Have you ever wondered how marketers gain insights into the consumer’s, i.e., your, decision-making process when making a purchase? Wonder no more. The answer is that they use neuromarketing. This method, which is used to understand consumers, has some benefits although it has garnered some criticism as well.
What Is Neuromarketing?
Neuromarketing researches consumers’ responses to a product by combining marketing, psychology, and neuroscience. It studies human emotions and behaviors related to products and ads, as well as the decision-making process behind purchasing a product or service.
Additionally, neuromarketing studies how people’s brains respond to advertising to reveal subconscious decision-making processes to understand and influence consumer behavior. Also, it measures the impact of branding and marketing strategies so marketers can predict consumer behavior and the future performance of a product, service, or campaign.
Tools
So, researchers measure a consumer’s responses to stimuli using a variety of tools:
- An fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) tracks changes in blood flow in the subcortical regions of the brain, which are involved in complex activities, like emotion or pleasure. However, it is expensive and invasive and must be performed in a lab or hospital.
- An electroencephalogram (EEG) uses sensors to detect the electrical activity of the brain. However, it isn’t as accurate as fMRI.
- Eye-tracking is a sensor technology that can decode eye movements and thus figure out what grabs the person’s attention or confuses them, for example. The drawback is that it doesn’t measure emotions.
- Facial coding identifies facial expressions to measure and understand emotions and behaviors, like surprise, fear, happiness, and the like.
- Biometrics measures and analyzes physical and behavioral characteristics, like heart rate, and it helps determine the level of engagement and positive or negative responses. Also, it is comparatively inexpensive.
Benefits
Among the benefits of neuromarketing are more detailed insights into human behavior that traditional marketing research can provide, honest feedback because subjects cannot lie, and the ability to design a holistic approach to marketing research. Other advantages include the ability to generate more sales leads, expand a company’s brand, improve marketing techniques, and design targeted advertising campaigns.
Criticism
Not everyone agrees with these techniques. There are some who find neuromarketing manipulative because it plays on a customer’s fears to encourage specific responses. On the other hand, critics have dismissed it as a pseudoscience that is not backed by serious scientific research. Lastly, neuromarketing is said to not come up with anything that traditional marketers didn’t know already.
Neuromarketing in Action
We can recognize the Coca-Cola logo from miles away, as it practically hasn’t changed since it was created well over a hundred years ago. It’s not just the font that we know so well, it’s also the color red. The color theory states that red feels bold and energetic and that it conveys powerful emotions like excitement, energy, and passion. According to neuromarketing, brand colors can help differentiate a product and influence the mood and feelings of consumers toward that product.
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Neuromarketing is one of the topics that we approach in our project-based lessons. This methodology incorporates meaningful, real-life situations into classroom projects for all levels and we use real materials designed in-house. Besides, it is highly effective because it activities designed to improve speaking, reading, writing, listening, and critical thinking skills. Get in touch today to find out more about our corporate language training.
