The Eyelet.

A few Mlicki associates had the opportunity to attend a seminar held by Chrisophe Morin, founder of SalesBrain, a San Francisco “Neuromarketing Coaching Company”. Mr. Morin illustrates how we marketing folk can harness the neuroscience findings of the past decade to fashion more effective marketing communications. At times his premises may seem a little manipulative – maybe even akin to “big brother” type tactics. But, when one peels back the essence of Mr. Morin’s message, it’s really a new perspective on what marketers and consumer behaviorists have been attempting for many years – how we can best use the knowledge we now have regarding how the brain makes decisions to be more effective and efficient in our persuasion efforts? In short, many of the creatives with whom I worked in my career were right all along. It’s not as much about the rational sales pitch. Consumers don’t follow the strict process of evaluating information, formation of attitude, evaluation, consideration, purchase intention and purchase. Recent research supports that our purchasing behavior, as is most of our behavior, is instinctual and triggered much more on some basic stimuli. In short, we are slaves to our “reptilian brain”.

The brain can be simply segmented into 3 parts; the “New Brain,” which is the high processing thinking center that separates humans from most other inhabitants of this planet, the “Middle Brain” where gut feelings and emotions are formed, and the “Reptilian Brain” which takes input from the other two brains and makes the final decision. The reptilian brain also controls basic functions such as breathing and heart rate. It earns its nickname from the fact that this portion of the human brain is very similar to the totality of the reptilian brain. Once you come to terms that this is the portion of the brain we need to persuade, there are 6 basic stimuli by which can be tapped as outlined by Mr. Morin:

- Self-Centered: The reptilian brain is only concerned with its own well-being – it has no empathy. It’s the part of the brain that’s relieved that it wasn’t itself when it sees something bad happen to somebody else. Show your audience what they how they will benefit personally from your product or service.
- Contrast: Simple contrasting elements are required by the reptilian brain to make quick and safe decisions (black-white, good-bad, fast-slow). Shades for grey are lost. Don’t be a leading provider of blah-blah-blah. Be the best or the only at something.
- Tangible: It can process numbers to a point but the reptilian brain craves the familiar and hard facts. Fuzzy-wuzzy concepts like “integrated approach” and “flexible solutions” are just noise. Keep it simple and tangible.
- Beginning to End: This helps to explain primacy and recency effects. We only remember the beginning and end of a block of information so make sure you make your point upfront and repeat it at the end – and don’t bury any important info in the middle.
- Visual: The reptilian brain reacts much more quickly than the other brains and it is most directly influenced by visuals. Whether in PowerPoints or trade ads, illustrate your main point with visuals.
- Emotion: The reptilian brain reacts to emotions. Pepper your key points with “emotional cocktails” and they will be much more likely to be remembered.

So how can we leverage these stimuli to influence and persuade? Mr. Morin also outlines 4 steps that to some degree should sound familiar to sales and marketing professionals – PAIN, CLAIM, GAIN, Deliver to the Reptilian BRAIN:

- Diagnose the PAIN: The reptilian brain is only concerned with itself and therefore wants to avoid frustration and pain. It doesn’t want your product or service. What can it do to alleviate its pain?
- Differentiate your CLAIMS: You must provide contrast for the reptilian brain to respond. You can’t sound anything like your competitors or you’ll be disregarded.
- Demonstrate the GAIN: What’s the tangible benefit of what you offer? There needs to be hard evidence that the benefits outweigh the cost and they must be real and easily understandable.
- Deliver to the Reptilian BRAIN: grab your audience’s attention early, make your main points upfront and illustrate them visually, keep it short and reiterate your main points at the end.

As marketers, I believe we can often get caught up in the minutia of our products and services and the complexity of our messaging. We get too close and lose perspective of how our audience receives and processes information. To regain a sense of simplicity and focus, I strongly urge you to check out Mr. Morin’s book “Neuromarketing – Understanding the Buy Buttons in Your Customer’s Brain” (http://www.salesbrain.net/users/folder.asp?FolderID=5622) that he co-wrote with Patrick Renvoise and please keep an eye out for part 2 of my post on this subject.