Avoid Cutesy Text and Exclamations in Buttons

Choose button text that people would normally say (and how they would say it).

Overview

When you read, you speak each word inside your mind. It’s called inner speech (Alderson-Day & Fernyhough, 2015).

Certain buttons can be problematic because any text that is cutesy (e.g., Count Me In) or exclamatory (e.g., Buy Now!) will produce inner speech that is disfluent. Something will feel wrong. And, if something feels wrong, customers will attribute this feeling to the action.

Alderson-Day, B., & Fernyhough, C. (2015). Inner speech: development, cognitive functions, phenomenology, and neurobiology. Psychological bulletin, 141(5), 931.