Neuromarketing has a great future

Humans are not thinking machines that we feel; we are sentimental machines that we think. This statement by the Portuguese neurologist António Damásio illustrates very well our way of deciding when choosing any option.

And it is that our choices are not entirely rational, since they are made mostly by the oldest part of our brain, the so-called reptilian brain. It takes care of primary life functions and survival instincts, and was developed by our ancestors millions of years ago so it is preverbal. That is, he does not understand complex messages, so he prefers images to words.

We think that we are rational beings, that we make the best decisions economically speaking. Nothing is further from reality, due to the emotional bias to which our decisions are subject and which also extends to the field of purchases. Therefore, any slight difference in a product or service (and in the way of selling it) will make our reptilian brain, and therefore we, lean towards a certain option.

With such a saturated product and service market, it is estimated that 80% of new products fail in their first three years of life. Having a perfect marketing mix is ​​key to success. But this does not guarantee us 100% success, a matter that leads marketers who fail to understand the real reasons for the fiasco.

To try to understand consumer decision-making, researchers have used during decades of different market research techniques such as group dynamics, surveys or interviews. However, these methods have been quite limited in predicting the success of any campaign, mainly because we now know that decisions have subconscious processes that cannot be detected in this type of studies. Because to know what consumers want, you do not have to know what they say, but what they feel, and neuromarketing has begun to play a fundamental role in this task.

The role of neuromarketing in consumer behavior

A proof that we are not rational beings is the experiment of neuromarketing conducted by the California Tech Institute. In it, different people were given wine from 5 different bottles, but there were two pairs of bottles with the same wine, that is, three different types of wine. However, bottles of the same wine were labeled one with a lower price and one with a much higher price. The individuals had to assess the quality and in turn were connected to a brain scan. The conclusion of the study was that the price of wine activated more the part of the brain related to the sensation of pleasure.

This study, and others that we show you in a previous post, show the importance of knowing the brain's reaction to the stimuli we receive in order to determine whether they will really appeal to the emotions of the potential consumer. For this, neuromarketing, which has been defined by Lee et. Al (2007) as the application of neuroscience methods to analyze and understand human behavior in relation to markets and exchanges, has various tools.

Among the most used we find the electroencephalography (EEG), magnetoencephalography (MEG) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). It should be noted that fMRI is the tool that best maps the brain structures involved in emotional reactions. What this tool achieves is to detect the change in blood flow in the different areas of the brain. This is interesting because the higher the blood flow, the more activity in that particular area.

It is becoming imperative to master this technology in order to achieve campaigns that achieve really segment the market and offer the consumer what he really wants and not what he says want. Undoubtedly, this is a very powerful tool that, used ethically and morally correctly, can help marketing get closer to being a more exact science. There are already companies in Spain as Science & Marketing who are exclusively dedicated to this activity, and surely more will emerge in the future in this budding market.

Bibliographic references:

• Calvert, G. A., & Brammer, M. J. (2012). Predicting consumer behavior: using novel mind-reading approaches. Press, IEEE, 3 (3), 38-41.
• Dapkevičius, A., & Melnikas, B. (2011). Influence of price and quality to customer satisfaction: neuromarketing approach. Science – Future of Lithuania / Mokslas-Lietuvos Ateitis, 1 (3), 17-20
• Lee, N., Broderick, A. J., & Chamberlain, L. (2007). What is neuromarketing '? A discussion and agenda for future research. International Journal of Psychophysiology, 63 (2), 199-204.
• Morin, C. (2011). Neuromarketing: The new science of consumer behavior, editorial. Society, 131–135.
• Roth, V. (2013). The Potential of Neuromarketing as a Marketing Tool. Bachelor Thesis Conference, June27th, Enschede, The Netherlands, pp. 1-16.