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Neuromarketing

Understanding The Buy Buttons in The Brain

Advertisers ride a brain wave called neuromarketing. But is it for real?November 6 2008

The following article was published in the Entrepreneur.com online magazine October 2008.

In early 2004, a half-dozen scientists from the Baylor College of Medicine published a no-brainer of a research paper. The conclusion: When exposed to Coke labels, soda drinkers who hadn't previously expressed much brand preference suddenly had affection for the Real Thing. Big deal, you say. Everyone knows that branding has an effect on the psyche. But get this: The researchers weren't measuring lip-smacks, nods or checked-off boxes. They were using a Siemens Allegra 3T functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) brain scanner. The drinkers' noggins lit up like Christmas trees after they sipped the branded Coca-Cola.

"When an image of a Coke can preceded Coke delivery, significantly greater brain activity was observed," according to the paper, published in the academic journal Neuron. It adds: "Equivalent knowledge about Pepsi delivery had no such effect "

In other words, our brains confirm that the brand with the more effective marketing wins and can even fake out our taste buds. Four years later, the field of neuromarketing--the practice of using brain-wave product feedback to target goods and services to our subconscious appetites--is growing up. While large corporations employ neuromarketing firms to conduct costly fMRI studies, a new breed of marketing upstarts with

The Power of 3: How simple repetition aids memory and believabilityAugust 31 2008

Research from the world of Neuroscience shows that humans remember information more easily when it comes in sets of three. In Peter Bentley’s recently published “The Book of Numbers” an entire chapter is dedicated to the number 3, reminding us of the extraordinary quantity of everyday concepts that take the form of triplets. Our brain just remembers things more easily when it comes in sets of 3.

During the Olympics, we have heard the regular sounds of starter’s orders going ‘ready, steady, go’; traffic lights turn from red to amber and then green; we celebrate with ‘three cheers’; we tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, learn our ABC’s, eat three good meals a day, make three wishes or in a religious context, refer to the Holy Trinity of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost.

The list goes on and on but now, a study published by the American Psychological Association has added a new twist to the power of 3. People generally infer that an opinion is more widely shared the more often it is repeated – even when the same person repeats it three times in a relatively short period of time. This repetition brings 90% of the same power of influence that it would have achieved if three different people had made the same claims. A series of six experiments with 177 people were us

Choosing candidates in less than 100 milliseconds?April 16 2008

One of the most important senses we use to decide whether or not we can trust humans or situations is our visual channel. The optic nerve contains about a million fibers compared to the auditory nerve's 30000 fibers. The speed at which we acquire and decode information visually is measured in milliseconds. Below 300 milliseconds, we cannot understand or process most of what we see with our higher cognitive functions (Todorov, Engel, & Haxby, 2006). Facial recognition especially is a very critical aspect of how we use our visual processing function and a core factor in assessing the trustworthiness of individuals. In a study presented by Princeton Universityon how we decode faces we trust, it was found that the most active part of our brains during the time it takes to process a face visually is the amygdala. The amygdala is an almond-sized organ located deep in the most primitive areas of our brain. It has been labeled the fear-processing center of the brain after countless studies using fMRI (Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging) have established its central role as being a mediator of many psychological functions that affect our immediate survival (Ledoux, 1996). In the Princeton study, the amygdala was observed to be active within about 100 milliseconds after photos were shown to experimental subjects. Photos of faces were presented as stimuli to participants of the study. Subjects were asked to respond to a simple question: whether or not f

Fear as a major driver of human responseNovember 1 2007

According to new research findings, "fear" is indeed the strongest emotional response humans can experience. As noted in this recent article written by Seth Borenstein (Science Writer), --fear is a basic primal emotion that is key to evelutionary survival-- The way we respond to fear is controlled to a large extent by the Amygdala, an almond-size organ located in the deeper, primal part of our brain. The amygdala is responsible for the intensity of the emotional response, largely an electrochemical reaction that will affect our entire body. Of course many advertising messages aspire to trigger fear responses as ways to increase attention and improve retention. After all, researchers have demonstrated that we react faster to showings of fearfull faces than we do in front of happy faces (Emotion, 2007).

Investing and the brainOctober 23 2007

A new book on how humans are wired to make decisions is confirming the importance of emotions and especially the role of hardwired mistakes we make. Richard Peterson in his book "Inside the Investor's Brain" is demonstrating the chemical basis behind our financial decisions with a remarkable attention to the latest findings on the brain. For more on this book, click here.