The Science of Neuromarketing

While the study of neuroscience can be traced back to ancient Greece, the study of neuromarketing is rather new and has only gained traction in the past 10 years or so. Since it’s so new, we decided to hit the pavement and learn more about the topic and how you can use it to boost your marketing strategy. Here’s what we found.

What Is Neuromarketing?

As a concept, neuromarketing is a marketing research field that studies how the brain responds to specific marketing stimuli. According to an article in Forbes on the topic, there are several lines of research, including decision neuroscience, which looks at “what our brains do as we make choices.” This specific line of inquiry is important for understanding how different marketing techniques affect the brain and how that affects the decision your potential customer makes.

More specifically, neuromarketing looks at why consumers might choose one product over another and then further extrapolates how to utilize marketing techniques to get a specific result.

In order to get high-quality data, companies would have to make a huge financial investment since even a small sample group can cost over $10,000, according to Marketing-Schools.org. But that doesn’t mean you can’t utilize some of the most important concepts gleaned from neuromarketing research.

How to Utilize Neuromarketing Concepts

In a recent The Business of Story podcast, learning expert Margie Meacham shared many of her insights into how neuroscience has influenced her sales training techniques. In the interview, she discusses how the power of story has a physical connection with the brain. By utilizing this knowledge, marketers can harness the power of story to take a leadership position with their potential customers and successfully lead them through the buyer’s journey.

Meacham discusses how selling and teaching are two sides of one coin and that teaching is potentially the best way to sell. The easiest vehicle for teaching your potential customer? Story.

The Power of Story

One of the most powerful tools we have as inbound marketers is the power of story. You see it all the time in traditional advertising, such as on billboards and in television commercials. But we don’t really talk about it as much in digital marketing because it’s somewhat implied in the overall concept of advertising. But with inbound marketing specifically, learning how to harness the power of story as a tool for teaching and selling is incredibly important for your overall marketing strategy.

So what’s in a story? If you’re telling a child a bedtime story, there are a few things you generally understand. There’s the introduction to the concept. This might be the “Once upon a time,” where you set the stage for what’s coming. You introduce the characters, setting, and overall tone.

Then there’s the introduction of the problem. This could be a dragon or an evil warlock or something else of the sort.

And then there’s the resolution of the problem, where a solution is worked through and hopefully everyone ends up happily ever after.

Throughout the story, the child learns lessons about good vs. evil, standing up for what’s right, or how the power of love will overcome any obstacle. But in general, the point of the story is the moral or the ending.

This same concept and method of teaching can be used in your marketing technique, according to Meacham. By utilizing this same technique, you can take a leadership position with your potential customer and lead them through the buyer’s journey by utilizing the power of story to lead the way. Using emotion and by providing a solution to a problem that your potential customer has been struggling with, you have the opportunity to lead them to the next step: the action. And that’s where you get to close the deal.

 

 

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—Ashley Bailey is an Inbound Marketing Copywriter at Stream Companies, a full-service Philadelphia-area advertising agency.