Last week I shared the first nine psychology of pricing tactics from Nick Kolenda's article. This week I continue the series with more great pricing tactics. Tactic 10: Position Low Prices Toward the Left According to a 2002 study, when designing a layout, you should position prices on the left if you want them to appear smaller. Here’s the reasoning. Research shows that people associate directional cues with certain concepts. Up is usually associated with good, whereas down is usually associated with bad. You give a thumbs up to things you like and a thumbs down to things you don’t. In the Christian faith, good people go up to heaven, and bad people go down to hell. This notion of up being good and down being bad triggers a spatial association. A 2004 study found that people recognized positive words faster when those words are positioned at the top of a layout. They recognize negative words faster when positioned near the bottom of a layout. This same principle applies to numbers, including prices. When people conceptualize numbers, they imagine a horizontal like with numbers going up from left to right. The smaller numbers on the left, the larger numbers on the right. Since people associate smaller numbers as belonging on the left, positioning prices on the left side of a layout can trigger someone to associate it with a smaller value. The opposite works with larger numbers. If you want a number to appear large, position it on the right of a layout. For example: for a message saying, “Receive a $20 credit for every person you refer.” you’ll want to place the $20 towards the right of the layout so that those seeing it will associate it with a large number making the offer more appealing. The whole point of this tactic is to change the perception of a fixed price.  If you want $20 to seem like a great low price, position it accordingly. Whereas if you want $20 to seem like a nice high reward, position it accordingly. Because of these directional cues associated with spatial concepts, the optimal position for your prices is the bottom left of a layout if you want it to appear as a low price. And the upper right of a layout if you want the price to appear higher. Tactic 11: Expose Customers to Two Multiples of Your Price My first time reading this tactic, I thought, “c’mon, this can’t be true.” but the more I think about it, the more it makes sense. A 2011 study showed that customers exposed to two multiples of a price reacted more favourably to the price. Let me explain this. Nick’s article shows four ads from Pizza Hut, a popular pizza chain you may be familiar with. All four ads offered a deal costing $24. The first ad is for 3 Medium pizzas with unlimited toppings. The second ad is for 4 small pizzas with unlimited toppings. The third ad is for 3 medium pizzas with up to 8 toppings each. And the fourth ad is for 4 small pizzas with up to 6 toppings each. The study conducted showed that customers were more favourable to ads 3 and 4. The two ads that limited the toppings. Then they were to the first two ads that offered unlimited toppings even though the first two ads were an economically better deal. Why is that? It’s because ads 3 and 4 incorporated multiples of the price. 4 small pizzas with up to 6 toppings each for $24. 4 x 6 = 24 3 medium pizzas with up to 8 toppings each for $24. 3 x 8 = 24 I know it sounds crazy, but psychology can explain it. As children, we were drilled with simple math problems where an association develops between operands. For example, if I say 2 x 6, you immediately think 12. You don’t actually have to do any math. It’s been ingrained into your brain. You just instinctively know that 2 x 6 is 12. Because of associations like these, your brain processes them more fluently than if we actually had to figure out the sum or product. Back to the Pizza Hut ads, Because ads 3 and 4 contained multiples of the $24 (4 x 6 and 3 x 8, respectively), customers could process the $24 more easily. The price