Michael Blanding wrote an article for Harvard Business School Working Knowledge titled Latest Isn’t Always Greatest: Why Product Updates Capture Consumers (06 Dec 2022).
« “After showing people a product labeled as revised, they assume that it is necessarily better,” says Ximena Garcia-Rada, a former Harvard Business School doctoral student who is now an assistant professor at Texas A&M University. “We see a significant proportion of participants shift to the objectively inferior product when merely labeled as revised, even though it is described exactly the same way.” »
« The researchers performed dozens of experiments, using products ranging from gummy candy to dictionaries, and testing out labels such as “newer version,” “updated edition,” and “revised product.” In each case they found the same thing: A significant percentage of customers preferred the revamped product, even if it was identical or worse than an unchanged counterpart. »
Articles of Interest 