As we are all individuals outside our heads and in our lives, we are all individuals inside our heads too. We use right brain for creativity and left brain for logic. We all think and feel differently, we are motivated differently. Personality and psychological type mark us out us as individuals, with our own personal ways of perceiving, deciding and acting. So, as customers, we don’t always think or act rationally and logically.

The web assumes we are all the same.

But bizarrely, the web assumes we are all the same. It serves up the same process the same way to those driven by emotion and gut-feel as those driven by logic and sensibility. But would a salesperson sell a car or a camera the same way to an extravert as to an introvert? No! She would watch, listen and learn, and adapt conversation and sales process to suit. Because, as we all know, we don't all perceive the same way, decide the same way or live our lives the same way.

Personality theories like Keirsey or Myers-Briggs based on work by psychologist Carl Jung can help us understand how and why people differ. Temperament theory gives us insights into grouped behaviours that might allow us to 'spot' a type and adapt process and flow to suit. Right now, the web is like a robot carrying out a stilted conversation with us, the same for everyone. But it doesn't have to be like that if we accept that we all do see things differently, decide differently, act differently and start designing to fit how people are.