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When you listen to Mark Zuckerberg, he simply created an innovative piece of technology that enables the world to “connect”. Well, that wasn't particularly new in 2005. For that we had Myspace, Friends Reunited and Bebo. Hell, you can send your friends a message in real time via instant messenger long before Facebook Messenger 2011 started.

But what made Facebook better than these other companies was creating a highly addictive product – one that used behavioral science principles to create something that people couldn't live without. What has recently emerged is that once they realized it had this effect, it became Facebook's business strategy.

At an Axios event in 2017, Facebook co-founder Sean Parker said: “You are exploiting a vulnerability in human psychology. The inventors understood that – and we did it anyway. "

Why? To get users to spend as much time with the app as possible: "In the thought process that created these applications, Facebook was the first … It was about:" How do we spend as much time and conscious attention as possible? ? & # 39; ”

Enter brand addiction

In a BBC panorama documentary on smartphone addiction in July 2018, Hilary Andersson spoke to a number of former executives about their time in the company and their concerns about developing such an addiction product. Sandy Parakilas, a former Facebook product manager, explained this as follows: "Your goal is to addict you and then sell your time."

Aza Raskin, the inventor of the endless scrolling functionality, was so concerned about Facebook's ability to create addictive behavior that he founded the Center for Human Technology: “We didn't notice that it became so powerful that it became addictive to people does, ”he says. "(Facebook is) the biggest behavioral experiment we've ever seen. It's like taking behavioral cocaine and sprinkling it across your surface."

Everything on Facebook, from the prompt in the status bar of "What are you going to do, Richard?" Right down to the content that fills my newsfeed, and in what order, has been carefully calibrated to create an addictive experience – so I get ahead let me click on a blue thumb for my next fix, keep me from going anywhere else , and make me a more valuable user to support Facebook’s business model.

This is so important that Facebook re-calibrated its algorithms in 2017 so that users see more addictive content (i.e. from friends) in their news feed and much less unwanted and unwanted content from advertisers. Like Google, which sticks to the "I feel happy" button, the short-term impact on advertising revenue has been sacrificed for long-term use and profitability.

A measure of the level of addiction of more than 1 billion active Facebook users was demonstrated in an experiment by Nudge co-author Cass Sunstein. He asked Facebook users how much they would be willing to pay for the once free service. The average response was $ 1 a month.

Not much, you might think, but probably a reflection of how people realize that Facebook is at best a mixed blessing in terms of its effects on our overall health and well-being. This number is much more important than the average amount that people were willing to accept to stop using Facebook: $ 59 a month.

As a true addict, we know that our habit may harm us. But don't you dare take it away from us.

If you want to understand how valuable behavioral research is for a digital company, there is an answer. If you create a product that people want, you can make a few million dollars. But if you create one that people can't live without, you could get 59 times richer.

Combine this with other behavioral insights and the effects are clear. Creating digital products and services using behavioral data can lead to positive behaviors. However, as Professor Shoshana Zuboff of Harvard Business School claims, there is a risk that this will usher in an “age of surveillance capitalism”. We see that the rush of companies to automate using machine learning and AI functions simply means that it is now happening faster and on a larger scale.

If your goal is simply to get rich and you want to understand how a group of Silicon Valley geeks became the richest people in the world, you can learn a lot more from a psychology textbook than from a computer science one.

But if you ignore the moral and ethical implications, you may still get rich – but you could end up in prison.

Where now?

This approach raises important ethical issues, and companies need to meet three main criteria to avoid potentially irreparable harm:

1. Do you use data ethically and lawfully (i.e. collect with clear consent and be transparent about how the data is used)?
2. Are the behavioral results you want positive? Ask: Would you use the product or service and will it significantly improve the life of the user?
3. What are the effects of creating an addictive product? Will this have a positive impact on society?

Contribution to Branding Strategy Insider by: Richard Chataway, President of BVA Nudge Unit UK, and excerpt from his book The Behavior Business, published by Harriman House.

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