PropTech Adoption: Understanding Motivation, Ability and Prompt

Even the best technology can flounder when we fail to understand the three basic elements that drive human behavior; Motivation, Ability and Prompt.

Adoption is not just about metrics, it is the subtle art of influencing human behavior. When getting people to use your product, there are three important levers at your disposal. Each Is powerful in its own right, but how you manage the intersections of motivation, ability and prompt is critical to moving the needle on adoption.

Motivation Matters

The more motivated someone is to do something, the more likely they will take action. They’ll also be much more inclined to push through any challenges along the way. Motivation sustains effort and, provided what you’re asking clients to do isn’t too difficult, it will translate into action.

Motivation is also fickle. It’s difficult to sustain and often competes with other priorities. So how can we influence motivation and capitalize on moments of high motivation?

How you talk about your tools can increase motivation. Specifically, use Why focused communications that speak less about What and How and more about value and benefits (the Why). You should always lead with Why when communicating. People will forget the What and the How but if they remember the Why, they will be motivated to take action.

The second part of this formula is when you ask a customer to take action. Timing calls to action (CTAs) to align with moments of high client motivation will amplify results. This is an area where deep knowledge of an industry is an invaluable asset. In proptech for example (depending on the feature that you want to see clients using) it may make sense to time the prompts to when they get a new listing, have a closed transaction, or their client has a home buying anniversary.

Ability: Make it Easy

Unlike motivation, the ability aspect of this formula is more objective and predictable. You need to reduce friction and barriers to make the action you want someone to take easier. The easier something is, the less motivation is needed to act.

One of the easiest ways to take advantage of this is to prompt someone when they are already in your application. They don’t need to login, and they are already motivated enough to be using your tool. Paired with Why-focused language, a strong prompt, activated while a customer is in a related feature, will reliably encourage action.

You should also pay attention to default choice architecture as it can drive future adoption. SMS notifications are more likely to be seen and acted on compared to email. The default cadence of a CRM email summary that highlights opportunity and activity may be defaulted to weekly instead of daily, reducing the number of prompts to get customers using the tool.

When it comes to ability, every small step forward matters but begin by prioritizing the initial steps from non-user to user. Until you get your customer to see the value, they are a high flight risk.

The Art of the Prompt

We can be motivated to act, it can be effortlessly easy, and yet we still don’t do it. Why? It’s because we lack a prompt to act.

Alongside motivation and ability, the prompt is the key to action. An highly effective prompt should reach customers when motivation and ability to take action are at their peak.

There are two types of prompts, time based prompts (i.e. follow up email a few days after the sale) or activity based prompts (i.e. prompt when you first login).

Activity based prompts are triggered by a behavior that we can associate to motivation. If you logged into an app, you’re likely motivated to use the app. Time based prompts are more of a shot in the dark. Other than the original purchase there are no cue’s to guess level of motivation.

Both types are necessary, but speaking from experience, smartly designed activity based prompts are much more effective at getting to action.

Conclusion

Deep understanding of your industry, paired with understanding the interplay between motivation, ability and prompts can help you drive adoption of virtually any technology.

• Motivation can be influenced by understanding customers and the industry, communicating the Why behind the technology and ensuring that the perceived value resonates with users' objectives.

• Ability is enhanced by simplifying processes and removing barriers, to make the desired action as effortless as possible.

• And finally, the prompt - timing actions perfectly to reach users when their motivation is high and the action is easy.

Thanks for reading! If you have any comments or thoughts I’d love to hear them. Comment below or connect with me on LinkedIn.