Today we’re talking emotions, rationality, and the brain. And you’re going to learn why it’s so important to cater to your customer’s emotions with your marketing. If you’re unsure of what emotional marketing looks like, don’t worry. If you’re alive, and watching this, you’ve seen plenty of emotional ads. These are the ads that evoke our core emotions of happiness, sadness, surprise, or disgust.
Emotional Ad Example
Before we can discuss the insane power of emotional marketing, I need to make sure you know the difference between an emotional ad and rational ad. So here’s an emotional example of happiness at work…
I love that product tie-in with the personal injury caused by Chuck, and then the app, and the doctor. Very well done.
Rational Ad Example
The contrast to emotional marketing is rational marketing. Samsung has offered to show us what a lesser-rational ad looks like (just the first 30 seconds is relevant…they quickly changed their rational ways)
Did you notice the difference between the United Healthcare ads and this Samsung ad? You feel different after seeing each of these ads. That Samsung ad talks about the yawn inducing features of the phone… it’s screen, it’s super fast speed, it’s mapping…our best phone ever. Features are great, and a small amount of consumers love rational product specs. But the majority of consumers purchase on how a product makes them feel, not on its specs.
Emotional Advertising, You Can’t Afford to be Rational
Ads that make you laugh, smile, feel awkward, or just make you say awwww… these are the ads that are marketing to your emotions. Emotional marketing is the pinnacle of advertising and it’s far more effective than ads that take a rational approach to their messaging. We’re going to remember the two old guys bantering about Chuck Norris, and then Chuck kicking the salt shaker at the old guy. We may not remember that the commercial is for United Healthcare, but we are far more likely to share that commercial with friends and recall the brand when we see it again. That Samsung ad on the other hand…is just plain forgettable. Fortunately rational marketing is most common in low-budget and local advertising, you know, the ones for lawyers, doctors, and car insurance. Still, even the big brands errantly toe to the rational on occasion when the budgets are tight.
As consumers we like to think we make rational, well educated purchasing decisions. The reality is, the vast majority of us are far, very far, from rational. Our irrational behavior is why we add another item to our online shopping cart just to get free shipping.
It’s why we buy name brand medicine when the generic is exactly the same. And it’s why we prefer certain brands over others.
Eliciting an emotional response has proven to increase intent to buy a product, increase brand “likeability”, increase consumer loyalty, and increase brand sales. With that kind of results you can’t afford to sit there and tout your benefits and features in a rational manner… you must connect with your customer on an emotional level with all your ad creative.
Emotions Run Deep
In order to create emotional advertising for your brand, you must understand the emotions you’re trying to evoke. There are four core emotions we experience in life: happiness, sadness, surprise, and disgust. We can break these core emotions down into more specific ones, for example humor is a sub-emotion of happiness and anger a sub-emotion of disgust. For now, we’re going to table the sub-emotions and take a deeper dive into two ads with very strong opposing emotions of happiness and disgust. The first is an adorably cute ad for Google’s Android that just makes me happy, and definitely has me saying awwww.
Android Friends Furever clip
The feeling you experience while watching that ad is actually a measureable neurochemical response in your brain. Specifically the neurochemicals Serotonin and Oxytocin. A quick brain lesson if you didn’t take Psych 101 in college (that’s the class I met my wife, she’s now a psychologist). Serotonin controls your greater mood and in the case of a baby goat climbing on a horse, that mood boost is quite positive. Oxytocin is the neurochemical behind empathy, and combined with the images of this ad it promotes connection and care.These two chemicals are delivered in high doses throughout this ad.
Chemicals are great…but what does that mean for the brand?
By connecting these blissful images with the Android brand, we subconsciously associate a positive experience to the brand regardless of what our rational brain is telling us. Perhaps you’ve had an Android Phone before, maybe you’ve even had a bad experience with Android. After seeing this commercial, that experience may now be perceived as less negative than it was before. If you’ve never used Android before, your feeling of the brand is now a positive one. This may not cause you to switch from your iPhone, however, if Apple starts letting you down, you’re going to be more open to switching in the future. And, if you do eventually switch you’re starting with an already happy emotion tied to the Android brand. This means you are more willing to maintain that positive association through actual negative experiences, and that’s insanely valuable marketing.
Happiness, like we experiences in this Android commercial, is what I see most in advertising today. It’s a safe emotion to strive for. It typically doesn’t offend people and I think it’s the easiest emotion to design advertising copy and imagery around.
As for a more complex and risky emotion to associate with your brand, let’s take a look at an example of disgust.
Save the Children Most Shocking Second a Day –
Wow. Whether or not you agree with the messaging of this ad isn’t the point. The point is, we are getting huge doses of neurochemicals from this ad. This time it’s from the stress chemical called Cortisol as well as a return of Oxytocin. Cortisol is referred to as the stress chemical and its use in advertising causes us to become highly engaged in the story, allocating all of our brain’s attention to the images on the screen. Additionally, we’re hit with an increase Oxytocin that causes us to empathize with the little girl as her world is torn apart.
As this ad concludes I feel compelled to care, it’s all that anger and disgust kicking it. I can imagine what my life would be like in a war torn society. I’m able to relate to the chaos and fear the girl is experiencing. Before seeing this ad I had some compassion for Syrian refugees … After seeing this ad I care far more, because now the experience is far more real to me. I’m able to connect on a deeply emotional level and that is very powerful advertising.
Disgust doesn’t suit most brands. Using a negative emotion to elicit a positive result (purchase) is very difficult. But I wanted to show you an example because when done properly disgust can be extremely effective.
In Recap
We buy what we feel, not what we think. The next time you’re brainstorming for an ad campaign, whether it’s video, images, copy, or an email, be sure to explore how your product makes people feel. Take those feelings and design a campaign that leverages the natural responses of the brain and effectively evokes those feelings in your customers. Focusing on your features, specs, and pricing can get you some sales in the short-term, but evoking a true emotional response in your audience leads to brand loyalty far beyond a single campaign.
If you liked this post, tap to sign up for the Newsletter that Drives Results. If videos are your thing, tap to subscribe to the Mystemic YouTube channel.