer (33:07.662)

Yeah.

Yeah. Yep.

Yeah. Well, and I love that you brought up, you know, showing that all of these concepts, it's, they are, infinitely complex, right? Because of how our brains work and all these applications of them. And so that can also be something where it feels like a little bit overwhelming. Like I need to master all the concepts before I can jump in. Right. there are hundreds of concepts in behavioral science and they all work, you know, in a lot of different ways.

Shannon Mattern (33:25.323)

Yeah.

Shannon Mattern (33:36.342)

Mm-hmm.

Melina Palmer (33:41.946)

Like I don't advise waiting until you master them all, but that's like, so I, when I work with clients, we will work on something and especially with small business, I love still working with small business owners and being able to what we call just find your five, right? And so I work with you to understand what are your goals? What are you trying to accomplish? You're looking to sell some more right now. You're looking on your experience or something, understanding where you are to help.

Shannon Mattern (33:43.692)

you

Melina Palmer (34:07.723)

choose the five concepts that are gonna be best for you to really focus on. And like in this example, if loss aversion was one of them, you can look at kind of like all the ways you can apply it, right? So it's in that pitch, should I leverage some loss aversion? Does it have to do with like not missing out on something and we have the discount right now? Is there a time clock that's gonna be running down for a bonus? Does it have to be with the way that we frame instead of saying,

just think about all the sales you'll make later, right? That we say, let's flip and look at that from a loss aversion perspective and say, like you're potentially missing out on five leads a day right now to your website by not fixing this. Just think about how much money you're losing that we can fix if we jump into this right now, right? That feels very different because we looked at that different aspect of loss aversion, right? And so by like embracing a concept and like,

Having the permission to just focus on five that you know work for you and all the different ways you can try to implement them is a really good way to be more thoughtful about human behavior, but not get overwhelmed at the same time and be able to move forward with that. Yeah.

Shannon Mattern (35:20.566)

So for our web designers who are listening to this, who are really helping build environments for their clients that their customers are participating in, using, visiting, what are some concepts that they can take into consideration when they're building?

when they're building the websites for their clients that are going, that can incorporate some of the things that we're talking about today to help people make better choices.

Melina Palmer (35:57.72)

Yes. so to use one of loss aversion and that example I promised I was going to give is, I don't do much with websites for people anymore. You know, I used to do that back in the day, but whenever I would, one of the things that I would always do is not let people be looking at the existing site when we're talking about what they're looking to create moving forward. And this is a loss aversion problem, right? So if you're looking at all of what's there,

Shannon Mattern (36:17.003)

you

Melina Palmer (36:23.903)

You're anchored in what you've always done and how it is and what you feel like you might have to. there's, we've got status quo bias and whatever else that we feel like stuck in it. And you end up with a bunch of pages that you don't need and, architecture that doesn't make any sort of sense. Cause and it becomes frank insight is what I would always be calling these. Right. And I know people have their versions of those. If instead we say like, we're not going to look at this, like let's talk about what you do. Right. Like why would someone call you?

What are they looking to do? How do you help them? And then what would they do? And then what might they be interested in? And how do these things work together in that ideal scenario, right? Where they're away from all of that. You can then build out and talk about some key pages and things. And sometimes they'll come back around and realize like, my gosh, we didn't even talk about this whole line of business. So the urge may be like, how do we shove it in?

And instead, maybe if we say, lean into, like, knowing there'll be loss averse with it, the question being, like, so should you actually do that? Right? Or if it doesn't fit and you didn't even think about it as something that you do, like, do you let that thing go? Right? If somebody asks, you can, but maybe it doesn't go into the new version of the website and what you're looking to do. so that's another thing when it comes to loss aversion, in a way that I really recommend using and not letting people look at.

that existing site, because that can just make things so much easier for you as you look to build. And that leans into, you you talked a little bit about choice architecture, right? At the beginning of the conversation, which is essentially just how you structure a choice impacts the decisions that people end up making. And so in this case, I like to give the example of like imagining that you go to the cheesecake factory. We know they have a notoriously gigantic menu.

And while there's a lot there, it maybe feels a little bit overwhelming. You can still pretty well find what fits for you and ignore things that don't because they have it structured by appetizers and pizzas and cheesecakes and entrees and whatever else, right? You can find what you're looking for reasonably easy. Now imagine if it was an alphabetized menu at the Cheesecake Factory. It would make no sense. You can't find anything total mess.

Melina Palmer (38:48.641)

Right? Like it would be unbearable and so many websites and experiences just become that alphabetized cheesecake factory menu. And if you can take some time to think about the right structure and the experience you're looking to create for the people on the other side, it can make it to where it's like, well, they should probably make this decision first. And then the next thought they might have is this one. Right? So back to those 35,000 decisions we make every day. Like if you use that to know that like.

Our whole life is just a series of micro moments and micro choices. And if you think, I'm not trying to do everything on this one page, it's job isn't to do everything, but like, what's just like the one little thing that happens from this. And if on this page or in this part, I just need them to scroll down, right? Or I want them to click that button. I want someone to notice this thing. If they only do one thing from this moment, what's the most important thing?

And then like, what's the next most important thing? So like breaking down into those very small micro moments and thinking about that choice architecture in the way that you're positioning information makes really huge difference. I have like two more things I would say, and I feel like I should pause because I've been talking for a long time to see if you have something to add.

Shannon Mattern (40:05.099)

Well, when you were talking about the choice architecture, was reminding me of a recent experience I had as a consumer. was buying a rug for my bedroom and I'm on rugsdirect.com and I'm like searching and I like find one that I like finally. And then my next thought is I have no idea what size to buy for a king size bed.

Melina Palmer (40:16.419)

Mm-hmm.

Melina Palmer (40:29.987)

Yeah, hope.

Shannon Mattern (40:34.963)

And lo and behold, a little pop-up is like rug sizing guide. Figure out which size of rug to pick for your room. And it's a little quiz. And it's like, what room is this going to be a bedroom? What size bed? King. You know, whatever. And then it spits out the exact size rug that I need to purchase in this style so that I can

Melina Palmer (40:57.24)

Mm-hmm.

Shannon Mattern (41:01.323)

make that decision and complete the purchase. If I had to get up and go get a tape measure and try to figure out if it had even said, make sure to leave three feet on either side of blah, blah, blah. And put it this, like, I would have been out onto the next thing. So just that one little consideration was like,

Melina Palmer (41:17.399)

Right. Yep. Yes.

Shannon Mattern (41:26.035)

I will never buy another rug from anywhere, but rugs direct.com because they made it so easy for me. I purchased that I'm thinking about the next one and it's there. My, they are my store now.

Melina Palmer (41:35.491)

Great.

Melina Palmer (41:39.768)

Yeah. And I go to from like one simple little thing that if you think about the logic of it, shouldn't matter. Right. And if you're saying you're not, you weren't questioning the price versus I'm going to go look at this other thing, like, and some people will, right? Some people go find the thing and then go buy it cheaper somewhere else. a lot of people are that loyal customer. And with something like a rug that I'm going to have for such a long time, and I want this beautiful piece.

Like, and I did invest in searching for this. There's endowment effect and efforts, that go into things that we want to keep with the thing that we already picked. And now too, where you can show, like take, put up your phone in the room and you can see what this rug would look like if the blue matches the blue of your headboard or whatever else. Right. and so those things that helped me to envision myself in that experience, you know, really make a big difference, on that for sure. Yeah.

Shannon Mattern (42:35.125)

Yeah. So you have a couple more suggestions. Yeah.

Melina Palmer (42:35.181)

Love that. Perfect. Yep. And I'll go quick with it. Of the main things that I know that people tend to get wrong when it comes to how you position and price and showcase sales and stuff, So, especially for small business, I see this all the time. What we feel like we should do is start low and work our way up to the most expensive option.

Shannon Mattern (42:47.092)

Yes.

Shannon Mattern (42:58.783)

Preach.

Melina Palmer (43:01.925)

And you should not do that because it sets a low anchor on whatever it is that you are selling. And so if you say, well, you know, I have this $2,500 option for people are probably, let's be honest, right? It's like, well, you could start at even just $500 for a first hour. And then we can figure out if it's a fit and what it might look like, or we have this $2,500 thing, or there's something for 5,000. And I know that might feel like a lot, but

But by the time you get to five, one, especially if you kind of hedge like that, nobody's gonna buy that thing. And if you started with something that was $1,500, you anchored them on that and everything else feels more expensive. So for one, you gotta flip it, you gotta start high and work your way down. Another mistake people make is the thing you really want people to buy, what you know is the best option for them, tends to be the most expensive thing that you offer them.

And you should not do that because people are not likely to want that most expensive thing, especially when you can layer in the like social proof elements we were talking about before. So if you have, we'll say a $5,000 option, right? Think about, and that's like what you think people should get this $5,000 thing, which for a website I know is like not in the quality vein where you're at, right? So maybe we'll say it's 10 or something. That's the thing you really want them to get is a $10,000 website experience, right?

So you wanna create what I call a wingman for that best offer. Like what's the stuff that most people don't need, but you would be willing to do and people would be happy to have and like, don't say it's stuff that you don't wanna do. Like I'm gonna go sit on site with you for three hours a day. Like if you don't wanna do the thing, don't sell that. Cause you'll be surprised how many people buy that other thing. But maybe it is like a give.

for a look, if you're redoing a logo in addition, or we'll also give you PowerPoint templates, or we're going to incorporate an additional video experience or whatever, right? Like there are other things you could be do some social media templates that could go along with it. I know there are plenty of options, right? So if you say, Hey, we've got this like all inclusive package that includes social media templates, PowerPoints, a new logo design, the brand book, whatever.

Melina Palmer (45:24.045)

And that option is $19,000, right? We have that as an option for you. And you know what we found is like, not everybody needs all of that. We also have this website experience where we're gonna give you ABCD. And for most people, this is a great fit. That one is just 12.5. And really we work with you along the way to find that best experience. And we can deliver that new website within three months, assuming we have this great back and forth, but we handle the bulk of it for you. Which one of those feels like the best fit for you?

Right. Like I even upped us right from 10 to make the point, right. But 12, five felt better after we heard 19 and like, and they might say, well, like I like the 12, five, but could I also get a PowerPoint? Like I don't need the social stuff, but could I like, how much is that? say, sure. Yeah. PowerPoint template is just an extra thousand bucks on top of this. Like, and you know, free, if you move forward today, uh, we'll just go ahead and do it for 13 even if you want to go ahead and throw that in there for you.

Shannon Mattern (45:58.036)

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Melina Palmer (46:24.055)

Right? Easy, right? It makes that decision feel really good.

Shannon Mattern (46:25.717)

Yeah.

Yeah, know, one of the, I'm so glad you brought that up. I love how you call it a wingman. I think that is so brilliant. So where it's like, it's job is to introduce this, the perfect offer for you. So it's like, you know, you call it the wingman in the book and you just, it's like, it's the one that's like, you know, a little flashy, a little extra, a little like over the top. And you don't want to date that guy, but his friend's really nice.

Melina Palmer (46:39.437)

Yeah. Yes.

Melina Palmer (46:50.509)

Right, yep.

Melina Palmer (46:55.757)

Right. Exactly. Right. And like every so often the wingman gets a date and that's cool. You can be excited about that when someone buys the $19,000 thing. You're like, heck yeah. Yay. For all of us. I'm delighted in that thing. And like most of the time it's not. And you also don't have to do that extra work, right?

Shannon Mattern (47:00.647)

Yeah. Yeah.

Shannon Mattern (47:08.188)

Yeah.

Shannon Mattern (47:14.717)

Yeah, one of the things that I see a little trap web designers fall into is they'll be like prices starting at or what's your budget for this project on the consultation form and it'll start like low, medium, high. And I see you shaking your head for those of you who are not watching this on the video. I'm like, you're unintentionally setting low anchors and any price you discuss after that creates that.

Melina Palmer (47:22.617)

Mmm.

Melina Palmer (47:26.425)

Mm-mm-mm.

Shannon Mattern (47:38.838)

feeling of rising prices. And I don't know if this is a thing, but this is how I talk about it. And I'm so curious if there's like a concept that like applies to I'm like, do you know how when gas prices go up, like they were $3 a gallon, they go up to five, you're like, I can't buy anything anymore ever. They dropped down to four. And you're like, Okay, I can spend money again. They're still more expensive than they were. But you went high and it came down. It's like,

Melina Palmer (48:01.901)

Yeah. Right.

Shannon Mattern (48:09.184)

When you start low and you go high, feel like people are just like, let me hoard everything I have. I can't spend it's too expensive. Like, is that, is that a real phenomenon?

Melina Palmer (48:20.705)

Yeah, definitely. And it does have to do with that anchoring, right? So if we're anchored on something at $3 and you were to raise to four, you would feel the same as if it went up to five, probably like emotionally you would feel that way. but then backing off you go, like, okay. Like I adjusted to this and I, kind of just forgot what the world was like when it was three, right? Like, cause you don't, who knows anymore.

Shannon Mattern (48:31.509)

Yeah.

Shannon Mattern (48:42.795)

Right.

Melina Palmer (48:46.361)

Um, and so that actually is another example I give to people where you feel uncomfortable maybe about raising your prices, right? Which I get it's hard. Um, it's hard for me. I struggle with these things too. I also have to say what my speaking fee is and whatever else. And if it just, you you feel it, we're human people. It's cool. Right. But the practice I recommend you do is to do a thought exercise and say, if you woke up tomorrow and you had to sell your stuff for 10 times,

Shannon Mattern (48:58.876)

Yeah.

Melina Palmer (49:15.277)

what you sold it for today, right? So all of a sudden, this is what you have to do. It's gonna be 10X. How would you talk about it? Like what might you be able to incorporate in? What does that look like? But like knowing you're not having to like do all that extra work, but if you do this at a 10X, how would you frame it? How would you think and talk about it? And now that you've set this like crazy thing in your brain,

Like now bring it back and you were just looking to like to double actually feels kind of easy, right? To make that difference because I got my brain around saying that this thing is 50,000 when it's only been 5,000. And so then if I want to say it's 12, five, it feels a lot easier if I thought about it being 50.

Shannon Mattern (50:01.224)

so good. I just looked at the clock. I cannot believe that we are at time. my goodness. So thank you so much. And I do want you to share with everyone where they can go to learn more about you. You will be speaking at the Simply Profitable Designer Summit. So you all can get even more information there. But can you share with everyone where they can go to?

Melina Palmer (50:05.175)

I know.

Shannon Mattern (50:27.999)

connects with you, learn more about you, hire you for them, hire you for their clients, all of the things.

Melina Palmer (50:32.809)

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Well, going to thebrainybusiness.com, you can find the podcast, you can find the books, including, you know, a free chapter of any of the books. If you want to check them out see if they're a fit for you. Um, and there's a contact form there. You can also just email Melina at thebrainybusiness.com. Uh, if you want to reach out about some work or something.

And you can find the Brainy Business on all the socials as the Brainy Biz, B-I-Z, and I am Melina Palmer on LinkedIn. And would love to connect with everyone. Please send those requests. It's good to learn about you and where you came from and all that great stuff.

Shannon Mattern (51:09.407)

Well, thank you so, so much for being here and thank you all so much for listening and we'll see you back here next week. Bye everyone.