Curiosity has a strong pull on the human psyche. There is something about the way we are wired that makes us want to know. If someone has a bit of information and you do not, does it drive you crazy until you hear the news yourself? That was the case with the disappearance of Dr. Livingstone. His story was left incomplete until Stanley made his eight month trek into the heart of Africa and then told the world about the famous doctor. In essence, Stanley closed the curiosity circle. In Gestalt Psychology, this is known as the theory of closure. In other words, there is something in our brains that is disturbed until we can completely close the loop.

How does curiosity play out in business? In marketing, curiosity can be used to drive people to a product. We live in the age of info-overdrive, where people expect everything to be found on your web site. However, putting the full story about your products on the web may not be in your best interest. Allowing room for some intrigue that drives a person to an action point is a better way of offering your services on the web, especially if the sales transaction is not finalized via e-commerce. An action point is the next step you want the customer to take to show interest in your product. That may be to contact your sales team in some manner (e-mail them, phone them, come into your store, etc.) It may be to ask for more information or to click to a pricing calculator. Whatever the action point, you need to create intrigue to get the customer to take that next step. This is especially true if price is not the main driver behind why people should buy your product. If you are selling on quality, you must have some sort of open loop action point to get the customer in front of your sales team. Quality is one of those characteristics that is hard to write about and have people take you seriously. Why? Because it is easy for anyone to claim their products and services are of high quality. However, when you are selling quality, the most convincing way of making a sale is when you are interfacing with a person, not a computer. A good sales person can show me the quality and talk to me about the satisfaction of other customers. He can convince me of the benefits of the product, and he can read what I’m thinking by the way I respond to him. How do you get the customer in front of a sales person? You do it by creating intrigue and an action point that brings the customer to you.

Take a strong look at the way you are offering your products and services, especially on your web site. Have you given the customer enough information to get them interested, but not enough to know everything there is to know? Have you given them a clear direction to the next step in the buying process? Is this action point easy to use? If you answered no to any of these questions, you might need to reconsider the methods you are employing to sell your products, Create some intrigue; leave the loop open, let your customer take the next step in closing that gap and see what happens to your sales.

Stanley’s accounts of finding David Livingstone made the New York Herald the most read publication of 1871. The editor of the Herald, James Gordon Bennett, Jr. capitalized on the curiosity of his market to send Stanley on his expedition. It paid off.

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Stanley begins search for Livingstone, This Day in History, History.com

Into Africa: The Epic Adventures of Stanley and Livingstone by Martin Dugard, Broadway Books, New York