A plethora of choices is a good thing except when we have to make a decision under a time constraint, or in a situation where we are observed - this increases the pressure and the feeling of being overwhelmed. It also can be difficult if we are in a situation where we have to make a decision with imperfect knowledge - say for instance your typical guy is presented with 216 colors and his wife is not there to take him past the basic 7 of the color spectrum. :-)

Frank, thank you for joining the conversation. While offering our customers options and choices, I believe there needs to be a careful balance between "more choice" and "value-add". In the software business for example, in many applications customers aren't using half the functionality available to them. And unfortunately, instead of simplification, there's a push to add more features. It can be an unending cycle...

Christopher Penn points to this:

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/93

Psychologist Barry Schwartz questions whether freedom of choice leads to personal happiness, or whether it undermines it.

Good post, Paul. Unless companies intentionally set up a mass customization model, they ought to limit their choices for consumers and streamline them as much as possible. And even in this model, a sensible number of options that are relatively easy to combine in a cost effective manner rules the day.

There will be cost savings and much more efficiency in companies when fewer choices are made available, as you point out in the comments made by Ford's CEO. And a lot less confusion and angst for consumers. Too much of a good thing is just plain too much.

Leave it to Ann Handley to find a terrific interview! Dr. Barry Schwartz has some great examples of too much choice, some of which I wish I had stumbled upon when I was researching for this post.

His key tenets are that too much consumer choice undermines "happiness" and causes mental paralysis. So that's really going beyond "mental fatigue" and if true, quite disconcerting.

I've seen some truth to these statements as I've observed companies finding market niches in reducing complexity. Indeed, all this complexity is creating employment opportunities for "experts" to help us sort out all our decisions!

Ted, thank you for commenting. You hit the nail on the head when you said "sensible number of options...in a cost effective manner." The concept of choice is a good thing, and I'm not suggesting we go back to 'you can have it in any color as long as its black'. However there needs to be a conscious thought process for marketers as to features/functionality and additional costs.

Unfortunately, many companies are stuck in the product release cycle, where the new product comes out in 12 months regardless of adoption and usefulness of the previous version...

One of the struggles is finding the balance between providing customers with something custom, just for them, and overloading them with too many choices.

Starbucks has been praised for providing customers the ability to create a drink almost anyway they like it, but they have been equally criticized for providing too many choices.

The thing I find interesting about Starbucks is that a majority of customers just order the drinks exactly the way they are on the menu and pass up any custom modifiers.

But what would happen if Starbucks slimmed down the number of choices customers have? I wonder if it would be anything like Microsoft Write, the simplified word processor that Microsoft created after observing that many of their customers didn't use hardly any of the features in Microsoft Word? It was a huge flop. It seems that customers like to surround themselves with unnecessary features, just in case they need them.

Maybe one answer is to provide customers the option to custom modify purchases, but have some standard packages set up that make quick choices easy. That seems to be what works for Starbucks.

Chris, thanks for adding your valuable input to the conversation. As consumers, we really hate to have "choice" taken away from us don't we? It almost seems "Un-American". I am unfamiliar with the MS Write case study, do you know if the price was reduced substantially to compensate for "reduced functionality"?

Paul, I think your comment about adding value is at the core of this issue.

As a business owner sometimes it's hard to narrow what you offer - "Will we be missing out on a potential sale?" "What if customers don't find exactly what they want?" We want to be attractive to more people so we load up on features and services.

In their efforts to attract customers and increase sales I think businesses often forget to ask their customers what they really want - what adds value for them (the 80% of them, not the fringe few).

I'm not sure there's a single answer to your question about whether more choice is a good thing. For me it depends on the impact the purchase has on me (bigger impact want more choices), whether I'm in a hurry (just give me a regular coffee), and likely my mood at the time (please don't make me decide).

Lee, thank you for adding some valuable input. It's interesting to note that complexity is not just the domain of large and costly purchases--there's no sliding scale. In some instances, there is as much complexity in retirement planning options as how to purchase a hamburger. I maintain there's a market niche for simplicity.

I believe offering customization options before production is a great way to allow customers to make it personal, while allowing manufacturers the ability to reduce the number of SKUs to the most popular forecasted variations of the platform product. That way, channel partners also have fewer slower-moving SKUs to apply discounts to.

Details on variation ranges and supply volume need to be worked out on an individual basis, but this consideration can be positive for both operations in terms of expenses and cash invested in inventory, and great for marketing in allowing customers choices in a make-to-order scenario.

If you offer a large amount of choice, you had better couple it with a great filtering system that only lets in the pertinent and tosses aside the unwanted. This could be word of mouth, recommendations related to a customers previous purchases or even well thought out search on your website.

I think we’d all agree that we want the Internet to continue to grow and offer us more but at the same time we are very grateful for companies like Google that help us sort through it all.

Mario, thank you for commenting. Pre-order customization options put the customer in the driver seat as to their unique and specific needs/wants. Under these circumstances you would have a very engaged customer and mass quantities of information are necessary so customers can make the best decisions.

I am not sure what percentage of total output "mass-customization" is compared to "mass production". I suspect a very small percentage. And of course, the ability to offer mass-customization potentially requires tweaking both supply and demand chain processes - not for the faint of heart.

Bill, you bring up an interesting point about technologies to help us sort through our choices to come up with an optimum solution. Your example of "search" - a concept that's been around in AI communities for a long time fits here, and potentially the emergence of artificial agents (in the future) that will find what we need for us, while we attend to other pertinent issues.

Paul,

I'm not sure what the price was.

After seeing Ann's link to TED that sparked my memory to the fact that David Pogue talked about MS Write in his speech at TED. http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/7

If you try to be everything to everyone, you're nothing to no one.

Excuse the double negative, but I strongly believe that if you try to get too big an audience you hamstring yourself.

I mentioned it in this post of my own: http://marketersynergy.wordpress.com/2008/01/25/create-a-successful-promotion/

Too many options leads to "option paralysis" in which people just stare at the novella which is a Cheesecake Factory menu and not being able to choose. Or even better, the same thing happens at McDonalds. Sinbad used to have a bit where he'd make fun of people at McDonalds looking at the menu and not being able to decide.

• Is “more choice” a good thing?

Not always. Every possible combination of your product should be analyzed from a sales prespective. The least-used options should be cut out like the gangrene limb they've become.

• Have you found yourself overwhelmed by not only considering too many options, but then having to “choose”?

Yes. I enjoy options in some things, like computers but not in other things, like video game consoles. Restaurants should have a few types of the main foods they offer, not a big book (e.g. a steakhouse should have 4-8 steak entrees, 2-3 chicken entrees, 2-3 pork entrees, and 2-3 vegetarian/kosher options).

• Your competitors are surely giving customers “more choice”, should you follow suit, or is there something to this research?

My whole business is customization and people are like deer in headlights. Things need to be slowed down. Say, "here are the x most popular things that make up y% of my business, if you don't like any of this, we can talk about customization." I do this as much as possible and no one gets offended I've offered them a "used" idea.

Sorry about the long post, I wanted to make sure I answered your questions.

Michael, thank you for commenting. I always enjoy your detailed analysis. Your comments about Sinbad at McDonalds made me laugh and reminded me of a "Kitchen Nightmares" where Gordon Ramsey walked into an Indian restaurant that served Indian, American and I believe one other ethnic variety of food. Too many choices within your core business is one thing, whereas non-tangential choices should be completely avoided.

Anyone who's studied usability for websites knows that endless choice is counter-productive. People are not super-computers, and we can't process new information beyond a certain threshold.

Now, if only Starbucks could come up with ONE way among the 87,000 to produce a cup of coffee that doesn't taste like burnt sh*t...

Patricia, you are right, we are not computers and thus too much choice equals mental fatigue.

Regarding the coffee note, that is probably one of the funniest comments I've had in a long time. A great way to wrap up my day. Thanks!

Excellent post as always, Paul. Good comments have been made to it and I would just add one more. Many people are indecisive, but when pushed, they will make decisions and choices concerning products they buy. So my questions are this, what happens after the purchase is made? When a plethora of options exist, won't many consumers question whether they've made the best possible choices for themselves? My guess is that the more expensive the product purchased is, the more second-guessing there will be.

How good is that for the company offering too many choices? What will the effect be as far as overall customer satisfaction is concerned? How will they remember the experience? Will they feel compelled to turn elsewhere when they make future purchases if the process is too daunting? If the result is less than satisfying?

Peoples' lives are complicated. . .what can companies do to help simplify the purchasing process? Wouldn't most of us truly appreciate it if an effort is made to do that?

Claire, thank you for commenting and adding to the discussion! Your points about cognitive dissonance and complicated purchasing processes are well taken.

Our world is awash in information and complexity is rising. There's a huge opportunity for companies of all sizes to simplify ordering and purchasing processes, not because customers are lacking the brainpower, but simply that most people are multi-tasking too much and running out of time and energy.

I'm reminded of the Staples "Make it Easy" button. Simplify, simplify, simplify!

Hi Paul,

Great post and terrific comments from all.

I'd like to submit that it may not be in the amount of options, but in the way they are presented. In a B2B complex sale, helping a buyer with the "thinking" involved in solving an issue is a great way to "simplify" the choice.

If the focus is on solving the problem, overcoming the obstacle or taking advantage of an opportunity, I think narrowing the focus to apply to what has the most impact is an effective choice.

So, I'd argue that the key is in the "conversation," and how it's focused.

When I go to Starbucks, I always order the same thing and could care less that they have thousands of options. This one option meets my needs. It is nice to know I have options - I'm just not likely to use them unless my needs change.

Ardath, you're right in that B2B companies offering a complex product or solution sale generally try to simplify the decision making processes and identify the maximum impact through business value consulting, ROI calculators or the like.

Thank you for contributing to the conversation!

Sounds like Ford is returning to its roots...Wasn't it Henry Ford that said "you could have a Model T in any color so long as it was black."?

Tiffany, you are right about the quote, but it seems like Ford is simply trying to remove cost and complexity from their business and offering customers more relevant choices.

I am in print business and the options of customization is overwhelming, let aside dimensions of customization. Paper size, colour, weight, type, origin... Ink type, colour, font name, size, style... etc.. all in the name of aesthetics, for a simple customized birthday card.
Suppose the options were limited, in which case, I would be 'forcing my preferences into her purse', and deprive myself of the huge markups in add-ons.
BTW, I never before saw this as a parallel to Ford's Navigator experience.
Thanks for a good read, feedbacks including.

Barry Schwartz fillets this subject in his brilliant book The Paradox of Choice, Why More Is Less. The book's even better than the TED clip Ann points to as it delves into the research and provides mountains of evidence. It also teaches you about Nobel Prize Winner Daniel Kahneman's Peak-End rule for designing a customer experience. No, I didn't know what it was either till I read it in Schwartz's book. If you're a marketer and haven't read it and the idea of 'too much choice' is a novelty to you, then you're about five years behind the times. Read him and catch up!

Diwas, thank you for adding to the discussion. I can see why, in the print business there are and should be millions of available combinations, as your customers likely are very diverse in needs. However, they are very lucky to have your "expertise" available to help them steer towards the right decisions!

Phil, your input into the discussion is appreciated. As widely read as I like to think I am, there's always someone out there who can add supporting (or sometimes contradicting) information to the mix. I believe we're all the wiser from simply participating in the discussion!