I’m reading an interesting new book by Martin Lindstrom called “buyology” I learned about in a Newsweek article.  It’s pretty quick read and highly worth the time investment.  His premise is one that I have believed for most of my marketing, advertising and branding career — that people lie about what they say they want.  Their brains behave differently than what their mouths tell you.  It’s sociology, psychology and common sense all rolled into the emotional componentry of the branding process.  Lindstrom calls it neuromarketing.

Lindstrom did a study where he tracked people’s brain scans as they answered questions about their purchase behaviors and response to brands.  What he found was quite interesting — that our brain circuitry attracts us to certain brands because of emotional cues inherent in that brand.  These cues may have nothing to do with our need for the product, but simply our wiring tells us we relate to that brand’s attributes.

Like my unnaturally strong attraction to Apple.  But that’s another blog post.

One of the most interesting (and scary) examples in buyology focuses on smokers, and why the Surgeon General’s warnings mean absolutely nothing to their brains.  In fact, their wiring is somehow attracted to those warnings, and what was meant to deter them from smoking actually attracts them to it.

Emotional bonding in the branding process is not new science.  But what Lindstrom brings to the equation is a cool scientific approach that actually proves up what we branding strategists are always telling our clients:  create brand attributes that connect with your customers on a human scale.

When we take a client through the branding process, one of the exercises we employ is a “personality assessment” of the brand. We ask the participants to think of their product as a person, and then name that person’s traits:

• Is this person warm, friendly, strong, believable, honest?
• Is he a leader?
• Does he make you feel hip, trendy, and carefree, or instead is it safe, secure, nurtured and pampered?

Whatever the set of attributes you attach to your product or service, they are the truest representation of how people will emotionally bond (or not) through your marketing.

From there, we can devise a strategic marketing plan that taps into your customer’s emotional bond, helping them to become more likely to purchase.  They are drawn to your brand because there is something vaguely familiar tugging at them to do so.

Fascinating. And  I always thought I would make a crappy scientist. Who knew?