About this library
Each case study takes a real brand decision, explains the psychological principle behind it with the research where available, and ends with what a small business can actually do with that idea. The full articles are in Persian and each includes a short video from the Mersholog YouTube channel. Titles and principles are listed here in English.
All case studies
- Why Apple keeps the iPhone looking almost the same every year — Familiarity and trust
- The jam study: why 6 flavours sold 10x more than 24 — Choice overload
- Why BlackBerry, loved by Obama and Kim Kardashian, collapsed — Competency trap
- Why Bugatti turned a car handover into a cinematic moment — Peak-end rule
- How a WWI tank inspired the Cartier Tank watch — Symbolic meaning and storytelling
- How a broken watch led to the Casio G-Shock — Origin story and proof
- Coca-Cola's Friendship Machine — Shared experience and reciprocity
- Why paying for rat tails increased the rats (Hanoi, 1902) — Perverse incentives and Goodhart's law
- Why Domino's admitted on camera that its pizza was bad — Radical honesty
- How a $5,000 bet saved FedEx — Risk and founder decisions
- Why Ferrari chooses its customers — Scarcity through customer selection
- Why a deliberately worn sneaker costs hundreds of dollars — Signalling and authenticity
- Why you can't simply buy a Hermès Birkin — Effort justification and scarcity
- Why we love furniture we assemble ourselves — The IKEA effect
- Why Apple waited to build a foldable iPhone — Second-mover advantage
- The car-wash loyalty card that nearly doubled completion — Endowed progress effect
- Why KFC in the UAE removed its restaurant doors — Costly signalling
- Kodak invented the digital camera, so why did it fail? — Status quo bias and the innovator's dilemma
- How 15,000 Kylie Lip Kits sold out in under a minute — Scarcity and social proof
- Why young wealthy Indians are buying Lamborghinis — The extended self
- How a tractor maker built Lamborghini — Rivalry and identity
- Why you recognise McDonald's before reading its name — Distinctive brand assets
- Why Blockbuster didn't buy Netflix for $50 million — Wrong benchmark, strategic blindness
- New Coke: a better taste that nearly destroyed a brand — Loss aversion and brand identity
- How Nike's three-word slogan changed its growth — Aspirational identity
- Why Nintendo left the console war and won with the Wii — Blue ocean strategy
- Nokia had touchscreen phones; why did it fall behind? — Incumbent blindness
- Why Patek Philippe says you never own its watch — Legacy and meaning
- Ray-Ban Aviator after Top Gun — Halo effect
- Why Richard Mille made a watch almost nobody can buy — Price anchoring
- Why Richard Mille put a million-dollar watch on Nadal in matches — Proof by demonstration
- Why Rolex still has waiting lists — Managed scarcity
- Why no two Rolls-Royces are exactly alike — Personalisation and uniqueness
- Why Starbucks works like a bank — Mental accounting
- How Tiger Sugar built hour-long queues without advertising — Social proof
- Why Tom Ford Private Blend perfumes cost more — Exclusivity and anchoring
- Why Yahoo didn't buy Google for $1 million — Not-invented-here syndrome
How to use these ideas
None of these principles is a trick. Scarcity, anchoring or social proof work only when they are true; fake scarcity and invented proof destroy trust quickly. If you want to apply one of them to your own business, that is exactly the kind of question we can work on in a business coaching session.
Frequently asked questions
Mersh Parker, an ICF-trained coach and brand strategist based in Dubai, who runs Mersh Coaching and the Mersholog channel.
Persian (Farsi). Titles and principles are listed in English on this page.
The study of how consumer psychology, such as scarcity, social proof, anchoring or identity, shapes how people perceive and choose brands.
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