Question 1

What is neuromarketing?

Accepted Answer

The term “neuromarketing” is used in a narrow sense to mean marketing and research based on direct measurements of brain activity in response to marketing stimuli and in a broad sense to mean marketing and research based on any measured unconscious or nonconscious response to marketing stimuli. In other words, the narrow sense refers to neural signals and the broader sense additionally refers to physiological reactions; both senses concern responses to marketing stimuli. Although other terms may also refer to this concept, “neuromarketing” seems to be the current consensus choice. The inclusion of “marketing” can sometimes be confusing because people often use the term specifically for market research without literally meaning marketing activities. Those who think of marketing and not research may immediately picture some kind of diabolical mind control that brainwashes people into acting according to someone else’s will. To some extent this is accurate because marketing and advertising are worthless if they don’t convince people to take actions they would not otherwise take. If people are going to buy your product anyway, why spend the money to promote it? Because marketing and advertising work to affect how people perceive and think about the world with the goal of influencing their behavior, pretty much all marketing could be considered neuromarketing. However, nobody uses the term that broadly. Instead, it is used to communicate that neural and/or physiological responses to potential marketing stimuli have been studied and that the results have been applied to new marketing efforts. In other words, the new marketing efforts are designed with specific knowledge about how different aspects of it will provoke particular unconscious or nonconscious responses in consumers and what the likely impact will be on their behavior. It is virtually impossible to conduct neurologically-based marketing without having access to research on nonconscious responses, so the term has evolved to mean both the marketing and the prerequisite research.

Question 2

How common is neuromarketing in market research?

Accepted Answer

According to a recent GRIT report, nearly half (46%) of all buyers of insights services, tools, or platforms currently use some kind of research that measures nonconscious responses or are trying them out. The GRIT survey asks about applied neuroscience (25%), biometric response (16%), eye tracking (40%), and facial coding and analysis (29%). Nearly everyone who is using or trying some kind of nonconscious measurement is using or trying eye tracking. One reason for this could be that eye tracking complements each of the other methods because it can be difficult to interpret a nonconscious response unless you know what the subject was looking at when the response was measured. Among suppliers of insights services, tools, and platforms, 21% told GRIT their offerings include applied neuroscience, biometrics, nonconscious measurement, or passive measurement services or platforms. It remains a relatively specialized kind of service, although 25% of full service research suppliers offer it. The use of neuromarketing research methods should continue to grow because of the evolution of the technology and increasing awareness of how it can be applied. Its adoption by the largest supplier segment should also propel usage upward. Some critics of neuromarketing say that if neuromarketing was as great as its proponents claim it to be, current adoption should be higher than it is. One rebuttal to this criticism is that we don’t know what the adoption rate should be. Clearly it can’t be used by 100% of insights professionals because, for example, they are not all involved in designing and fielding research projects. On the other hand, new applications of neuromarketing research are being identified and technological advances are enabling more, so there may be a long way to go before the market for neuromarketing is saturated.

Question 3

What are kinds of measurements are used in neuromarketing?

Accepted Answer

In the broadest sense of the term “neuromarketing,” there are two kinds of measurements: direct measures of neural activity and direct measures of physiological responses from which neural activity may be inferred. Both kinds of measurements help marketers understand how their offerings will stimulate consumers and customers in terms of attention, emotion, and likely behavior. On the neural side, brain activity is typically measured via techniques such as electroencephalogram (EEG), functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), or steady state topography (SST). An EEG measures electrical activity in the brain non-intrusively via electrodes. Another non-intrusive measure, fMRI, measures and maps brain activity. Because different parts of the brain are related to different kinds of feelings, the location of the activity can indicate the kind of emotional response that was elicited. While EEG and fMRI have applications in the health field, SST is primarily a research methodology. As applied in neuromarketing, an EEG is recorded as a research participant engages in an activity, such as performing a task or watching or listening to a specific stimulus. At the same time, a dim flicker is presented in the peripheral vision field which enables the researcher to measure not only the amount of brain activity, but changes in the speed of response to a stimulus. The process provides insight into long-term memory encoding, engagement with the stimulus, attractiveness of the stimulus, arousal, and visual attention, each of which are useful for marketing initiatives, such as anticipating the likely effectiveness of planned advertising. On the physiological side, several kinds of measurements are useful for understanding how consumers are likely to experience different marketing stimuli. Tracking eye movement can help to understand what catches the consumer’s attention and holds it. Heart rate variability (HRV) can indicate changes in emotion, and galvanic skin response (GSR), which measures changes in the electrical conductivity of the skin, provides insight into the strength of a reaction. Facial coding and analysis help to understand the consumer’s emotions. Some researchers also consider methods such as implicit association testing, dial testing, and response latency to be part of the neuromarketing toolkit, but they are different because they require conscious activity from the participant. Although they may not technically count as neuromarketing tools, that doesn’t mean they can’t be useful.

Question 4

How is “neuromarketing” different from “consumer neuroscience”?

Accepted Answer

Instead of “neuromarketing,” some researchers may refer to “consumer neuroscience,” but they are not exactly the same concept. Whereas neuromarketing leverages neuroscience and related learnings to improve marketing strategies and techniques, consumer neuroscience focuses more specifically on individuals and what impacts their preferences and their behaviors. As the name implies, consumer neuroscience tends to stay within the realm of neurological phenomena while the boundaries of neuromarketing are considered to include physiological phenomena from which neurological responses can be inferred. You may find this difference to be trivial, but being aware of it may help you to navigate your way through the evolving terminology.

Question 5

What is the difference between the “subconscious” and the “unconscious” or “nonconscious”?

Accepted Answer

To be blunt, the difference between the “subconscious” and “unconscious” or “nonconscious” is that the latter two are real and synonymous while the “subconscious” is fictitious. There is brain activity that has manifestations in consciousness and brain activity that does not, but there is not a different kind of consciousness lurking somewhere in your mind. Someone who has studied psychology seriously would not use the term “subconscious” unless they studied it in the 19th century. The term belongs to mystics, mediums, pulp novelists, charlatans, and the uninformed or misinformed. Use of this term may be an artifact of carelessness, but might also be a red flag if used by a reputed expert. If you encounter a neuromarketing researcher who claims to study and understand the “subconscious,” you shouldn’t dismiss them out of hand, but you may want to make sure your critical thinking cap is firmly in place.

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