Use neuroscience to supercharge your brand

People buy with emotion and justify with logic

But your emotion is wrong

So people aren’t buying anything at all

 

Use neuroscience to supercharge your brand

People’s buying behaviours are heavily influenced by their emotions.

So knowing how they work is key.

Emotions are fundamentally formed through association.

We can use this to power up your brand.

 

Strap in, we’re about to get technical

The part of the brain that is responsible for our emotions is the Amygdala.

It is commonly known for generating the Fight, Flight or Freeze response that we all know so well.

 

But the Amygdala is also responsible for our emotional memories.

Emotion memories are different from normal memories.

Who would have thought it?!

Most people think of memory as being a single entity.

But there are two types of memories.

 

1) Cortex-based memories

These are the classic memories you know.

• Images, places, numbers, names

 

2) Amygdala-based memories

These are totally different. These are emotions.

So they can be difficult to understand.

 

An amygdala-based memory is abstract.

Drinking orange juice and suddenly feeling joy would be an amygdala-based memory

Listening to a song and feeling happy or sad is an amygdala-based memory

 

Sometimes they can be connected to a traditional cortex-based memory or sometimes they are just on their own.

Leaving us trying to work out why this orange juice makes us so joyful.

The amygdala learns through association.

It is constantly putting things together.

Some stick.

Some don’t.

 

Still with me?

Good.

Leveraging this can make your brand even stronger.

 

Semiotics

The design of signs and symbols and the meaning we associate with signs is called Semiotics.

 

If you see a red stoplight, you wouldn’t cross the road.

We have given this stop sign meaning.

The amygdala has learnt through association that a red stop sign means fast traffic and danger.

 

This leaves you with two options

1) Play to the associations we have made

2) Break the associations we have made

1) Playing to the associations

A fashion brand’s visual identity would be very minimal, monochromatic and probably use a serif font.

People will instantly understand it because of the associations that have been made by the person viewing the new brand.

 

These associations have been built over time by experience and culture.

The downside is brands that play to the associations can become cliché because it’s so expected.

That’s how we end up with memes about web3 brands.

2) Break the association

Brands that break the associations we have made can suddenly become market leaders because they are so fresh.

But it’s a risk.

Break the association too much and you will be left educating people about what your new brand is.

 

This requires people and cultures to relearn what they know.

This can break a brand faster than Usain Bolt after that glass of joyful OJ.

 

This trick is to get a balance.

Use your market research to inform your decision.

Are you in a saturated market where breaking the associations could make you stand out?

Or maybe your market is new. Therefore going with the crowd will give you safety in numbers.

 

The associations our amygdalas have made have had a profound effect on the way brands talk, look and feel.

Every message and vision a brand sells enforces or breaks the associations we have made.

Choose wisely

 

In Summary

• The Amygdala is responsible for emotion

• Emotion is made through associations

• Choose if you want to make or break them