Your brand’s best friend might be an enemy

Red Sox vs. Yankees, Coke vs. Pepsi, Republicans vs. Democrats, Apple vs. Microsoft. These are among the most recognizable brands in the world. Each is defined in part by its opposition to the other. Can you even think of one without thinking of the other?

What makes rivalries so compelling and, oftentimes, enduring? In a word, balance.

Some social configurations are more stable and require less energy to maintain than others, according to Cornell University researchers who applied models from physics to social dynamics. For example, when the enemy of your enemy is your friend, or the friend of your enemy is your enemy, you’ve got balance—and less social stress. The easiest, least stressful configuration to maintain? Tied for first place: a rivalry between two groups and, conversely, zero rivalry (all friends).

I know. Hard to believe that a stadium full of screaming fans wearing giant foam fingers is “balanced.” But while a rivalry may be intensely expressed and experienced, socially speaking, it takes the least energy to maintain. It’s black and white. It’s easy to understand. Which plays right into one of neuromarketing’s basic rules: keep it simple. Our brains prefer things that are easy to think about.

More than that, competition is good. General competition validates your market space, and specific competition validates your corporate existence and offerings. It is social validation; any attention you get—even from your rival—grows your market presence.

It’s not about mudslinging, although obviously that happens in sports, politics, and marketing alike. It’s about turning your rival into a foil that helps you define and focus your brand. It’s about creating a bond with your client—you’re on the same team.

Plus, a rivalry makes a great story. And as I’ve blogged about, the brain loves a story.

Tips for using rivalry in marketing:

• Pick the right enemy. Spend some time finding the right anti-you. Our client inRESONANCE sets itself apart from other school database companies by promoting customizable solutions over their competitors’ all-in-one approaches.

• You can either redefine your enemy in contrast to you (Verizon maps AT&T’s poor coverage), or redefine yourself in contrast to them (7-UP is the uncola).

• A subtle jujitsu attack is usually preferable to a full-on assault. You don’t want to be unlikeable. The Mac guy lets the PC guy make a fool of himself.

• Your specific rival can be an idea or stereotype. For example, Bidwell ID “enemies” are prima donna designers and full-of-themselves marketers.

• Embrace competition as a way to excel. Competing to win can be exhausting, and studies imply it is not healthy.

• Don’t spend too much time on your competition. You may be giving them more attention than you want.

The future is usually hazy for me. I wasn’t impressed when first introduced to the Macintosh II in 1988, figuring the computer would take its place beside the waxer as a pasteup tool. I didn’t predict my wife would be upset when I forgot her birthday. But it was clear to me that neuromarketing would be big.

The question is whether we will expect too much of it. I was reminded of this just this morning while listening to “NPR’s ‘Mozart Effect’ Was Just What We Wanted To Hear.” The piece talks about the parenting movement spawned by psychologist Francis Rausher’s study indicating that students who had listened to a Mozart sonata scored higher on a spacial-temporal task. A cottage industry of Mozart CDs for young ones sprang up, and states like Georgia and Tennessee started giving out free CDs to every baby.

Then came the backlash when our children’s intelligence failed to improve overnight.

But the original study promised nothing of the sort. Rauscher had simply made a modest finding within a certain set of parameters. The media and self-proclaimed experts wanted it to be more than it was. And, of course, we parents wanted it to be more as well. Who doesn’t want a smarter kid? My mom still does.

And who doesn’t want smarter marketing? The key is to not run wild with a one modest study, even–or especially– if it seems to reinforce what you want in the first place (confirmation bias strikes again). This is the biggest concern of neuroscientists: that marketers will abuse scientific findings. The Mozart effect story is a reminder for us to use and triangulate multiple data sources.

Or just forge ahead, and deal with the backlash later. At least you might sell a few books and CDs.

Why we’re all buying—and selling—cool

I have a horrid confession: I wore Daisy Dukes in middle school. It didn’t have to do with the TV show or Catherine Bach…honest. Rather, it represented rural New Hampshire social capital of the day: the more ragged the cutoffs, the better.

Most of us like to think we left peer pressure behind when we left middle school (or graduated from high school). But when it comes to benefits, in the marketing sense, there’s one that always comes out on top: enhanced social standing. In fact, as far as the brain is concerned, it can be as good or better than cash.

Buying involves juggling multiple considerations, price and quality being perhaps the most obvious. But fMRIs of the brain suggest that when we’re making buying decisions, the most important factor is how the product will affect our social standing. Or, as neuropsychiatrist Joshua Freedman puts it, “who you are and what you represent in the context of how others see you.” We just want to be cool, and not only as kids picking out shorts, but also as adults choosing seemingly innocuous stuff like peanut butter.

We can’t help it. It’s the work of our mirror neurons, which are central to empathy—and to many neuromarketing reactions. They explain social validation, which I blogged about last year. Mirror neurons fire when we see others do something, prompting us to do that thing too: yawn, laugh, drink Coke (when we like Pepsi better), line up for an iPad . . .

Just how powerful is social approval? It’s right up there with money. Researchers say the two activate the same reward circuitry in the brain (not surprising when you stop and think about how money is all tied up with status). We seem to weigh one against the other, and status often tips the scales.

The upshot: social status is like money in bank—for your customers and for you.

Tips for using social status in marketing:

1. As a general rule, don’t be too obvious. Show you are cool; don’t say it. The iPad is cool because Apple does cool stuff—not because Apple says that it is cool.

2. Get testimonials. Most people turn to their peers to see what is cool. Again, don’t promote it yourself. Kanye West is seen as cool because he actually makes good music—it has nothing to do with his self-absorbed antics.

3. As always, know your audience. What’s cool with one group can be an embarrassment to another.

4. Develop rituals. Customers can appreciate being part of a “club.”

5. Recognize your best customers or donors in a public way. My local independent movie theater lets big donors name a seat, for example.

6. Charge more. A higher price can cultivate a perceived benefit of social status … assuming you have a quality service or product to begin with.

Facebook’s Big Brother issue

Professor George Milne of the University of Massachusetts studies online privacy and why some businesses—like Facebook—are starting to give us the creeps.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been clear that he believes we should all be open with our personal information. He put that belief into action by setting Facebook privacy defaults that were … well, less than private. (Zuckerberg obviously read Nudge, which notes that even when given choices, most of us never bother tinkering with defaults.)

But the past few months has seen a public backlash. Facebook is backpedaling, and companies are watching closely. More information means a better understanding of customers—and better marketing. Too much probing makes customers feel “creepy,” Milne says, and being branded as creepy is not good for business.

Milne’s most recent study investigates privacy issues and young adults (18–24). His findings suggest that:

• Consumers do not read privacy policies.
• Women are more concerned with privacy issues than men, but general concern is low overall.
• Women are less likely to favor tailored advertising based on their profile information.
• Men and women disclose different things. Men more readily provide contact information. Women post more preferences (e.g. movies and books). College women disclose personal information on Facebook.
• The more concern they expressed, the less people felt that their social network service (i.e., Facebook) was doing a good job protecting their privacy.
• Women are more assertive in seeking help to protect their information.
• Women perceive privacy loss to have more severe consequences than do men, which contributes to their reluctance to buy online. However, women perceive less risk when they receive recommendations from friends.
• People often lie to protect their privacy.

All of this implies that trust (or disinterest) is a default, but once that trust is rattled, the consequences can be severe.

The privacy backlash appears to be growing, but this is not just Facebook’s fault. Consider that in answer to the rising need to monitor freelance labor from a distance, oDesk created a program that takes a snapshot of somebody’s computer up to six times a minute. And that Coke Zero Facial Profiler will find your Facebook doppelganger—provided you give Coke access to your profile information and “other content.” And authorities are questioning Google co-founder Sergey Brin over personal-data screwups in Europe.

The bottom line: Whether you take advantage of this default behavior or leak personal information by mistake, customers will become more protective. If you don’t play your cards right, you will not get information, or you’ll get lied to. What to do?

• Go with the trend. Encourage and educate about privacy protection, especially with women. Recognize who they trust most—their friends, not you—and don’t fight it.

• If you use privacy defaults, make them tighter, with the option to be more open.

• Beware of ads that are too targeted. They can be perceived as infringing on privacy. Alert users when tracking their online behavior. This allows the user to opt in and is much less likely to trigger a defense.

• Keep an eye on the issue. Social norms around privacy are being tested like never before, and they are changing rapidly. Don’t assume everything is okay. Don’t let creepiness catch you unawares.

• Get permission first, keeping in mind opt-in and opt-out marketing. Opt-in requires a potential customer to self-select what she wants. For example, boxes are unchecked by default. Those who opt-in are considered more qualified potential customers, and opt-in is shown to be the most effective of the two. Opt-out means you have signed up the customer for something by default. It should only be considered with existing customers, if at all.

Baby schema Doesn’t Like Sharing the Stage

As you may have noticed, we’re awash in cuteness these days. The latest dose comes in the form of a full-length documentary film, Babies, released Mother’s Day weekend. Advertising Age reports that marketers were all over it. Vanity Fair examined the trend at length last year, noting among other things the scads of Internet sites devoted to baby animals, the enduring success of Hello Kitty, the evolution of the Geico gecko from slithery to big-eyed, the fact that even Darth Vader is now available as an adorably stumpy stuffed toy …

What’s going on?

“Baby schema,” aka cuteness, that’s what. When presented with characteristics we unconsciously associate with infants, such as a round head and big eyes, our brains get busy telling us to nurture. Cuteness may even be addictive.

A recent series of experiments using functional MRI showed that baby pictures—especially those with the best baby schema—stimulate the nucleus accumbens. This ancient part of the brain is involved in reward processing, and it’s also stimulated by perennial favorites such as food, drugs, and sex. In a less high-tech experiment, a psychologist left hundreds of wallets, some containing baby pictures, around the streets of Edinburgh, Scotland. The wallets with the baby pictures were returned far more often than those with other pictures or no pictures at all.

So cuteness can help you get your wallet back, but can it get your customers to reach into theirs?

Maybe. Like sex, cuteness is reluctant to share the stage. You might get everyone’s attention, but you might also lose the battle for brand recall. My friend’s real estate agent dreads bringing his 7-month-old daughter to appointments when he’s on child-care duty. “She steals the show,” he says. It’s good for his ego, but not for his sales: buyers are so busy cooing over the baby, they don’t take in the house.

Tips for using cuteness in marketing:

1. Make sure the focus is on your brand, not the cuteness.

2. The cuteness has to work with the context of the brand or ad. A puppy selling razors? Probably not. A Chihuahua selling tacos? I don’t have to tell you it worked.

3. Everyone has the cuteness button, but cute’s effect seems to be strongest with women on the young side. The audience of the hit website cuteoverload.com, for example, is largely female and between 18 and 34.

4. Beware the dark side. Cuteness sometimes puts its object into ridiculous or vulnerable situations, as Daniel Harris notes in his book Cute, Quaint, Hungry and Romantic. Kittens crashing into walls? Adorable to some, disturbing to others.

(although it does a good job of selling itself)

Synaptic Branding 005: Sex Doesn’t Sell Products

This is a repost—with a new accompanying podcast—of one of our most popular blogs.

I have a long-standing vision of myself as the big advertising art director. I’m donning peg-leg Armanis with a tight crotch, and sporting a flowing Diesel Sevento shirt. My face is perfectly framed by Calvin Klein glasses. (Hey, I’ve already got those!) I’m directing a beautiful young model to take off more of her clothing. “Look honey, you’re not back in Kansas now, baby,” I would purr, “We’re in Florence, Massachusetts, and in Florence, sex sells.”

Contrary to conventional wisdom—and my fanciful dreams—sex doesn’t help sales, and can actually be a hindrance.

According to the 2005 book Sex in Advertising: Perspectives on the Erotic Appeal, about one-fifth of all ads employ sex in an attempt to sell. The problem is that studies have shown that subjects are no more likely to recall erotic ads than non-erotic ones. And women in particular are more likely to perceive too much sex in marketing as a negative.

A recent study found that nudity has no positive impact on movie popularity with viewers or critics. Top-grossing films, such as Spider-Man, typically have only mild sex or nudity. “Sex did not sell, whether in the domestic or international box office,” said Dean Keith Simonton, professor of psychology at the University of California–Davis. “Even among R movies, less graphic sex is better.”

The same goes for video gaming. Yes, you heard me, gaming, that world frequented mainly by sexually repressed and immature young men—or so goes the stereotype. Apparently, they aren’t impressed with straightforward sex. Playboy games have been met with indifference, and even cartoon adventurer Lara Croft has had her body “reduced to more anatomically feasible proportions” at the same time as her critical stock has risen.

Why is it that sex—something most of us think too much about—doesn’t do a better job of selling?

First, we are becoming more accustomed to sex. It is all around us and very accessible. Second, sex is blinding and doesn’t like to share the stage. People might recall a sexy ad, but they rarely remember what the ad was trying to sell. Chaste ads might not get the heart pounding, but they do a better job of getting the mind to focus on what advertisers want it to focus on—the product.

This doesn’t mean the end of trying to use sex to sell. As we are all exposed to more sex, our titillation level rises, so we will probably see an increase in sex in marketing before we see a decline. Unfortunately, companies will push the boundaries under the delusion that sex, if done right, will sell for them.

For the rest of us, this means:

• Choose models who look more like your customers, which probably means less sexy and more normal looking. Or set the standard a notch above your customer, offering a realistic aspiration. Extremely sexy/attractive is just too out-of-reach for most of us.

• Using realistic models will also help customers’ perception of you being authentic.

• Don’t advertise around sex, such as during sexy TV shows. Studies show that your ads are less likely to be remembered.

• If you are looking to tantalize your customer, studies show that men prefer to see 40 percent of a woman’s body. Less than that is seen as prudish; more suggests a woman might be unfaithful. (We’ve no idea what percentage of a man’s body women prefer to see, but co-workers suggest it has less to do with a percentage than with what is seen.)

• Don’t use sex to try to sell, unless you are trying to sell sex itself.

So much for my peg-leg photographic dream. The lesson here is that marketing is best grounded in what works; don’t get too wrapped up in what is just fantasy, however appealing.

Humor is attention-getting, memorable—and persuasive

It’s the funny ads that go viral. And funny ads regularly clean up the Clio awards, advertising’s Oscars. Marketers have always relied on humor, but now brain science is helping us understand why it works so well—and how best to use it.

The human response to humor runs deep. Babies laugh before they talk, by about 4 months, and they go nuts for what researchers call the “safe surprise.” Think peek-a-boo, which one psychology professor deems “the archetype … of all humor.”

Most types of humor take advantage of incongruity—a form of surprise—to one degree or another (as some rather dry and unfunny analyses of humor in advertising show). Think punch line. A part of the brain called the amygdala, which plays a key role in the processing and memory of emotional reactions, is especially sensitive to the unexpected. EEGs show that incongruity stimulates the amygdala, as well as the temporoparietal junction, which is involved in detecting novelty.

So for starters, humor gets our attention. I’ve written about what an accomplishment that is. And humorous material is easier to remember. But further, as the brain tries to solve the “problem” of the incongruity between the punch line and the expectation shaped by the lead-up, it’s actually stunned for a moment. Its cognitive security system goes down, leaving us more open to suggestion. In other words, more open to being marketed to.

That’s why, as an article in the March/April issue of  Scientific American Mind put it, “The persuasive power of humor is second to none.” And why the best jokes—for laughs and for marketing—are the ones we don’t see coming.

Tips for using humor in marketing:

1. The more unexpected/incongruous the punch line, the more persuasive the ad.

2. It’s easier to develop incongruity with video/TV than with print, which doesn’t give you audio or dynamic interplay of characters.

3. As always, know your audience. What’s funny to one audience is offensive to another.

Here are some examples of humor in advertising. High incongruity is one reason some are more memorable than others.

• Old Spice 1 and Old Spice 2

• Danier Leather

• Some very creative print ads and billboards

• Clio winners, many of which use humor

Patrick Hanlon’s Primal Branding taps into belief systems—and neuromarketing

Before I even knew about neuromarketing, I was inspired by Patrick Hanlon’s book Primal Branding. Patrick’s premise is that brands are belief systems. Like all belief systems, they consist of seven pieces of what Patrick calls “primal code”: a creation story, a creed, icons, rituals, sacred words, nonbelievers, and a leader.

Now, Patrick’s work can sound all highfalutin or academic, but his approach can be more…earthy. (This is “not the same old branding bullshit,” he writes.) And he has the chops, having worked on brands like Absolut, UPS, John Deere, Pepsi, and LEGO at big-boy agencies TBWA, Ogilvy, and his own Thinktopia.

In any case, I think he is on to something.

First, he keeps good company. Primal Branding reminds me of Joseph Campbell’s work on comparative world myths and religions, popularized by his interviews with Bill Moyers in the series The Power of Myth. Here, too, we hear about creation stories, heroes (leaders), and rituals.

Second, Patrick’s notion of primal branding is grounded in brain science, if unintentionally. I wrote Hanlon about this, suggesting the connection. He responded, saying of his branding system, “The short answer is that because it’s primal, it IS neuromarketing.”

He went on:

“Since our primeval beginning, we have learned attraction and avoidance. We are attracted to things that sparkle with Primal Code. People, products and services, ideas and communities that tell us where they’re from, what they’re about, show us what they look like, tell us how to use them, tell us the special words used to describe them, tell us what they’re not, and who’s leading the show [the 7 pieces of primal code] provide us with a brand narrative. They also provide us with meaning.

“And along the way, they give us a dopamine drip. We prefer them—and avoid things that do not give us those same benefits. I don’t know what the opposite of the dopamine drip is, but it’s probably not nice.”

The heart of Patrick’s response to me is that we are drawn to well-crafted narratives (which I’ve blogged about). Narratives trigger emotions, and we make decisions—like what brand to buy—based on emotions. We almost never make decisions for logical reasons, as much as people like to believe otherwise. Logic merely backs up decisions we’ve already made for emotional reasons. Think of your mind as the Starship Enterprise: the emotional human is in charge; the logical Vulcan is in the second seat.

But I believe it is also more basic than that. Highfalutin science aside, neuromarketing—or neurobranding or neuroanything—simply seeks to understand the primal reasons for what we do. For what attracts us, what is meaningful to us, and what we ultimately buy, or buy into.

Patrick has developed a successful narrative-building system for his clients. Although not consciously built on neuromarketing, it is certainly of neuromarketing.

You can watch Patrick on YouTube and get an overview of primal branding on Slideshare.

Chime in: Are you using narrative marketing and branding?

Synaptic Branding for Your Ears

After a string of people suggested podcasting the blog, we obliged! We’ve started with a few of the favorite posts, and will expand from here. Great thanks to the talented  Dennis Crommett for production and theme music!

• Synaptic Branding 001: Neuromarketing 101
• Synaptic Branding 002: You Put a Spell on Me
• Synaptic Branding 003: A World of Inspiration
• Synaptic Branding 006: Triangulation Tour de Force

Chime in: What posts would you like podcastified?

Interested in viewing our neuromarketing presentation from last week’s Communication and Leadership Conference at Western New England College? Download the PDF or view it online at Slideshare. Thanks again to Jennifer Williams of Verilliance for being the perfect co-presenter.