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by reinhardt 4996 days ago
We are having this discussion because this particular book happened to make it to the HN front page. Everything you write would be equally valid justifications to buy every self-help or get-rich-quick book out there. In fact, that's one of the standard marketing tricks such ebooks employ: comparing the modest price of the ebook with the potential (typically best case) reward. There must be a name for this common fallacy but can't think of it off the top of my head.
3 comments
ryanwaggoner 4996 days ago
Everything you write would be equally valid justifications to buy every self-help or get-rich-quick book out there.

It wouldn't for me, because I haven't bought all those other books or gotten results from them. I did from this one. YMMV.

Your attack can be used for any product that's ever been sold: "Wait, you're telling me that I'll get more value from this than what I'm paying for it. Hmm...that sounds an awful lot like every get-rich-quick scheme I've heard." Yes, marketing sounds like marketing, whether it's for a bad product or a good one. If you think that this sounds like more fluff than value, don't buy it. But attacking it (not you, but others upstream) because it's for sale and purporting to offer net value seems ridiculous.

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scoot 4995 days ago
I can't speak to the name (or even existence) of any fallacy that this describes, but pricing strategy you mentioned is known as price anchoring, where a higher number anchors the value against which the lower number is compared. Sometimes it's an explicit comparison of price, for or example where a higher price is offered, then "discounted" to a still high, but percieved bargain price; or a comparison of price to value (eg. ROI); or to an unrelated value that sets a subconscious numeric anchor for the price that follows.

This is relevant: http://danwin.com/2011/12/the-irrationality-of-price-anchori...

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Evbn 4996 days ago
Your argument seems to apply to every book in existence, yet books sell. Why is that? Perhaps because the books are in fact worthwhile, but the particular book you buy is more a function of marketing than merit. And this applies to entertainment, groceries, etc. It is the "microphone effect".
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