point-sized

Welcome the word “Neuromarketing”

ithink — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 10:07:38 +0000

The world of marketing is set for one another revolution post the Social Media by the name of “Neuromarketing”. A term which sounds to sophisticated has its description as the practice of using technology to measure brain activity in consumer subjects in order to inform the development of products and communications–really to inform the brand’s 4Ps. The premise is that consumer buying decisions are made in split seconds in the subconscious, emotional part of the brain and that by understanding what we like, don’t like, want, fear, are bored by, etc. as indicated by our brain’s reactions to brand stimuli, marketers can design products and communications to better meet “unmet” market needs, connect and drive “the buy”.

Like me there were too many minds that always had the curiosity of how the media and communication bombardment has an effect on the consumers mind. As we do understand that attention level, emotional engagement and memory storage are common factors which play a vital role in the purchase decision.

Also at innumerous instances the brands believe and accepted that traditional market research is flawed because consumers don’t know, can’t articulate, or will even lie in a focus group about their purchase motivations. Neuromarketing research removes subjectivity and ambiguity by going right to measuring observable brain behavior which makes it an even more dependable research and analysis tool.

The various techniques used in the process are the following

fMRI (Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging)
SST (Steady State Topography)
EEG (Electroencephalography)
Eye Tracking
Galvanic Skin Response

The brands and cooperate into the study are

Microsoft is now mining EEG data to understand users’ interactions with computers including their feelings of “surprise, satisfaction and frustration.”

Frito-Lay has been studying female brains to learn how to better appeal to women. Findings showed the company should avoid pitches related to “guilt” and guilt-free and play up “healthy” associations.

Google made some waves when it partnered with MediaVest on a “biometrics” study to measure the effectiveness of YouTube overlays versus pre-rolls. Result: Overlays were much more effective with subjects.

Daimler employed fMRI research to inform a campaign featuring car headlights to suggest human faces which tied to the reward center of the brain.

The Weather Channel used EEG, eye-tracking and skin response techniques to measure viewer reactions to three different promotional pitches for a popular series.

Beside this there are issues and confrontation that this technology is facing. First, consumer advocates and other groups have claimed neuromarketers are exploiting people to “sell us crap we don’t need” and creating unhealthy and irresponsible addictions and cravings.

Second, neuromarketing still suffers from the issue it is trying to overcome: the artificiality of market research. Brain activity in a lab may not equate to brain behavior in the mall where the buying decision is consummated

Third, neuromarketing studies have not been common in the B2B arena, perhaps because the customer buying process tends to be lengthy and involve many people so it may be difficult to measure these decisions reliably.

Fourth, the cost of conducting these studies today is prohibitive for many companies.

It’s hard to figure out as of now what is future of this practice but surely the brands entered into it would have an edge over their competitors.

BABY IT’S HOT & I NEED SOME FANS…

ithink — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 11:07:32 +0000

Social media is the hot topic and the topical trend in the marketing world. As the marketers wants and needs for the un- diverted, un- interrupted and un- bared attention grew, so it happened that this new breed of mass communication evolved.

But did it just come up out of the blue? Not really, we in India were into community group discussion since a very long time. The chai stall (tea shack), the shade under the old big banyan tree or the Cross section nearby (nukkad) all were the real world social spaces. Discussion whether on local subjects or on international politics, absolutely nothing has been left to be amongst the hot topics here.

It’s just that the entire spectrum has been given a makeover and jazzed up. But the point to note here is that the rules of the game remain same. A person who has flair to connect gets the chance to be the part of discussion and make his way into that group, the same also applies to the online social networking as well. Also to note is that it was open to all sect of people irrespective of their belonging or status in the society.

So it clearly states that Indians were always social and practiced the social behavior/habits even before the west could understand the meaning of word social. But, today in the present times we in India seem to forget the core practices of how to be social when it comes to activate the same for a brand.

We sell social media to brands as stocks or commodities with a metric that’s even worse than buying groceries. Human trafficking a crime in real world has been reinvented or rather reengineered as CPF which is elaborated as Cost Per Fan.

But no one understands that unlike the practice as in human trafficking a person is bound to act as they wish to. A user at any point of time can move away from a fan page or block a brand which was forced onto him/her for showing any kind of disrespect to the their existence on the social space.

The strange thing about most of the brands on the social space is they are just not connecting with their use base. I believe as a brands comes onto the social media space, it no more remains as a non living identity but becomes a inhabitant with life in the virtual world who does and lives as any human lives and wants to live with its peer group which is the TG of the brand. Now here we have a proposal for a brand who says I would have a seed count to be 40per/month. I would like to ask you – Do you have a cap on how much would you talk to your friend?

But again we have a issue here. How many brands have you been through who have talked to you in social media space rather just having their presence as a mere bulletin board sourcing information about the latest PR, product or service release?

Can you change it? Can I change it? Can brands change it? Can agencies change it?

But surely there has to be someone.

Social on the move

ithink — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 05:17:17 +0000

It’s time now that have mobile manufacturers and service providers are using Social Buzz words to position themselves. There are reasons for the shift to the approach and have a distinction among the competitors. One of the reason is being highlighted by the study and numbers mentioned below.

ONE MINUTE !!!

ithink — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 10:55:34 +0000

Mom’s call from the window, Dad’s call to switch the television, Teacher’s call to submit the test papers, her call to disconnect the phone, boss’s call to submit the reports and what not. All of these situations above had one thing in common that didn’t change over the era.
Wonder what exactly was it?
It was the “EXCUSE” which happened to be “ONE MINUTE” then and is still, now. But have you ever given a minute thought at least to know what all things do actually happen in a minute? NO ! Well the image below then would be an eye opener and of great interest to you.

Thinking On Thinking

ithink — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 21:39:01 +0000

Ideas, strategies, decisions, solutions, all of them have a common activity to them, to think. Some do it in groups; some do it alone, some in conference rooms and some in loos. The process of thinking is quite an unusual activity. At times you just get into it without you yourself knowing about it and end up with something that worthwhile whereas at times are left empty handed and disturbed. It can be at times a conscious activity and times an unconscious activity.
Recently went through an interesting account that informed me about the various types and categories of thinking process. Sounds strange, isn’t it? But yes that’s true.
The various thinking types are as follows
1. Natural Thinking
This is fluid and undirected, it wanders and meanders, is subject to repetition and generalizations.Our unconscious thinking processes fall into this category.

2. Logical Thinking
This selects a route and follows it to its conclusion. With this approach the solution is largely predetermined, so if you head off in the wrong direction you can end up painting yourself into a corner. It’s like reaching from point A to point B and the best possible method is being thought of in the exercise.

3. Pattern Thinking
This confines thoughts to operate within given rules. Therefore solutions are limited by the possibilities available within the pattern.

4. Lateral Thinking
This is purposeful in intent without specific aim. Freewheeling to be precisely, so as it can reveal solutions which might have been overlooked in other approaches.

So the next time when you are pulled into the process consciously or unconsciously at least at the end of it you would know what kind of thinking were you into and if you haven’t reached a solution there are some other thinking approaches that you can try your mind on.

thinking

To help you further in the process of thinking check http://tinyurl.com/y8str3a which can help you think like Einstein in 12 different ways.

Social media and public toilets

ithink — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 10:10:21 +0000

Social media a fad or revolution is something that everyone is still finding an answer. But whatever it is it surely has the vortex that’s pulling all the brands to it.

Brands are getting into it but in most of the instances they end up being lost in the maze made by human behaviour in a virtual world of social media. It’s unlike TV for the audience to hop between channels on a commercial break. This nature not only indicates brands to move and activate cautiously in the space but also makes various platforms to think twice and be sure of decisions taken to allow advertising and branding with utmost care on their social media space. Presently for brands social media happens to be present on Facebook as Twitter which happens to be just mere tools in the social media mechanics.

There are no short or long terms strategies or guide maps that brands actually work by. Social media is taken by them as a touch point just as a hoarding or an ad space in a public loo which attracts the audience filtered at a very basic male/female level. They have forgotten on what values the social media space came into being, to remind them all – It wasn’t a give and take as barter or I talk, you hear or vice versa approach but on the contrarily on the values of sharing and meaningful dialogue.

WHY POINT SIZED ?

ithink — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 21:42:27 +0000

“I have a point to make”, often heard and said about anything and everything from terrestrial to extraterrestrial, exploiting the freedom of speech and expression-given to the few fortunate. But it’s just not about a point to be made, but about it to be sized so as to knows if it is to be whispered or shouted aloud.

Lorem Ipsum Text

ithink — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 21:32:32 +0000

A common piece of text used as mock-content when testing a given page layout or font.
The following text is often used:
“Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetaur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.”
This continues at length and variously. The text is not really Greek, but badly garbled Latin. It started life as extracted phrases from sections 1.10.32 and 1.10.33 of Cicero’s “De Finibus Bonorum et Malorum” (“The Extremes of Good and Evil”), which read:
Sed ut perspiciatis unde omnis iste natus error sit voluptatem accusantium doloremque laudantium, totam rem aperiam, eaque ipsa quae ab illo inventore veritatis et quasi architecto beatae vitae dicta sunt explicabo. Nemo enim ipsam voluptatem quia voluptas sit aspernatur aut odit aut fugit, sed quia consequuntur magni dolores eos qui ratione voluptatem sequi nesciunt. Neque porro quisquam est, qui dolorem ipsum quia dolor sit amet, consectetur, adipisci velit, sed quia non numquam eius modi tempora incidunt ut labore et dolore magnam aliquam quaerat voluptatem. Ut enim ad minima veniam, quis nostrum exercitationem ullam corporis suscipit laboriosam, nisi ut aliquid ex ea commodi consequatur? Quis autem vel eum iure reprehenderit qui in ea voluptate velit esse quam nihil molestiae consequatur, vel illum qui dolorem eum fugiat quo voluptas nulla pariatur?
At vero eos et accusamus et iusto odio dignissimos ducimus qui blanditiis praesentium voluptatum deleniti atque corrupti quos dolores et quas molestias excepturi sint occaecati cupiditate non provident, similique sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollitia animi, id est laborum et dolorum fuga. Et harum quidem rerum facilis est et expedita distinctio. Nam libero tempore, cum soluta nobis est eligendi optio cumque nihil impedit quo minus id quod maxime placeat facere possimus, omnis voluptas assumenda est, omnis dolor repellendus. Temporibus autem quibusdam et aut officiis debitis aut rerum necessitatibus saepe eveniet ut et voluptates repudiandae sint et molestiae non recusandae. Itaque earum rerum hic tenetur a sapiente delectus, ut aut reiciendis voluptatibus maiores alias consequatur aut perferendis doloribus asperiores repellat.
Translation:
But I must explain to you how all this mistaken idea of denouncing pleasure and praising pain was born and I will give you a complete account of the system, and expound the actual teachings of the great explorer of the truth, the master-builder of human happiness. No one rejects, dislikes, or avoids pleasure itself, because it is pleasure, but because those who do not know how to pursue pleasure rationally encounter consequences that are extremely painful. Nor again is there anyone who loves or pursues or desires to obtain pain of itself, because it is pain, but because occasionally circumstances occur in which toil and pain can procure him some great pleasure. To take a trivial example, which of us ever undertakes laborious physical exercise, except to obtain some advantage from it? But who has any right to find fault with a man who chooses to enjoy a pleasure that has no annoying consequences, or one who avoids a pain that produces no resultant pleasure?
On the other hand, we denounce with righteous indignation and dislike men who are so beguiled and demoralized by the charms of pleasure of the moment, so blinded by desire, that they cannot foresee the pain and trouble that are bound to ensue; and equal blame belongs to those who fail in their duty through weakness of will, which is the same as saying through shrinking from toil and pain. These cases are perfectly simple and easy to distinguish. In a free hour, when our power of choice is untrammelled and when nothing prevents our being able to do what we like best, every pleasure is to be welcomed and every pain avoided. But in certain circumstances and owing to the claims of duty or the obligations of business it will frequently occur that pleasures have to be repudiated and annoyances accepted. The wise man therefore always holds in these matters to this principle of selection: he rejects pleasures to secure other greater pleasures, or else he endures pains to avoid worse pains.
– Translation by H. Rackham, from his 1914 edition of De Finibus.
However, since textual fidelity was unimportant to the goal of having random text to fill a page, it has degraded over the centuries, into “Lorem ipsum…”.
The point of using this text, or some other text of incidental intelligibility, is that it has a more-or-less normal (for English and Latin, at least) distribution of ascenders, descenders, and word-lengths, as opposed to just using “abc 123 abc 123″, “Content here content here”, or the like.
The text is often used when previewing the layout of a document, as the use of more understandable text would distract the user from the layout being examined.