Going Shopping? Beware of the Decoy

'Dilemma', that's the state a marketing person always tries to infuse inside the mind of a customer. "What should i select?All the options sound reasonable" this is the question every salesperson awaits to hear from his customer.Cause once he gets hold of customer's mind swirling around all the reasonable options presented before them he easily manipulates their mind to focus on one specific option which he(the marketing guy) wishes to sell, which i bet he does and at the same time receives an appreciation from his customer for ushering them out of the mess and helping them select the best option on the table.Little does the humble customer know that they have fallen prey to a very simple but efficient marketing technique---THE DECOY EFFECT.
Decoy effect works on basic principle of comparison , we humans have a tendency to compare everything.When it  comes to buying a product we compare it in terms of price,quantity and quality.

fig.1

fig.2

Suppose the customer is confused between two products,lets say A and B.Both have same attributes in inverse proportions(refer fig.1) which makes them quite appealing and reasonable.But the sales-guy is interested in selling you product A.Now that the customer is in confused state weighing both the products 50:50,the salesperson from his arsenal of marketing weapons deploys a decoy.He simply slides on the table another option --product A- .This product has a lower grade in terms of attribute as compared to other two products(A and B) but most importantly it is similar to product A(refer fig.2). Introduction of A- on the table makes comparison of A and A- simple (which the customer was in need of) and concludes that A is not only better than A- but also better than B.

At the end of the day, the salesperson sells what he was supposed to and the customer buys what he thought he deserved thus concluding the entire transaction on a happier note. UNLESS.................Unless the customer stumbles upon the decoy effect and realizes what an ass he was succumbing to the dilemma and leaving his instincts bare open to be manipulated by a sales-guy!!!.