Social proof in UX: An ancestral habit demoted to dark pattern
How our decisions are influenced by other people and why that should be a good thing.
Imagine you’re on a first date.
After some good coffee and a nice conversation, you’re entering a movie theatre where you see the following movie posters:
You’ve already mentioned your great taste in movies so your date is pretty excited and asks you to pick one.
So, go ahead and choose one of them. I’ll wait.
3…
2…
1…
All good?
I’m guessing you probably winged it, right? That’s what I would have done because I’ve never heard of these.
However, it would be a shame to ruin a nice date and waste 2 hours of your lives so what if the posters were accompanied by this:
And what if you’d also have access to reviews? Let me highlight an absolutely superb one about Slender Man:
Where to start… I don’t have a single positive thing to say, everything is terrible! There are no characters, the acting sucks, the writing is terrible, the effects are bad, the direction is boring, it’s all tedious garbage.
This quickly turned into no brainer, isn’t it?
Why did this become easy?
Because this is what social proof is about. The tendency of people to follow the behaviour of others when they are unable to evaluate a situation by themselves or uncertain how to act.
Basically, we try to identify what is correct or good by looking at what other people think is correct or good.
Which, for the most part, it’s fine.
Social proof is a type of social influence
Social influence is how people change their ideas and behaviour in order to meet the demands of a group of people or society in general.
According to Morton Deutsch and Harold Gerard, people have 2 psychological needs that make us want to conform to those demands:
- need to be liked and accepted, called normative social influence
- need to be right, called informative social influence or social proof as it was named by Robert Cialdini in 1984 in his book “Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion”.
It has been around for ages
Here are two interesting examples:
Moirologia
Was the occupation of professional women mourners a few thousand years ago, still present today in some parts. These people were paid to lament, cry and induce a feeling of sadness at funerals, showing that this is the proper behaviour for everyone else present.
Claquing
Kind of the opposite, this was the occupation of claqueurs, hired to applaud and greet performances in theatres and opera houses in Paris in the 1840s.
They laughed loudly at comedies, faked cries at tragedies or just clapped and shouted “Bis!” to request encores. Same as before, they were used to influence the people in the audience to act a certain way.
Fun fact: some of them were even blackmailing actors not to be booed. Being an asshole is also an ancient occupation.
We still do it today
The speed we drive on a specific highway lane, choosing a full restaurant over an empty one, the exit we go for when leaving a stadium or even deciding to embarrass yourself alongside other people by joining that awkward dance at weddings.
They’re all involuntarily based on how other people act.
It can take many forms
The fact that social proof is so ingrained in our DNA, makes it understandable why it became one of the most influential concepts used on the Internet and why there are so many forms of it online.
Based on their structure, I would categorize them into counters, assessments and approvals.
1. Counters
These can be seen as the wisdom of the crowd, as they represent either an average of a large number of items or just their total amount.
Counters include:
a. Ratings — Ex: Uber
They are an essential part of the experience for Uber. Low ratings for passengers makes it harder for them to get rides, while ratings below 4.5 for drivers can get them suspended.
b. Subscribers — Ex: Zero
Zero highlights the impressive number of people fasting at that particular moment. If you’re in doubt, this acts like a great motivator that you should do the same.
Other types of counters are followers, views, downloads, backers and similar.
2. Assessments
They refer to any form of social proof that includes some sort of written or spoken evaluation or judgment coming from experts, celebrities or regular customers.
Assessments include:
a. Reviews — Ex: App Store
They have the power to make or break an app or game. Evaluating millions of apps and showcasing good ones is a huge challenge so reviews play a big role.
b. Testimonials — Ex: Figma
Figma uses designers from top companies that chose to endorse their tool. I have mixed feelings about testimonials because we only hear from those who liked the product so we get a bit of a biased picture.
Other types of assessments are endorsements, quotes, mentions and similar.
3. Approvals
These are the types of social proof that either associate your product with trusted brands or highlight any form of official recognition from verified organizations or regulators.
Approvals include:
a. Awards — Ex: Citymapper
Citymapper and 1Password are showcasing some of the prestigious awards they received over the years, a great way to increases trust in their brands.
b. Badges — Ex: Online banking apps
Dealing with money transactions would always be a challenge for mobile banking companies like Monzo or TransferGo. That is why using badges of security companies or regulators is a good way to reassure users that everything is in safe hands.
Other types of approvals are certifications, integrations, referrals and similar.
It works better in some situations
There are 2 situations in which social proof will work considerably better.
1. When there is uncertainty
When people are not sure how to act, they will be much more likely to look for guidance from other people to reduce the uncertainty of the decision.
Example:
You’re planning a trip to Paris and you’re looking at 2 very similar places but one has positive ratings and reviews, the other has none of them.
Most people will not want to gamble their romantic weekend in Paris so they’ll be much more likely to go for the less risky option that decreases their uncertainty. Even if the reviews are not all positive, at least they know what to expect.
2. When we see a similarity
We are easily influenced by people like us. So, the more people relate to the evidence provided, the more powerful the evidence is.
If I were to build a scale, it would probably have 3 levels.
Level 1. Other people did this action
Other people decided to stay here but I don’t know who they or if we have something in common.
Level 2. Other people like me did this action
Seeing other people from the same country already makes me more interested since we have similar backgrounds.
Level 3. Friends did this action
Apart from family, friends are the closest connections we have so they are the most trusted.
It feeds other biases
There are a few other psychological biases that are fed by social proof, which makes us even more receptive to it.
Authority
People have a strong tendency to comply with authority. If your social proof mechanism includes testimony from entities seen as authorities in their field, it will have a much stronger impact.
Risk aversion
As mentioned earlier, when dealing with uncertainty, most people go to extreme lengths to make matters more predictable before making a decision. Knowing other people’s options does just that, lowering risks.
Bandwagon effect
The chance of adopting the same beliefs, ideas or behaviours increases the more they have been adopted by a lot of other people, even if those are against people’s original thoughts.
It has a bad reputation
However, being able to rely on other people is pretty amazing. This is what helped us evolve as a species. Over thousands of years, we’ve learned that being right actually keeps us alive so integrating into a group and copying good decisions made a lot of sense.
So, viewing social proof as just a technique used by designers for making products more appealing would be very simplistic.
Social proof is actually an ancestral human habit that people often rely on. Knowing how others like us evaluated an item we know nothing about, is a great starting point that we should not hide from our users.
If used right, social proof is a necessity for offering better user experiences.
Wouldn’t people take advantage of it?
Of course they will, like pretty much every human habit or bias, it can work against people. I’d mention 2 scenarios when social proof can be deceiving:
1. Following fake evidence
It happens when social evidence is falsified and it guides us towards seeing something that isn’t true. Manipulators create the impression that a lot of people act the way manipulators want us to act.
2. Copying the copycat
It happens when the crowd is actually mistaken because people do not base their decision on some sort of special access to information but are in fact reacting to social proof themselves.
Basically, we look at other people for guidance, which are themselves looking at other people but nobody actually knows anything more than what we do.
But that’s not a reason to hide it
The fact that some people don’t use social proof ethically, doesn’t mean that we should do the same or pass on its potential to design for better experiences.
What we should do instead is be aware of 4 things to do and 4 things to avoid when deciding to integrate it into our products:
Things to do
1. Use social proof only if it brings value to your users
If you have doubts about the quality of the user-generated information or you do not trust it, avoid offering it to your users.
2. Display the forms of social proof that best fit your product
Make use of those types of counters, assessments and approvals to increase trust in your offering and associate your product with trusted sources.
3. Reduce uncertainty and highlight the decisions of similar people
This will decrease anxiety when making a decision and help users relate to the behaviour of people like them.
4. Test before implementing social proof
Use A/B testing to see if social proof improves conversions, usability testing to test the proper amount of social proof and surveys to understand how confident users are with the type of social proof you’re showcasing.
Things to avoid
1. Don’t use fake social evidence to create artificial engagement
Faking things will not only harm your product but it will also turn you into a scumbag. Honestly now, it’s a bad idea, people find out eventually. I actually urge you to boycott companies that use fakery to manipulate users.
2. Don’t use social proof if it diminishes the focus on your content
If people chase likes and hearts instead of the actual content, your product will become shallow in the long run.
3. Low proof is worse than no proof
Low proof can backfire and have the opposite effect so avoid using forms that can give the perception that very few people approve the content (even if they don’t).
4. Don’t be an asshole
You shouldn’t do stuff you wouldn’t want others to do to you. This includes exploiting users intentionally or just generally being dishonest when designing things.
Found this article useful?
Then take a look at my other articles:
Gamification: A guide for designers to a misunderstood concept
Scarcity in UX: The psychological bias that became the norm
Resources
If you want to read more about social proof, below are some resources I found interesting while documenting this article.
Social Proof in the User Experience; Behavioral Economics — Social Proof; Digital Psychology — Social Proof; A study of normative and informational social influences upon individual judgment; Ecommerce consumer reviews: why you need them and how to use them; The Ultimate List of Ecommerce Statistics 2020; Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion — Robert B. Cialdini
