Temu, a Chinese online vendor that has rapidly gained global popularity, offers an extensive variety of goods at almost unbelievably low prices. From clothing and jewelry to electronics and home appliances, its catalog rivals industry giants like Amazon, while employing unique marketing and psychological techniques to keep customers engaged and spending.
However, there are some notable differences between Temu and Amazon and other online vendors. For instance, Temu does not deliver merchandise nearly as quickly as Amazon, nor does it package items as neatly as its more established rival. In addition, the merchandise it sells is sometimes of disappointing quality and/or is not properly sized. Temu addresses this by making it easy and hassle-free to return items; in fact, when I have tried to return an item to Temu, the site will frequently give me a refund and allow me to keep the item at no cost to me. (Admittedly, Amazon has done that for me on occasion, but not nearly as frequently as Temu does.) As discussed in more detail below, while platforms like Amazon rely more on convenience and trust-building, Temu employs more aggressive strategies such as scarcity and gamification.
I confess that I do not understand the business model that allows Temu to sell merchandise at such steeply discounted prices. Apparently, it has not yet turned a profit, though this is not unusual for new vendors seeking to establish a beachhead in a market. The incredibly low prices, of course, limit the need for Temu to deal with returns, as many customers will not bother to seek a refund on an item that only costs a few dollars.
However, what I find most intriguing about Temu is its aggressive use of psychological inducements that encourage customers to buy and to keep buying. Temu employs a blend of psychological tactics aimed at keeping shoppers on the hook—from countdown clocks and scarcity cues to gamification elements like prizes and credits. These strategies tap into basic human behavior, exploiting urgency, reward systems, and convenience to turn browsing into buying.
I should make clear that Temu is not forcing anyone to buy the merchandise it offers. (In the past, I did encounter some instances where I believe the company shipped me items that I had examined on their site but had not placed in my cart; however, it accepted the return of the items I didn’t want, and that practice seems to have stopped.) But Temu is savvy when it comes to how online shoppers think, especially those who may be on the fence concerning a purchase.
One technique Temu employs is to require a minimum value of purchases in order for it to fulfill an order. At least for me, that minimum value is not very high – just $15. So, the site will not process my purchase of a $5 item, unless at least another $10 in merchandise is added to the order. This is, of course, not an unreasonable practice, as Temu incurs certain costs in addition to shipping (which Temu charges for), costs that may make it unprofitable for the company to fulfill orders under a certain value. But, as I can tell you from personal experience, the effect will often be to induce a shopper to purchase more merchandise than they had originally intended or even wanted.
Yet another example of Temu’s aggressive investment in ways to motivate customers to make purchases is that when there are items remaining unpurchased in a customer’s cart, after a while, the site will provide a countdown clock telling the customer how much longer the item of interest will remain available at the indicated price. Temu is not alone among vendors in using this sort of feature (online shopping networks used it as far back as when they started selling on cable and satellite TV decades ago). However, Temu goes further and provides these clocks even with respect to goods that the customer just browsed but did not actually put in their cart. Of course, all “sales” by vendors are time-limited by necessity, so this sort of feature is not unique. Moreover, Temu will place the running countdown clock on a customer’s screen regardless of where the customer is on the site to keep them reminded that the clock on the deal is ticking. Temu will also tell a shopper when supplies of an item they have placed in their cart but have not purchased are running low, the goal being to induce anxiety in the shopper that Temu will run out of the item in which they are interested if the shopper does not act quickly. If a shopper is unsure as to whether to make a given purchase, these time and supply pressures are likely to induce them to buy the item, lest they miss out on the item and/or the discounted price being offered.
A third technique used by Temu is to constantly bombard shoppers with prizes, games, coupons, and credits as they are shopping (and sometimes even when they are not shopping). Thus, the site might, out of the blue, inform the customer that they had won a prize, credit, or coupon worth some small amount of money to use on the site. The games include spinning wheels that give the shopper a monetary credit or discount percentage depending on where the wheel stops. There is absolutely no skill involved, and I have never failed to win something when the site has offered a game to me.
These strategies are rooted in the psychology of reward systems, similar to those used in gaming and gambling. By presenting a ‘chance to win’ with minimal effort, Temu taps into the dopamine-driven behavior of anticipation and reward, encouraging users to spend more time and money on the platform. It can be difficult for the shopper to resist “spending” these awards and prizes — which will usually need to be supplemented by the shopper with additional funds — to purchase more Temu merchandise. Amazon has begun using countdowns and lightning deals, but not to the extent or intensity of Temu’s manipulative design patterns, which bombard users with artificial urgency and rewards.
Readers should note that shoppers have no way of confirming the accuracy of Temu’s countdown clocks or the truth of any of the site’s other assertions in connection with its use of these techniques. For example, if the site tells a shopper that an item they had looked at is available at a discounted price for a limited time only, the shopper has no way of confirming if indeed there is such a time limit on the discounted price. Likewise, when Temu says that supplies of an item are running low, the shopper has no way of confirming the accuracy of that statement either. That Chinese companies are often not known for their transparency may make it difficult or impossible to confirm the veracity of the site’s representations that are intended to encourage purchases.
Now, I am not suggesting that any of these techniques is terribly sophisticated or that Temu is the only vendor using them. They’re not incredibly sophisticated, and other vendors use similar techniques. However, these techniques do raise some important ethical considerations. By amplifying urgency and playing on fear of missing out (FOMO), Temu’s design could contribute to compulsive shopping behaviors. This could lead to buyer’s remorse and dissatisfaction when the quality of the products does not meet expectations, creating a paradox where low prices lure in customers but lead to disappointment. Certainly, many customers will recognize these manipulative techniques for what they are and will approach the site’s representations concerning time limits and supply availability with some degree of guardedness. But what is interesting about Temu is how extensively and aggressively it deploys these techniques to encourage shoppers to spend money on the site. And I would imagine that Temu likely employs other techniques for manipulating customers’ psyches of which I am not even aware.
As Temu continues to grow, its aggressive use of psychological techniques may set new norms for online shopping. Will these methods, which blend convenience with manipulation, become a standard in the e-commerce landscape, or will they face backlash as consumers grow wary? Either way, Temu’s approach provides valuable examples of how psychology and technology are intertwined in the modern marketplace.
I have not yet seen any studies examining the utility of any of the techniques employed by Temu to encourage sales. And do not get me wrong, shoppers can get excellent values from Temu that more than make up for the small inconvenience of having to return disappointing items for a refund. I imagine that once the vendor has a longer track record, meaningful studies and assessments are likely to follow, and we will have an answer to the question of which, if any, of the motivational techniques used by Temu are to be emulated by others seeking to follow in their footsteps.
