A short note on Psych framework
Notes from a webinar conducted by Darius Contractor (creator of Psych framework)
Last week, I attended a webinar organised by Toplyne on the Psych Framework. It was conducted by Darius Contractor, who has led growth at Dropbox, Facebook and conceptualized the Psych framework for driving user growth through user psychology.
Q — What is Psych?
Psych is a unit of measurement of user motivation. Psych score will vary from 0 to 100.
Whenever a user visits a website, they encounter different elements on the website. These elements can either add to the user motivation, thereby increasing the psych score. Or these elements can reduce user motivation (by creating friction or confusing user), thereby reducing the psych score.
The goal of a website should be to maximise the psych score for the user by increasing elements that add to the psych score and reducing elements that reduce psych score.
Q — Does the user have a starting psych?
Whenever a user visits a website, they have a starting psych. This is determined by how important the product is to them and how they landed on it.
For example, users landing on a dating site via Google search have a very high intrinsic motivation as they are explicitly searching for dating.
On the other hand, if user clicks on an Ad on a third party website and land on a website without clear messaging, they will have low motivation and are likely to drop off.
Q — Which elements add to your psych score and which ones remove from your psych score?
If we consider the landing page of a website, here are the different elements that could add or reduce psych.
+Psych factors: Social proof (logos, testimonials), clear action oriented layout, high quality images, clear messaging
-Psych factors: low quality images, crowded layout, unclear next steps etc
Conclusion
Psych is a useful framework for understanding how the user’s emotional energy changes as they browse through your product or website.
Focusing on things that add to this emotional energy can help build us products that have a higher conversion rate.
