People believe that they
know what moves them to act; marketers seem to agree. To learn what people think and feel about a
product or message, just ask them, right?
As a result, marketing research has long relied
on questionnaires, surveys and focus groups. Research may also try to show that a
message was attended to and/or recalled. It is simply common sense to assume
that the more attention one pays a message,and the more remembered, the more
effective it is likely to be.
Unfortunately, both instances
of common sense are wrong. The “just
ask” approach assesses only the tip of the iceberg but misses th elarge proportion of
our mental functioning hidden below the surface. It misses the unconscious and, as a result,
often fails to predict consumer behavior.
Unconscious
Processes
Marketers need to understand
how the mind’s unconscious processes work.Cognitive, neuro- and
psychological sciences have demonstrated that the brain is organized in networks
of associations (networks of neurons). In
layman’s terms, unconsciously we organize our mental world in terms of how the
stuff in our heads is connected associatively. Artists and advertising creatives intuitively understand this and pitch
their works at associative networks.
Recent science has proved
that we are emotional beings to our core. This is literally true of the brain,
where central regions are involved in emotional functioning, surrounded by layers
of information processing cortex.
Because emotional circuits fire more quickly than cognitive regions, we
react emotionally before we are consciously aware of what we have experienced.Simply
put, emotion precedes, and trumps, rationality.
Measuring
Unconscious Associative Networks
The key to assessing unconscious
associations lies in measuring reaction time.
Whatever is on our mind, whatever resonates the name of a product,
watching a commercial, glancing at product packaging—captures our attention. If
the phrase “captures our attention” sounds like something we cannot consciously
control, it is.
Market researchers can probe
unconscious associations by assessing how quickly, or slowly (in thousandths of a
second), people respond when these associations are presented. Reaction
time essentially measures one’s involuntary, unconscious attention.
Measuring
Emotional Reactions
The key to assessing
automatic emotional reactions is to present a stimulus (central aspect of a message)
too quickly to be processed by the conscious brain, but slowly enough to be
processed by the unconscious. The result is
some level of positive and negative emotional reaction, which people cannot talk
about in focus groups or report on surveys.
This is followed by a relatively neutral stimulus that the person
consciously sees (usually a generic product from the category, e.g., an
“unnamed” glass of brown liquid or an unidentified person).
As far as the participant is
concerned, she only sees the second stimulus.
She is then asked to rate a series of statements. The answers are biased emotionally by the initial
stimulus, but the person does not realize this.
In other words, that unconscious emotional reaction “lingers” long enough
to influence what the person feels toward the second stimulus.
Marketing isn't a puzzle you can just solve by asking. Image link: wonderbranding.com
Making
Sense of Unconscious Processes
By combining the results of
these two measures, we can determine the associative strengths and weaknesses
of a message,as well the emotional context.
Now we have the unconscious “story” of the message.
Conscious processes are not
without predictive power but their influence is limited to focused, short-term
behavior. In contrast, long-term and spontaneous behaviors are best predicted by
unconscious measures.
Combining the results of
conscious and unconscious measures allows us to more accurately predict how
consumers are likely to behave. Some
messages will have a strong conscious impact but little unconscious effect and predict
short-term, focused behaviors. Other messages may have a strong unconscious
impact but little conscious effect, which predict long-term and spontaneous
behaviors. Some messages will be weak on both levels; these are the losers. And, some messages will have a strong impact on
both levels. These are win/wins.
The
Bottom Line: Ask, But Don’t Just Ask
In sum, if we hope to better
predict how a potential customer will act, we must address the whole
person. We need to understand how the
person responds to messaging on both the conscious and unconscious levels.
Only by taking a holistic approach to how the
mind works can marketers and their creative partners hope to craft
communications that have the intended effect.
