Beware of these top retailer tactics

We all know that payday feeling: you’ve been going without treats for what seems like the whole month, so when you get paid, the temptation to blow your wages on the latest deals and built-up notifications about payday deals seem too tempting to resist. But these are simply retailer tactics, designed by the experts to make you spend more money.

With this in mind, the team at OnlineMoney has shared some of the top tactics that retailers use to make you spend more money, so you can avoid falling for their tricks:

 Retailer tactics:

‘Anchoring’

This is a classic scheme that makes people think they’re saving by putting a discounted price next to the “suggested” price. This seems simple and beneficial to the customer but really the product hasn’t been discounted: it’s merely that store’s chosen price.

Goldilocks pricing

Deals like this are labelled up carefully to make it appear that three products that are virtually the same are priced differently: one low cost, one middle range and one higher priced. So the customer might think they’ve found a special deal and go for the ‘middle’ one for quality over the lower price, but not as much as the higher price.

Buy one get one…

Buy one get one free deals are clever because they literally make you spend more than you were going to. “But the second is half price” you might say. True, but you only went into the shop to buy one, and now you’re buying two and spending those extra pounds.

‘Spaving’

While ordering online for example, you might add more items to save time and money but end up spending more on delivery. This concept of spending more to save more is known as ‘spaving’. Keep an eye on what you actually want to put into your basket and what you’re putting in because it SEEMS to be saving you money.

Limited-time offers

Act fast or it’ll be gone! Again, this kind of deal implies urgency to the customer, suggesting they’ll miss out if they don’t take the store up on a fantastic deal, when you may otherwise have not noticed that product or spent the money in the first place. FOMO is a big thing in these kind of deals: make sure whether or not you can actually afford to “miss out”.

So now you are aware of these retailer tactics before you go payday shopping. Do as we suggest and shop around.

*Header image credit to CouponSnake