What if there was a way for you to know precisely what to say, and how to say it, to get the things you wanted and needed? Wouldn’t it be great to know exactly what to say to land that job you really want? Or to get your kids to do the dishes without you having to nag them? Or to get your partner to behave like your dream man/woman? Or to target your marketing message so your completely awesome product gets the attention (and world domination) it deserves?
That would be sweet, right?
But what happens when the tables are turned on that scenario? How would you feel knowing that the politician you just voted for manipulated your unconscious mind using information he/she got from using brain science? Would you be ok knowing that Pepsi got you to switch from Coca-Cola by using brain scans to determine how to construct an ad that would tap into your reptilian, pre-conscious brain? Does it make you uncomfortable to know that some ads you watch may have been carefully designed to target the irrational part of your brain?
That’s exactly how the lines are already being drawn between the field of neuromarketing and consumers. Big business and neuroscientists are gathering behind closed doors with consumer guinea pigs to find out what triggers our loyalty, our brand memory, and our impulse to buy one product versus another, and it’s exciting news for business, and for neuroscientists who suddenly have the possibility of lucrative jobs. It’s rather disturbing news for those who are about to be, or unwittingly already are, on the other side of these highly targeted marketing techniques.
But haven’t advertisers already figured out how to influence us? Look around your house. If you died tomorrow, how long would it take for the products that surround you to disappear from this earth? A lot longer than it took you. Look around again. How much of that “stuff” is essential to your survival? Not much. And yet, when we buy, we are often fooled into thinking we “need”, not that we “want”, and certainly rarely can we admit we’ve been brainwashed by the advertisers through compelling copy, the website design, the message, the packaging, the brand cult, whatever.
Haven’t we, as a collective culture, also often been excited about the possibility of influencing others if we can? Think of all the books and gurus we’ve thrown money at over the years that promise we’ll be able to land that job, raise our children perfectly, get the raise we want, etc, all through influencing others. All those theories, whether they knew it or not at the time the books were written, were calls to appeal to the reptilian pre-conscious brain.
So what about neuromarketing is such a loaded concept? Probably because it moves from theory to fact. Because it moves from the few with intuitive talent about human nature, to the many with the money to afford the technology. Because it flies in the face of what we believe about ourselves; that we make our decisions rationally, that we have will power, and that with the use of that will power we can choose what we want.
It is unlikely that neuromarketing, or using new findings in brain science to market, is going to go away any time soon. How do marketers ensure the ethical use of such knowledge? Where do we draw the line between good marketing, good science, and individual rights?
I invite you to sound off in comments, and if you would like to join what should be a very interesting Twitter discussion on the topic, follow me on Twitter and look for #nmchat on Monday, January 25th at 10 a.m. EST.
We are being controlled by images and icons. Our unconscious has more power over our choices that we dare imagine. The more we understand the symbolic language of images–the more we can have more control both as business owners and consumers.
Understanding this is as fundamental as our alphabet.
Thank you for your commitment to illuminating the darkness of the neuromarketing “unknown.”
Jenn
Hi Jenn, thanks for stopping by and for your comment. I think a lot of people feel they are in the dark about what neuromarketing means, both for businesses and consumers. I also think lots of people don’t know about neuromarketing at all, nor how the resulting marketing messages might be brought to us, for example through the use of scent to invoke certain emotions around a product.
It will be fun to explore this topic, along with many others, but the focus won’t always be neuromarketing, nor do I see my role as “exposing the darkness”, but rather to explore many topics where marketing and psychology, evolution and neuroscience intersect.
From what I can tell, neuromarketing is just a new word for something that people have been doing for decades, if not centuries. We’ve known for a long time, for example, that certain words are likely to make you seem trustworthy, and others will make you seem untrustworthy. Product placement seems like it would be another example. The fact that advertisers are doing increasingly sophisticated research to get a better idea of how and why these techniques work (or don’t) seems more like a logical step than a shocking revelation.
I am, perhaps naively, reasonably certain that this research will never yield a “Buy Button”, and that no technique will ever be an advertising holy grail. If such a thing were discovered, what would the ramifications be? Would everyone drain their bank accounts and max out their credit cards to stock up on Product X? What then? It seems to me the only way that such a thing could be successful in the long run would be if it actually convinced people to act in their own best interests and sold a product that was truly beneficial to them. Anything else… it is my suspicion that anything else would probably just result in the acceleration of our current condition: more pollution, worse obesity (and related diseases), and a widening gap between the wealthy and the impoverished (to name just a few characteristics).
(I’m tempted to go on about how selling things that are not good for people would not only exacerbate our current situation but is actually the thing that brought us here, but this comment is probably long enough as it is, and that’s only tangential at best.)
Hi Joel,
My response to your comment could generate a whole other post (or two or three). I’ll try to make it brief.
One of the most important discoveries of neuromarketing thus far (as well as neuroeconomics and neuroscience studies generally) is that focus groups don’t work. Why? Because when we answer questionnaires, we think we know what we want, but the fMRI studies have shown that we don’t. Most of our decision making is not based on rational thought, but rather on emotional, pre-conscious reaction.
That said, so far neuromarketing studies have only really been able to show mostly what doesn’t work. However, there is some real value there. If company X has 4 ads on the table, they can see which of the four are more likely to light up the consumers’ brain in a way that is more likely to lead to brand memory, loyalty, and/or conversion.
As to the question or probability of finding a “buy button”, I agree. That isn’t likely to happen. Even if it does, that just simply levels the playing field again anyway.
Finally, our collective unconscious and irrational decision-making as humans living in a media and product saturated culture have already led to all kinds of poor behavior and decisions, and I expect this will continue for many. On the plus side, all of these studies can educate the consumer as much as the marketers, making us more savvy to our own vulnerabilities.
Thanks for your thought-provoking comment! New posts are on the way.
well written blog. Im glad that I could find more info on this. thanks
Thanks for that. I love pepsi.
Just wanted to give you a shout from the valley of the sun, great information. Much appreciated.
I just wanted to say that I found your site via Goolge and I am glad I did. Keep up the good work and I will make sure to bookmark you for when I have more free time away from the books. Thanks again!
We are being controlled by images and icons. Our unconscious has more power over our choices that we dare imagine. The more we understand the symbolic language of images–the more we can have more control both as business owners and consumers.
Understanding this is as fundamental as our alphabet.
Thank you for your commitment to illuminating the darkness of the neuromarketing “unknown.”
Jenn
Pepsi is still the best! Coke is so disgusting, I don’t get why people drink it.
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