COMPULSION

In the week that saw the publication of research attempting to shed a little light into the ‘black-box’ of IMPULSE BUYING and COMPULSIVE BUYING, we swivel the beam (like an usherette’s torch) onto audience ticket-purchasing behaviours.

Most entertainment consumers rush to snap up tickets for our shows and concerts, films and attractions, because they are totally rational beings who understand the superb quality, and unbeatable value for money, of the unforgettable transformational experiences they are buying from us.

Their purchasing decisions are (mostly) arrived at as a result of a considered and level-headed evaluation of the opportunity presented to them, supported by a rigorous cost-benefit analysis and an informed market survey of potential suppliers...

But that does not apply to every consumer.

We are also aware that our weekly sales will inevitably include a percentage of more spontaneous, ‘semi-automatic’ purchases.  And if you’re anything like me, attracting this type of patron underpins a fair amount of the decision-making surrounding messaging, pricing, calls-to-action, campaign timing, on the one hand, and designing online customer journeys (UI and UX) on the other.  One website we built could only achieve fewer clicks to purchase with the advent of a telepathic interface.

This week saw the publication of a paper* attempting to shed light into this ‘black-box’ purchasing.  And while this particular research was based on a ‘comparatively small sample size,’ its treatment of the overall subject, and some of the insights it surfaces, offers a lot of food for thought…

First off, and most importantly, there are two very different species of ‘non-planned’ purchase.

COMPULSIVE BUYING, aka addictive and excessive purchasing, is ‘almost always accompanied by negative emotional responses such as anxiety, frustration and depression.’

Whereas…

IMPULSE BUYING, ‘places greater emphasis on a predisposition to purchase spontaneously and immediately, exhibits a diminished regard for presumable outcomes, and is often accompanied by positive feelings.’

What they have in common, this new research proposes (or in-part recapitulates) is that they both rely on something called ‘mental simulation’ or ‘the cognitive construction of hypothetical events that involves the anticipation of desirable outcomes and how one can bring them about ’** and which is broadly split into two distinct (if potentially overlapping IMO) constituents:

PROCESS SIMULATION in which prospective purchasers focus their imagination on the process of securing a desirable end state (e.g. buying a ticket);

OUTCOME SIMULATION in which they focus their imaginations on the actual end state they want to achieve.

Compulsive Buyers, a broad body of research suggests, are broadly driven by a desire to escape negative feelings (anxiety, depression, loneliness, etc.) by fixating on a ‘Process Simulation’ and thereby (hopefully) using that focus to blot out the painful feelings they are trying to avoid (a similar escape mechanism to that at play in gambling and other addictions).  And they are not a tiny, troubled tribe. 5.8% of adults in the US have ‘declared a tendency toward compulsive purchases’ and ‘an empirical study on compulsive buyers in a range of countries reports and estimated 3.4% to 6.9% of consumers are compulsive buyers.’ Among young adults this can reach as high as 16%.

Impulse Buyers, by contrast, are ‘typically centred around affective states, such as high arousal feelings (e.g. excitement, pleasure) and an irresistible urge to purchase something.’  Accordingly, Impulse Buyers are focussed on ‘Outcome Simulation,’ on creating a mental picture of all those great things the purchase will deliver.  And therefore any thoughts involving ‘Process Simulation’ (e.g. imagining the hassle of queuing for hours during a Friday morning On Sale) might actually kill off the dream.  Of course, we will never know how many of those waiting in that line are driven more (compulsively) driven by the thought of getting a ticket than actually seeing the band.

In the realm of the semi-automatic purchase, either ‘bad’ (negative) or ‘good’ (positive) feelings may be chiefly responsible for blocking out the more rational voices in a purchaser’s head.  Or as one paper puts it: ‘Individuals may experience a situation in which they are torn between the urge to seek immediate gratification and a call to behave reasonably.’

Which is all very well when purchasing low-cost items promising (relatively) predictable pay-offs (e.g. chocolate bars, washing-up liquid, Rom-Com box-sets).  But there’s a completely different order of risk-and-reward ratio when it comes to the much higher cost (both financial cost and social cost) of purchasing top price tickets for a brand new West End show, that maybe isn’t fully cast yet, and won’t be fully orchestrated/blocked-out/scoped for sight-lines, etc. until well into the Preview period (…or later)

And what about purchasing tickets for a gig one year in advance? By the time the concert comes around, the band will (probably) have a new album out, and the ticket-purchaser might (possibly) not know/like any of the new tracks the band insist on ‘sharing.’  Or maybe, after those twelve long months, the ticket-purchaser themselves now has a new partner accompanying them, and they (Sod’s Law dictates) won’t know/like any of the band’s repertoire!

But no matter how well-known and well-loved the show, and no matter how forensically thought-through the ticket purchase, for us in The Business of Pleasure, which, let’s face it, only really succeeds by exceeding our audience’s anticipatory ‘mental simulations,’ every call-to-action is, at least in part, The Call Of The Wild. A bit of a flutter that should always, always set the heart a bit of a-flutter.

DT

22 March 2025

*Mental simulation and compulsive buying: a multiple mediation model through impulse buying and self-control Xiaowei Duan, 17 March 2025

**Zhou et al, 2024; Riskind and Calvette, 2020; Taylor et al, 1998