To better understand the mechanisms of the human brain associated with emotional connection, marketing has been increasingly studying psychology to understand people's behavior.
This is because people often think they are making purchasing decisions based entirely on reason, but it is emotion that really determines a purchase. But what inspires this emotion? What triggers a taste, a preference, an attraction to a product?
Os advances in neuromarketing, which is a union of neuroscience, consumer psychology and marketing, has pointed out that the way forward is to always seek the desires of the human soul, even when the interest is to sell. Understanding people's mindset is the focus.
And this is not an easy task, after all there are 7 levels of consciousness that inspire all human attitudes:
- survival;
- fear of not being accepted;
- self-esteem;
- transformative processes;
- internal cohesion;
- make a difference in the world;
- be open to service.
When the brain has the right stimulus, it generates satisfaction, but how do you figure out the trick in this equation? What level of consciousness is being reached with each stimulus? Who knows how to hit the right spot to generate this satisfaction, inspire the purchasing processes and retain customers.
Therefore, the neuromarketing professionals analyze consumer actions, their reactions to a stimulus, be it the color of a package or even the contents based on audio marketing that can generate consumer engagement with a given brand.
It is already known that there are other aspects that can also determine a purchase, such as cultural, social, personal (age, sex, stages of life, etc.) and psychological (personality and self-image) factors.
And this last factor shows that people are looking for a good shopping experience, that is, they are looking for the satisfaction that generates pleasure in the brain. And truly, we are in the age of experience.
Research
In the statistics presented by Google Cloud during the “RD Summit 2018” event:
63% of consumers would like to have a different shopping experience
62% of people expect brands to provide a consistent experience
42% only think that consistent experience is offered by brands.
Beliefs and values
Much of people's buying behavior is based on their beliefs and values. And in this sense, the issue of experience also plays a big role. Different people with different factors may like the same product, but it is the experience with that product that can determine the purchase.
According to the book “Influence: Weapons of Persuasion”, the author Robert Cialdini, there are also their principles of influence for persuasion:
- reciprocity (the tendency is to say “yes” to those who owe you something),
- scarcity (fear of not having something important);
- authority (who is an expert on the subject);
- consistency (commitment to what was promised);
- affinity (people like what is similar to them);
- social proof (what the world is doing to do the same).
In all of the principles revealed above, there is a broad psychological study of the human being. And in many of these principles, the issue of experience is very decisive. To do this, it is necessary to activate mental triggers, which are so efficient at the time of sale, because they activate the subconscious very effectively.
mental triggers
Nowadays, people don’t just want to know the benefits of a product, but rather, what satisfaction that product will bring to their lives. Who has never seen the advertisements that say that a certain cleaning product is the best because it will give them more time in their life to enjoy moments of leisure and pleasure with their loved ones?
At the time the commercial is being shown, whether on television or even on the internet, the consumer may not understand exactly what it represents, but the subliminal messages (mental triggers) directly reach their brain.
Who doesn’t want to “work” less to have more free time, whether that person is a housewife or a busy businessman?
Of course, for the entrepreneur, the targeted product could be different from a cleaning line, it could even be a happy family breakfast with that tub of margarine, but certainly, the message that both types of consumers want to hear and experience is the same.
This is when knowing how customers behave before, during and after a complete shopping experience can be decisive for results.
This can inspire marketing professionals, especially digital marketers, to produce completely different and unusual content. What do you need to know to make customers take more steps towards the bottom of the sales funnel?
It is often necessary to understand what the customer needs before they know they need it, and this becomes very difficult without in-depth studies of human behavior.
At this point, the use of artificial intelligence can produce a lot of predictive material to outline new marketing strategies, but even so, the study of human behavior will still be very important.
The power of narratives
According to digital marketing expert Rafael Rez, author of the book Content Marketing – the currency of the 21st century, within the study of human psychology, the brain learns from narratives, it is as if it were a cerebral comfort to hear or read a good story.
According to him, 70% of people have an emotional connection with brands they already know. Who hasn't noticed that Coca-Cola sells happiness? Therefore, the strength of the narrative story will be in creating the right context.
Remember what we said above about the family coffee with the tub of margarine “unpretentiously” on the table at the happy moment?
Images create an emotional reaction in the limbic system much more quickly than reason, hence the need for increasingly visual stories.
For Rafael, the tip is to understand that the function of the story is to create a mental projection, and this will generate a series of neurological and psychological effects. When emotion is triggered, the consumer is more quickly convinced to buy.
And remember how we started above, saying that emotion is what determines everything? In other words, emotion has a much greater impact on reason than we think. And marketing professionals are increasingly trying to understand this.
The tip is to provide the right motivation, to make the consumer have the right perception to select, organize and interpret situations, to promote a remarkable and satisfactory experience, which will be recorded in the consumer's memory.
But we know that there is still much to learn about human behavior, the unlimited potential of the human brain and the factors that generate pleasure. Studies of consumer psychology never cease, and for marketing, this is an essential factor.
How has your brand behaved in this new world panorama, where platforms are increasingly modern and technological and customer needs are increasingly personalized and humanized?
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