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Neuromarketing allows media buyers to get inside the heads of their consumers

By admin | March 14, 2007

Even though neuromarketing allows media buyers and marketers to get inside the heads of their consumers, it’s not always easy to understand what’s going on in there.  Figuring out exactly what people are thinking based on scanning results remains a challenge, says Carolyn Yoon, associate professor of marketing at the University of Michigan Stephen M. Ross School of Business.

Yoon says that although scanners do enable researchers to see whether certain well-defined regions of the brain activate when a test subject encounters something like an ad, a product, or a spokesperson, it’s still difficult to interpret exactly what that activity means.  “If your visual cortex lights up, it can mean that you’re picturing something, but what?” says Yoon.  “If your activation pattern shows a strong emotional reaction, is it love, hate, envy, ardent appreciation, anger, or one of many other strong feelings?” In her own research, Yoon typically collects behavioral responses (e.g. emotion ratings) at the same time as the brain scan images, and this can be useful for drawing inferences about neural activation patterns.

Although some observers are concerned that neuromarketing research smacks of Big Brother, others see great potential.  “I am optimistic about what science can do to an area of marketing,” says Christophe Morin, co-author of the book Neuromarketing: Is There A Buy Button Inside The Brain? and co-founder of SalesBrain, the marketing company that worked with Vistage on its revamped campaign. Morin doesn’t see this field as a chance to invasively manipulate, but rather an opportunity for businesses to communicate more clearly with their customers.  “I truly believe that neuromarketing will improve the work that we see done in advertising and communications,” says Morin.

According to Morin, focusing efforts on communicating with the decision-making center in the brain will yield more effective marketing. “The primitive area of the brain, also known as the “old brain,” is critical for all marketers [to be aware of], ” he says, “because it would guide their creative efforts to trigger maximum attention, generate higher retention and ultimately increase the response.”

And there are plenty of campaigns out there that could use some help. “Many ads, especially print ads, violate neurological principles,” says Caroline Winnett, vice president of marketing for NeuroFocus, Inc., which provides in-depth research on commercial advertising and political messaging. But there are some very simple things you can do to make your ad more effective, she says. For example, images on a direct mail piece should be on the left, with the text on the right, because the left brain processes information and the right brain processes images.

Instead of using fMRI imaging, NeuroFocus uses electroencephalograms (EEGs), eye-tracking, and galvanic skin response (GSR) tests to conduct its research. Scanning the brain with an EEG differs from using an fMRI in that the EEG measures electrical signals produced by the brain, through sensors in a cap worn by the subject, and the results are displayed as bumpy lines on graph paper.

Winnett says these methods are more practical, affordable, and portable than using an fMRI scanner.  Winnett says a typical NeuroFocus study costs about the same as a focus group, but yields what she considers more reliable results. “Since we measure brain waves directly, we are language-neutral and free of the cognitive biases inherent in surveys and focus groups,” says Winnett.

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