{"id":4893,"date":"2024-09-06T13:57:29","date_gmt":"2024-09-06T17:57:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/?p=4893"},"modified":"2025-12-11T08:33:18","modified_gmt":"2025-12-11T13:33:18","slug":"the-false-consensus-bias-in-marketing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/blog\/the-false-consensus-bias-in-marketing\/","title":{"rendered":"The False Consensus Bias in Marketing"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>For all the talk about&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/marketinginsidergroup.com\/marketing-strategy\/empathy-in-marketing-why-its-more-important-than-data\/?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">\u201ccustomer empathy\u201d as a supreme value in marketing<\/a>, marketers are surprisingly bad at deploying it.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And by that, I mean, it\u2019s very common for a marketer to think about their preferences and apply them broadly to their customer base or to the market more broadly.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is called the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/False_consensus_effect?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">False Consensus Effect<\/a>. Here\u2019s how ChatGPT described it for me:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>\u201cThe false consensus effect is when people believe that their opinions, beliefs, or behaviors are more common than they actually are.&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>In marketing, this can lead businesses to assume that everyone thinks like them, so they design campaigns that appeal to their own tastes rather than their customers&#8217;.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Think about the messaging you see on a daily basis on LinkedIn and on podcasts.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>\u201cPeople don\u2019t want to talk to sales, they just want to use the product.\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>\u201cPeople don\u2019t want to fill out forms, they want to use a chatbot.\u201d&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>\u201cHey 2014 called and wants its inbound strategy back &#8211; no one reads ebooks anymore!\u201d&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>\u201cCold emails don\u2019t work; I\u2019ve never opened one.\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>\u201cSearch is dying; I\u2019ve replaced Google with ChatGPT for 80% of queries.\u201d&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>\u201cEducational content is saturated, the future of B2B marketing is personality-led content.\u201d&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>\u201cPeople have short attention spans, no one wants to listen to a long podcast.\u201d&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>\u201cPeople are bored with interview-based podcasts, you have to do something creative and novel.\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>All valid opinions to hold, in some sense. These types of insights often lead to great ideas, campaigns that stand out, and even business and product ideas.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For instance, it is generally true that getting to poke around in a product helps buyers decide between solutions, thus something like&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.navattic.com\/?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Navattic<\/a>&nbsp;solves this.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As a matter of marketing effectiveness, however, I could thoroughly debunk each of these using data and counter-examples.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But that\u2019s not the point of this essay.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The point of this essay is that you are not your audience, and that by limiting your set of options to what you believe, you limit the potential impact of your programs, campaigns, and experiments.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-no-one-likes-comic-sans-right\"><strong>No one likes comic sans, right?<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/foodz\/?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Andrew Anderson<\/a>&nbsp;has influenced my thinking a ton (and sparked my interest in&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/blog\/barbell-content-strategy\/?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Nassim Taleb\u2019s ideas<\/a>, which I believe I\u2019ve passed on to many of you).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He\u2019s an experimentation guy, so much of what he speaks about applies to the lens of marketing and product management that can be analyzed somewhat objectively and run through randomized controlled trials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A world where&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/jeffgothelf.com\/blog\/highest-paid-persons-opinion\/?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">highly paid people\u2019s opinions<\/a>&nbsp;often clash with what the data objectively says.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>One thing he hammers home&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/cxl.com\/blog\/top-5-reasons-suck-making-rational-decisions\/?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">is that our own cognitive biases<\/a>&nbsp;often prevent us from achieving the results we want.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the funniest and most extreme example of this, he wrote about an experiment involving the cartoonish villain of aesthetics: comic sans.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Since I edited and published the article on CXL, I\u2019ll&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/cxl.com\/blog\/organizational-push-back\/?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">just give you the passage here<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cMy team decided to run a font styling test on one of our larger sites. We included concepts from our designer, our copywriter and others, but of course we included challengers to those beliefs as well to make sure our pool was as high beta as possible. So guess what won? What is the one font that would upset a designer or copywriter the most?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you said Comic Sans, you win no prize.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Not only did it prove to generate a 70%+ lift to RPV, but it blew away all the other tested experiences. We are talking well over 3 weeks of data as proof here. For us that means we are helping 70% more people get help, which is what we are here to do. For a designer however it means that they now are being asked to put a despised and hated font on a site that they \u201cown.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now I am sure that you are already going through a thousand and one excuses, explanations, attacks on testing data, etc\u2026but that is exactly my point.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>From an optimization standpoint, Comic Sans could just as easily be called \u201cFont Variant #5,\u201d but because we all have a visceral hatred of Comic Sans and that does not mesh with our notions of aesthetic beauty, good design, or professional pages, we must come up with an explanation to our cognitive dissonance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Is there anything inherently wrong with comic sans? No. But from a design perspective it challenges the vision of so many. Did testing make comic sans the better option? No. It just revealed that information to us and made us face that knowledge head-on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you are testing in the most efficient way possible, you are going to get these results all the time. These are the moments that teams will turn against your optimization program in a heartbeat.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-the-world-has-changed-consumers-no-longer-want-insert-thing-here\"><strong>\u201cThe world has changed. Consumers no longer want [insert thing here]\u201d<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Comic sans is, like I said, a whimsical example.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But you hear similar (and more rational sounding) opinions all the time, usually backed up by some phrase about human behavior changing.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The first time I really recall this happening was when Drift came out with a (very effective) campaign proclaiming \u201cforms are dead.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you\u2019re too young to remember it (or you just live an interesting enough life that doesn\u2019t center around B2B SaaS product marketing), it was around 2018-19, and the foundational gating mechanism on the internet was the form.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You enter information in form fields, validate that information with javascript, and collect the information in a CRM (and often automatically trigger an email to send an ebook or to book a meeting).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Drift claimed that this was old school. People hate forms. They want to have a conversation. They want conversational chatbots.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"543\" data-src=\"https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-68-1024x543.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-4894 lazyload\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-68-1024x543.png 1024w, https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-68-300x159.png 300w, https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-68-768x407.png 768w, https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-68.png 1120w\" data-sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 1024px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 1024\/543;\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/cxl.com\/blog\/lead-forms\/?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Image Source<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I was at HubSpot at the time, and I was working on freemium acquisition. One of our products was a free forms tool. We also, for what it\u2019s worth, offered a conversational bot. But I was genuinely curious, \u201cwhat is the perception of forms in the market?\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So we conducted research. At least at the time in 2019, the data showed that the claims that \u201cforms are dead\u201d&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/blog.hubspot.com\/marketing\/state-of-email-lead-capture?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">were completely overblown<\/a>. People were, by and large, fine with forms, and they performed quite well.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Let&#8217;s further complicate the plot: the point here is not that \u201cthe new thing\u201d is always overblown. Often, \u201cthe new thing\u201d is early and really does change the way consumers interact with products.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In this example, I actually really dislike using chatbots and prefer forms. But, and this is the important message \u2013 my audience may like chatbots. I\u2019ve run many experiments that \u201cprove\u201d both can be right depending on the context.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>I simply cannot universalize my own preferences<\/strong>, filtering out potentially more effective ways of reaching my intended audience and customers, and preventing the success of my product and company.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I hate jogging. Plenty of people love it. For the life of me, I cannot understand why people like Pearl Jam. But they do.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What I should really do is be open-minded and understand that other people have different preferences and thoughts than I do.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Theory of Mind, Piaget\u2019s Egocentrism, and Good Old Fashioned Data<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Jean Piaget came up with a popular model of cognitive development, outlining stages of development through childhood. His<a href=\"https:\/\/www.simplypsychology.org\/preoperational.html?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">&nbsp;\u201cpreoperational stage\u201d<\/a>&nbsp;is the second one, occurring from roughly two years old to seven years old.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It is marked by \u201cegocentrism,\u201d which \u201crefers to the child\u2019s inability to see a situation from another person\u2019s point of view. The egocentric child assumes that other people see, hear, and feel exactly the same as the child does.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At this stage, we simply haven\u2019t developed \u201ctheory of mind,\u201d which is \u201cthe capacity to understand other people by ascribing mental states to them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I\u2019m being a bit didactic in describing these theories, as I clearly don\u2019t believe that all of us marketers are stuck in the preoperational stage of development.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We can obviously theorize that others feel differently than we do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But the ideas here help remind me of something we all know we should do: get out of our own heads, and into the heads of our audience and customers.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Every single one of us falls into this thinking trap, including myself, and especially when it seems &#8220;obvious&#8221; to us what customers want.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I\u2019m going to give you an example, and I want to emphasize that I\u2019m not throwing Amanda under the bus. I respect her work a ton, read every newsletter she puts out, and she may even be reading this newsletter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/sparktoro.com\/audience-research-newsletter?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Amanda Natividad\u2019s newsletter<\/a>\u00a0literally just came out as I was writing it and it\u2019s the PERFECT EXAMPLE, so I had to use it. Check it out:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"826\" data-src=\"https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-69-1024x826.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-4895 lazyload\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-69-1024x826.png 1024w, https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-69-300x242.png 300w, https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-69-768x619.png 768w, https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-69.png 1120w\" data-sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 1024px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 1024\/826;\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Now, obviously, I run an SEO agency.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But I have such an insane abundance of data that shows this is not true, and in fact, I\u2019m often surprised by how many people convert from \u201cwhat is [keyword]\u201d pages, especially in technical spaces and for enterprise software.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I fall for this trap myself. All. The. Time.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In fact, just last night, I was talking to&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/ryanbaum?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">a friend<\/a>&nbsp;about his idea for a marketing meetup that was much more involved than a little dinner or a happy hour. I started opining about how much friction it was and how I wouldn\u2019t go through the effort to do something like that, and then I realized\u2026I\u2019m doing the thing!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I hadn\u2019t interviewed a single person or looked at any data. I just assumed that, because it didn\u2019t sound good to me, that others would feel the same way.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So what are we left with?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The banal cliches you\u2019ve all heard before:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Customer research<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Data analysis<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Experimentation<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Actually, one interview question I\u2019ve been loving lately is, \u201cwhat marketing experiment you\u2019ve run recently that surprised you?\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We should all have one of these. I have dozens. It\u2019s not that I\u2019m naive or bad at marketing; I\u2019m simply not clairvoyant. Heck, I can\u2019t even accurately describe my own \u201ccustomer journey\u201d or how I decide to buy products.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>We\u2019re not even good at understanding our own behavior and preferences<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>As\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/ca.linkedin.com\/in\/edoty?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Eric Doty<\/a>\u00a0pointed out on my LinkedIn post about the false consensus effect, we\u2019re not even good at attributing our own behavior and attitudes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"552\" data-src=\"https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-70-1024x552.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-4896 lazyload\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-70-1024x552.png 1024w, https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-70-300x162.png 300w, https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-70-768x414.png 768w, https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-70.png 1120w\" data-sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 1024px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 1024\/552;\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>This is certainly true of myself if I\u2019m being reflective and intellectually honest.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I consider myself a highbrow content consumer. I like to, if I can, read research papers about the technology of a given bandit algorithm in an experimentation platform. I pride myself on being able to grok the really technical, long-form stuff.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But I just signed up for a product last week because I searched for a jobs-to-be-done phrase (something like \u201cAI overview tracking tools\u201d), read like two listicles, and I converted on a free trial.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>My company just got back from an offsite in Costa Rica that originated from a cold email that was sent to me two years ago.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I entered my email to download a recent state of the industry report last week.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yesterday, I wanted to figure out how to blow up a photo I took on a trip to Guatemala and make it into a canvas image. I searched for how to do that, landed on a blog post, and bought from the company that wrote it. Last click! Insane!&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I\u2019m a hypocrite. Most of us think advertising works, just not on us. But&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theatlantic.com\/business\/archive\/2011\/08\/why-good-advertising-works-even-when-you-think-it-doesnt\/244252\/?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">it does<\/a>. I like to think that I&#8217;m a highbrow and discerning consumer, and I\u2019m too smart for all the simple and old school marketing tricks. But I\u2019m not,&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Bias_blind_spot?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">even though I\u2019m aware of them<\/a>.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We have trouble explaining our own behavior due to deeply embedded cognitive biases:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/topics\/neuroscience\/recall-bias?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Recall bias<\/a>&nbsp;happens when we don&#8217;t accurately remember past events or behaviors. We tend to forget instances that contradict our current beliefs or feelings, which can lead to a skewed perception of how often something happens, like cold emails working on you.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/link.springer.com\/referenceworkentry\/10.1007\/978-94-007-0753-5_4046?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Self-reporting bias<\/a>&nbsp;occurs when people inaccurately report their behaviors or preferences, often because they either don\u2019t remember correctly or unconsciously want to present themselves in a certain way.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>So even if you survey people and ask them how they prefer to do something, you may get inaccurate results. After all, there\u2019s a&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/blog\/what-people-say-vs-what-they-do\/?utm_campaign=Newsletter&amp;utm_source=hs_email&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz--1w7Kzv-1RvksQJgV8ntZYvIFzCpyoAcDVPL8jsRRy4C6Wo1aND0vpc0sdtMdH4lYCKnwS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">delta between what people say and what people do<\/a>.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Human behavior and psychology is complex, ain\u2019t it?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Want more insights like this?&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/newsletter\/\">Subscribe to our&nbsp;<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/newsletter\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Field&nbsp;<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/beomniscient.com\/newsletter\/\">Notes<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For all the talk about&nbsp;\u201ccustomer empathy\u201d as a supreme value&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6640,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[24,184],"tags":[],"wf_post_folders":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-4893","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-content-strategy","8":"category-field-notes"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.3 (Yoast SEO v27.3) - 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