What is FOMO in marketing and 5 tips to benefit from it

FOMO stands for Fear Of Missing Out, i.e. the fear (in some cases real fear out of sheer greed) of missing out on a great opportunity, in marketing terms, a great market opportunity, whether you are a buyer, investor or any other player. In marketing terms, a great market opportunity, whether you are a buyer, investor or any other player. What if it is a “bargain” that will never come up again in our lifetime? Our sometimes sinister brain can’t help but ask itself that question.

In the world of cryptocurrencies, FOMO materializes when a certain virtual currency starts a tremendous bullish rally, and investors for fear of missing out on the rise, enter with their capital in the middle of it (or in the worst case when it is already at its peak), and in many occasions what happens is that it then starts to go down, often in that world with really sharp drops.

Human beings, in general, although with certain exceptions, are not overly attracted to risk. But risk is not only the possibility of losing something, but also the possibility of regretting a missed opportunity. And we don’t want to put ourselves in that position.

For example, you are thinking of buying a car. You have a general idea of the type of vehicle you want and how much you are willing to spend. Suddenly, you see an ad on the Internet that shows you a great deal at your local dealership. And it’s exactly the car you want. Maybe you haven’t committed to buying a vehicle yet and you’re in a still-early purchase decision maturation phase, but now your FOMO is on, and your brain knows it.

You’re afraid of missing this opportunity to save a lot of money because it may not come around again. That’s purely the definition of FOMO applied to the marketing world.

If you’re a marketer, you’ve probably seen this on many occasions. Every viral campaign has helped trigger FOMO among consumers. When you see everyone around you buying a product, you want in on it too. Or taken to another area, when everyone sees a series or a movie and they keep talking about it, we have the imperious need to watch it, not because we think we will like it, but simply because we have to, curiosity kills us.

And in terms of marketing keys, what are the best techniques to take advantage of this phenomenon?

5 TIPS TO BOOST THE FOMO OF OUR POTENTIAL CUSTOMERS

1– Establish a limited time to take advantage of an offer, favorable conditions or whatever is going to be that great opportunity. In online commerce, free shipping for a certain period of time can also be an action with very good results.

2– Adding testimonials or reviews from former customers who have already tried your product or service and encourage their purchase.

3– Personalization of offers based, for example, on previous purchases. That feeling of exclusivity makes us much more likely to buy than a “one size fits all” offer.

4– Use suitable language to motivate the potential customer to buy, for example with phrases such as “while stocks last”, “only for the first 100 applicants”, “limited quota” and other similar phrases that give the idea of scarcity and increase the desire to be one of the “lucky” ones to get it. You will improve the online cart abandonment rate.

5– And finally, one of the best without a doubt, with a double aspect and that surely you are familiar with, for example, from hotel booking platforms, travel, etc. Show the number of people who at that moment are looking at the same thing as you, and at the same time, the remaining stock. It has happened to all of us. We want to book a hotel room, we get a message saying that there are three more people looking at the same accommodation, and what’s worse… there are only two rooms available! We get very nervous, we can’t let them take it away from us. As a result, we end up booking right then and there.

The term FOMO has become very popular lately, in line with our modern passion for anglicisms, but this is not new, it has always been about taking advantage of the human being’s desire to take advantage of a bargain limited in time or quantity. What a bad feeling that your neighbour got it and you didn’t!

Without abusing it, but knowing how to use it in a timely and intelligent way, these actions can be really beneficial for a business.