Nir And Far: Business, Behaviour and the Brain

Today, there’s an app for just about everything. With all the amazing things our smartphones can do, there is one thing that hasn’t changed since the phone was first developed. No matter how advanced phones become, they are still communication devices — they connect people together. Clearly, we’re a social species and these tech solutions help us re-create the tribal connection we seek.  Howe...

Let's admit it, we in the consumer web industry are in the manipulation business. We build products meant to persuade people to do what we want them to do. We call these people "users" and even if we don't say it aloud, we secretly wish every one of them would become fiendishly addicted. Users take our technologies with them to bed . When they wake up, they check for notifications, tweets, and upd...

My interview with author John Jantsch about his new book, The Self-Reliant Entrepreneur. Nir & Far, a podcast about business, behaviour and the brain by Nir Eyal. If you enjoy this podcast, please subscribe on iTunes and leave an iTunes review. It will greatly help new listeners discover the show. Please visit my website Nir and Far for other info about my writing, books and teaching: http://w...

It’s time to abolish the reference check. The unpleasant process of calling up a job applicant’s former boss to gab about the candidate’s pluses and “deltas” is just silly. Maybe if we all just agree to stop doing it the practice will go away, like pay phones and fanny packs. Instead, I’ve learned a better way to hire that leverages a universal human attribute—namely, the fact that we’re all lazy....

A reader recently asked me a pointed question: “I’ve read your work on creating user habits . It’s all well and good for getting people to do things, like using an app on their iPhone, but I’ve got a bigger problem. How do I get people to do things they don’t want to do?” Taken aback by the directness and potentially immoral implications of his question, my gut reaction was to say, “You can’t and...

Nir’s Note: In this guest post, Ryan Hoover, Director of Product at PlayHaven, utilizes my thinking on the “Habit Zone” to shed light on where Turntable.fm fell short. Ryan blogs at ryanhoover.me  and you can follow him on Twitter at  rrhoover . As I described nearly two years ago, much of Turntable’s success was due to its well-executed  social engagement loop ; however, that...

We in the design business love when people do what we want. Nothing is more satisfying than when a user intuitively understands what to do with what we’ve built. At the heart of good design, however, is understanding what the user really wants to get done. But what of designing for behaviors people don’t want to do, at least not right now? We all know we should eat healthier, exercise more, create...

Nir’s Note: This guest post is by Auren Hoffman , the CEO of LiveRamp in San Francisco. This essay is a bit different from the normal subject matter on the blog but I hope it will stir some discussion about which of our personal habits are worth improving. Connect with Auron on Twitter at @auren or on Facebook . To really differentiate yourself and become a superstar in this winner-take-all world,...

Nir’s Note : This guest post is by James Clear. James writes at JamesClear.com , where he share ideas for mastering personal habits. Join his  free newsletter here . In 1936, a man named Kurt Lewin wrote a simple equation that changed the way we think about habits and human behavior. You can read the Nir and Far blog post on: This Simple Equation Reveals How Habits Shape Your Health, Hap...

Nir’s Note: This post was co-authored with  Stuart Luman , a science, technology, and business writer who has worked at Wired Magazine, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, and IBM . In the never-ending effort to motivate employees, companies are taking cues from video games–adding scoring, virtual badges, and other game-like elements to everyday work processes to make jobs more fun. Y...

Nir’s Note: Lyle McKeany is an entrepreneur writing and working on an early-stage startup. In this essay, he shares his experience using lean startup methodologies with my Hook Model at the Lean Startup Machine conference. This article also appears today on Pando Daily . Follow Lyle on Twitter  @lylemckeany . The conventional view of lean startup ideation methodology is to identify a problem,...

Wednesday was my birthday. It should have been a great day. My wife and daughter had prepared a delicious breakfast, I had lunch with close friends, and I finished up some writing and client work. At the end of the day I headed to San Francisco to enjoy a swanky scotch tasting at a friend’s house. Then I heard the news.  WhatsApp had been purchased by Facebook for $19 billion.  When I re...

I’ll admit, the bento box is an unlikely place to learn an important business lesson. But consider the California Roll — understanding the impact of this icon of Japanese dining can make all the difference between the success or failure of your product. The California Roll provided a gateway to discover Japanese cuisine and demand exploded. Over the next few decades sushi restaurants, which w...

Marketplace businesses exist to connect two or more parties, typically the buyers and the sellers. Investors love these marketplace businesses because they tend to grow quickly and spawn winner-take-all companies. A long line of successful Silicon Valley startups have found success providing a place for people to connect and transact. Examples of these kinds of companies include industry titans li...

Nir’s Note: This guest post was authored by Lisa Kostova Ogata, one of the first product managers at Farmville and a VP of Product at Bright.com (sold to LinkedIn). While at Zynga, Lisa learned how to shape user behavior, but in this essay she describes her surprise when she found herself unexpectedly hooked. I don’t consider myself a gambler. I’m the person who places a minimum bet at the roulett...

Nir’s Note: Is “no” the most powerful word in the English language? In this guest post Chikodi Chima explores the power of no and what happens when people say, “No.” Chikodi is a former VentureBeat staff reporter who helps startups with their public relations and marketing. His blog is PR Tips For Startups and he is @Chikodi on Twitter. Sirens were beautiful creatures from Greek Mythology who lure...

Nir’s Note: In contrast to  last week’s post  on the power of saying “no,” Eric Clymer shares how a creative attitude helped his team build a #1 ranked app. Eric was the lead developer of the “ A Beautiful Mess ” app and is a Partner at Rocket Mobile . In improv comedy, there are really only two words that matter: “Yes, and.” You share a premise, form a scene, create...

In advertising, marketers reinforce a behavior by linking to the promise of reward. “Use our product,” they claim, “and you’ll get laid”; it’s the gist of many product pitches from soap to hamburgers . But online, feedback loops aren’t cutting it. Users are increasingly inundated with distractions, and companies find they need to hook users quickly if they want to stay in business. Today, companie...

If the Internet had a voice, I am fairly certain it would sound like the  HAL 9000  from  2001: A Space Odyssey. “Hello Nir,” it said to me in its low, monotone voice. “Glad to see you again.” “Internet, I just need a few quick things for an article I’m writing,” I’d reply. “Then it’s back to work. No distractions this time.” You can read the Nir and Far blog post on: This Will Be t...

Nir’s Note : This guest post is by James Clear. James writes at JamesClear.com , where he share ideas for mastering personal habits. Join his  free newsletter here . In 1936, a man named Kurt Lewin wrote a simple equation that changed the way we think about habits and human behavior. Known today as Lewin’s Equation, this tiny expression contains most of what you need to know about buildi...

Nir’s Note: Jane McGonigal is a game designer at The Institute for the Future and bestselling author of Reality is Broken and SuperBetter . She’ll be speaking at the upcoming Habit Summit in April. (You can register here !) In this interview with Max Ogles , McGonigal discusses impact of future technologies on behavior, habits, and the way we design products. Q: You recently worked on a project de...

Nir’s Note: Gad Saad is a professor of marketing at Concordia University and the author of The Consuming Instinct . He’ll be speaking at the upcoming Habit Summit in April. (You can register here !) In this interview with Max Ogles , Saad discusses the role of evolutionary psychology in modern marketing. Q: Let’s start with a simple question: What is evolutionary psychology? Gad Saad: Evolutionary...

Nir’s Note: This guest post by Avi Itzkovitch offers some clues as to why we can’t seem to put our cell phones down. Avi ( @xgmedia ) is an Independent User Experience Consultant. He is currently working from his Tel-Aviv Studio XG Media . Do you constantly check your smartphone to see if you’ve received messages or notifications on Facebook? Does your phone distract you from your studies or work?...

Nir’s Note: This post was co-authored with Ximena Vengoechea . Ximena is a design researcher at  Twitter  and will be speaking at this year’s Habit Summit .  In his famed experiments, Ivan Pavlov trained his dogs to associate mealtime with the ring of a bell. Pavlov found he could elicit an involuntary physical response in his dogs with a simple jingle. Every time his bell rang, the...

Nir’s Note: This guest post is written by Max Ogles. Max writes at MaxOgles.com about behavior change, psychology, and technology. Sign up for a free copy of his upcoming e-book, “9 Ways to Motivate Yourself Using Psychology and Technology." A commonly quoted and incredibly scary stat reveals that 9 out of 10 people who undergo heart bypass surgeries as a result of poor health are unable to change...