The Science of Engagement

You’ve probably done a lot of thinking about how to get customers to adopt your product and increase their usage and engagement. And in the course of all that thinking, you’ve no doubt tried various methods of gathering data and metrics and trying to improve the customer’s experience -- and that’s critical.

But if you haven’t considered the issue from the perspective of behavioral psychology then you’re leaving a lot on the table.

Harnessing behavioral science in product design isn’t strange or niche. In fact, a behavioral framework is an illuminating, common-sense way to think about adoption and usage. After all, you’re really trying to accomplish two main behavior changes: persuade someone to begin to use your product, and then increase the intensity of their usage and engagement.

One person who has thought a whole lot about how to change all sorts of behaviors is Standford behavioral scientist BJ Fogg. He created a behavioral model, in which he identifies three main factors -- motivation, triggers (or prompts), and ability -- that must be present in order to change a target behavior.

Simply put, this means that for a desired behavior to take place, a person must have sufficient motivation, sufficient ability, and an effective trigger.

And in order to increase a behavior over time – as opposed to changing it one time – Fogg says that at least one of the three factors must be intensified. That means increasing motivation and/or triggers, and enhancing someone’s ability to perform the desired behavior. He points to six ability factors to consider:

• Time: Does the behavior take a long time?
• Money: Does the behavior require a lot of money?
• Physical Effort: Does the behavior require significant physical effort?
• Brain Cycles: Does the behavior require significant mental effort?
• Social Deviance: Is the behavior strange, out of the norm?
• Non‐routine: Is the behavior something the person is not used to doing?

Now, if we’re talking about changing some of the behaviors Fogg cites, such as “Exercise 10 more minutes each day from now on” or “Eat more fruits and vegetables each day into the future,” the details of his model align perfectly to create the intended effect.

But trying to persuade people to adopt and increase engagement with a SaaS product is a bit different. So I’ve adapted Fogg’s model to reflect those unique considerations and give you a behavioral model framework within which to think about driving adoption.

Motivation

Fogg points to three main areas of motivation: pleasure/pain, hope/fear, and social acceptance/rejection.  As it applies to product adoption, motivation initially plays a role in the very first stage of adoption, the “acquire” stage. This is when people must decide whether to fire whatever method they’re currently using to solve their problems and hire your product instead.

Keep in mind that humans are resistant to change, so to increase motivation to switch to your product, you must lower the perceived pain of adoption by conveying your product's superior value and ease of adoption.

And to maintain and intensify their motivation to increase engagement with your product, you need to consistently fulfill your customers' hopes that your product will remove the struggles and obstacles they face when trying to do the job they’ve hired your product to do.

Triggers

Fogg is certainly correct when he contends that “Since the advent of persuasive technology, the role of triggers has grown in importance. Today, many of the most desirable target behaviors are done when using computers -- donate money, share this with a friend, buy this new product.

When we use interactive technology, we can receive a trigger and perform the target behavior immediately.” But he points to examples from the consumer product world, such as a Facebook notification that you’ve tagged in a photo, that triggers you to go interact with someone’s page.

In the B2B product world, triggers are a tad different. That said, his three categories of trigger types can be adapted as techniques to remind users to interact with your product. Think of them as potential adoption accelerators, with a different type of message depending on the circumstance. Things like emails or in app reminders can help trigger usage of your product, and you want to track which triggers are the most effective with your users.

There are three main types of triggers, which I’ve adapted for SaaS:

Reminders: for Motivated Users

These triggers are just what they sound like: reminders for your motivated users to interact with your app. Because these users are already motivated to interact with your product, all they need is a nudge to drive them back to your product. Reminders could be in the form of emails, notifications, or even in-app reminders to perform further actions. Because this group of customers is most likely to form your avid customer base, designing targeted reminders should be your first priority.

Enhancers for Users with Low Ability

Users with low ability are encountering roadblocks at some point (or points) when trying to make progress with your product. Because of these roadblocks, these users are in danger of moving into a lapsed usage category. It’s important to identify their moments of struggle and obstacles and simplify the tasks they’re attempting to do. Enhancers should alert the user that the roadblock has been removed, and emphasize the new simplicity that you’ve introduced that will help them unlock the value they signed up for.

Enticers: for Users with Low Motivation

Users with low motivation aren’t grasping the value your product is offering, so go back and identify ways you could more clearly demonstrate this value. Trigger these users with enticements such as a reward or a clear demonstration of the value that would be derived if a given action were taken. You don’t want to oversell yourself and try to boost motivation based on anything other than your product’s intrinsic value, or you risk annoying or alienating your users. Because this is the trickiest group to convince -- and most likely to lapse -- this should form your third priority.

Each type of trigger can also take one of two forms: hot or cold. A hot trigger allows a desired action to be performed right away. An email containing an actionable link is an example of a hot trigger; an email reminding someone to perform an action at a later date is a cold trigger.  Because they’re actionable, hot triggers, especially for motivated users, are much more effective than cold ones.

Popular wisdom states that hot triggers are mainly meant to be put in the path of motivated users. And it’s true that a hot trigger + a motivated user = the best chance for successfully creating and maintaining an intensified behavior change over time. That’s why hot triggers for these users should be your number one priority when it comes to designing your product with behavior change in mind. But it stands to reason that a hot trigger — one which allows for immediate action, rather than action sometime in the future –  would in general be more effective than a cold one in just about every situation.

Ability Factors

While Fogg’s ability factors apply in many situations where an increase in a behavior such as a diet or new workout regimen is desired, they don’t quite align with the needs of product adoption. In order to make them useful for companies in the B2B realm, I've tweaked them in order to align the Fogg model with concepts that will provide you value. I’ve eliminated the physical effort factor, as it doesn't apply here. Think of ability factors as conditions that need to be optimized to make it easier and more desirable for users to interact with your product. It breaks down like this:

Time: Does the behavior take a long time?

• Is your set up long and grueling? Is onboarding an arduous task that doesn’t convey immediate value to your users? These stages should be easy, breezy, and full of clarity around the value you’re going to provide. Do you provide quick wins and “ah-ha” moments in your onboarding that make it a no-brainer for customers to jump right past low usage and into fair or frequent usage?

Money: Does the behavior require a lot of money?

• This doesn’t apply for free plans, but do your paid plans appear to offer high value for the subscription fee? If you’re providing stellar value, you can probably get away with a higher price, but even a modest fee can seem princely if you aren’t giving users bang for their buck.

Cognitive Load: Does the behavior require significant mental effort?

• This doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to dumb things down. Some effort can be satisfying IF there’s a payoff. That said, if it’s difficult for a user to figure out why and how they should interact with your product, the cognitive load will be too high and you’ll decrease adoption.

Repulsion: Is the behavior strange, or out of the norm?

• Think of this as anything that might make the user uncomfortable or give them a case of the creeps. This could include asking them for too much personal information, or anything that might give the impression that their privacy will be violated in some way.

Convention: Is the behavior something the person is not used to doing?

• In an effort to stand out, don’t try to reinvent the wheel just for the sake of being different. Make every effort to ground your product’s functionality in a mental model that will feel familiar and comfortable to the user. And make sure that the reasons you ask customers to take certain actions makes sense -- and doesn’t need excessive supporting documentation or other factors that will reduce their ability to interact with your product.

Bottom line: People tend to change a behavior -- in this case, adopt your product -- when three factors are in place: Motivation, Triggers, Ability.

People increase usage of and engagement with your product when you intensify one or more of the above three factors. Increase motivation to adopt and then use your product, target your triggers to incite usage, and enhance ability to interact with your product.

It’s not wishful thinking – it’s just science.