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A few winters ago me and many other American women Amazon JacketIt’s a pretty affordable piece of outerwear that grabs attention for a warm minute. It’s an ok jacket, but I keep forgetting the name of the manufacturer. I doubt I’m a lifetime customer.

I’m not weird about it. One way our online lives rewire our brains is that we are more comfortable buying from an unfamiliar brand. And the same changing habits may be making us less loyal to anything we buy.

I was talking to the research firm co-founders Josh Lowitz and Michael R. Levin recently about this phenomenon. Consumer Intelligence Research Partners. We talked about how online customer reviews, relatively low-cost social media advertising, and newer shopping destinations like Amazon and Instagram are reorganizing the way we evaluate and buy products. Exciting in many ways and not so great in others.

Think about how you might have bought something – like before 2010 – in Before Times. Maybe you went to your local hardware store looking for a cordless drill and they only had DeWalt models out there.

You trusted the store to sell a good product – or if you didn’t, it was your only option anyway. This is what you bought. Levin and Lowitz said the retailer essentially makes the selection for you.

We don’t usually shop like this anymore. Instead of choosing that alone, we can browse millions of cordless drills from our sofas on Amazon and peruse online customer reviews.

Initiatives like Dollar Shave Club and Warby Parker proved that a smart product and cunning advertising can distract us from old expectations. We no longer need the store to be the arbiter of what we buy. We may just need the nudges Instagram will convince us to try new cookware.

In many ways, this is great. Only one company Shopify website, listings on Amazon, or a Facebook page to compete with multinational companies. Powerhouses like Nike or Levi’s cannot trust their laurels for a century. We have more options, we are more open to trying something new, and great products can emerge.

But like me and my Amazon jacket, building a lasting relationship can be harder than ever. maybe you bought The vacuum cleaner you see everywhere on TikTok, but will you shop from that company again? These young companies, as Lowitz describes them, “make a sale, but not a customer.”

What if companies don’t focus on making us loyal customers, but only on selling us something right away? I wonder if it creates incentives to make meh products if companies have to convince us to buy something once.

Elections also have a cost. There is more chances for us to be deceived from fake reviews or other online tricks. Sometimes it’s a relief to have a single cordless drill option instead of choosing from an ocean online.

Molson Hart, owner of educational toy company Viahart. He had written about said earlier this year that he believed it was still possible to build a great brand with permanent customers. It only requires fresh skills.

Items purchased directly on Amazon can encourage repeat buyers by entering welcome messages on the product packaging or reaching people who write raves on social media, he said.

The idea is to get in the minds of people to come back for another purchase, leave a positive review on Amazon or both. (Not all customers like these tactics. And some Amazon sellers go too far offering gift cards in exchange for reviewsis against company rules.)

“A store, Shopify, Amazon, a billboard, an ad… whatever. “If you can grab people’s attention and make them think your product is good, you’re creating a brand,” Hart said. “It doesn’t matter how you do it.”

We often don’t take a step back and think about why we bought certain products. When we do, it’s remarkable how much we’ve changed and all our habits have twisted the shopping world.

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Tip of the Week

Digital video games or the real thing?

Brian X ChenThe New York Times’ consumer technology columnist addresses a burning question for video gamers, especially novices.

This week, Greg Bensinger He asked The Times Opinion team for help with the holiday:

“To our children a Nintendo Switch For Hanukkah,” Greg said. “But it’s been a long time since we’ve had any kind of console. Is it better to buy physical versions of games or download digital copies?”

Each format has its pros and cons and you can mix and match. Here’s my advice for Greg and others making a similar choice.

Game downloads: Instant gratification and convenience are the biggest advantages of purchasing digital copies of video games. You don’t have to go to a store or wait for a game to arrive in the mail. Downloads also don’t clutter your living room the way physical games do.

But downloading games may cost more. Stores drop prices for older games pretty quickly, but that’s usually only for physical releases. Digital titles stay at their original prices longer, and price reductions may only be occasional.

Another disadvantage of digitization is that games quickly clog up storage space on the console. On Switch, this can be fixed by purchasing. memory card.

Physical games: One of the advantages is that you can loan a game to someone else after you’ve finished playing the game, or trade it for store credit at a retailer like GameStop.

There is no difference in performance. If you’re playing a digital copy or playing from a cartridge, video games will run just as fast.

The games you hold in your hand have another big advantage this time of year: Gift-wrapping a game is far more fun than emailing a digital download code to a loved one.

(In case you were wondering, Greg has decided to go physical games for his family’s new Switch.)

Before you go …

• Good news for your wallet and the planet: It would be annoying and expensive if you only had your car muffler replaced at the dealership. This is how Apple checked iPhone repairs until this week. Brian explains the benefits of Apple agreeing to start sales parts, tools and instructions to any repair shop and home appliance repairers.

• A strange side effect of the US embargo: Mailchimp, the software company that supports emailed newsletters, Temporarily blocked at least three independent news outlets in Cuba From sending their information to subscribers, the Rest of the World reports. The account bans appeared to be related to the decades-old US embargo on Cuba, but Mailchimp has reinstated news outlets’ accounts.

• They want a piece of the potential US chip boom: Traveled to Taylor, Texas to see my colleague David McCabe. one of many US cities or states trying to build a new computer chip factory in their backyard. His tactics raise questions about how far communities must go and how much taxpayer money they have to pay to get a share of the high-tech economy.

hug this

Baby Frills For nearly 100 years it is believed to be New York’s first indigenous harbor seal on the Bay of Jamaica. Local news outlet The Wave said the birth was a sign of significantly improved water quality in the Bay of Jamaica.

Join us at a virtual event on Thursday to discuss the secrets of productive and healthy online communities. read this To get information about the event and to reserve your place

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