Facebook Inc. this spring commissioned a San Francisco company called SalesBrain to gauge how consumers responded to ads viewed on a smartphone versus a TV screen. Neural researchers used various sensors to measure perspiration, heart rate, eye movement, and brain activity of the 70 participants. Their conclusion: People get more out of information on a mobile phone than a TV, and watching television forces the brain to work harder to combat distractions.
“Our physical closeness to the mobile screen has shifted our perception of the size of the device,” says Helen Crossley, the head of audience insights for Facebook IQ, the company’s internal market research unit. “It is drawing us in to be more attentive and feel more positive about the content.”
A host of new companies founded or staffed by brain researchers have some advice for advertisers: Read your customers’ minds. In a world of ever-shrinking attention spans, wher consumers flit through social media sites and skip right past online ads, advertisers are turning to neuroscience to better understand how to steer buyers toward their products.
“People are not governed by the rational side of their brains, so the majority of purchase decisions are made irrationally,” says Itiel Dror, a Harvard-trained neuroscientist engaged by London consultants BrandOpus to test the redesign of a logo for Canada’s McCain Foods Ltd.
Dror asked 1,700 shoppers in seven countries to match phrases such as “family,” “warmth,” “mass-produced,” and “factory” with both McCain’s old logo -- the company name inside a plain black box -- and a new one depicting a sun setting over farmland. McCain is rolling out the new version in 160 countries.
Facial Coding
These companies use methods such as eye tracking, brain scanners, and facial coding -- cameras that analyze people’s expressions and assess their mood second by second -- to determine reactions to ads. The Neuromarketing Science & Business Association, started in 2012, has more than 1,000 members in 91 countries.
The field helps advertisers create simple messages that “deliberately mix conscious recall with unconscious,” says Dan Machen, director of innovation at HeyHuman, a neuroscience-focused ad agency in London. “We need to think of the recipient’s brain as an already over-clocked and overloaded system.”
The industry’s traditional powers are taking notice. Millward Brown, a research arm of ad giant WPP Plc, says it started exploring neuroscience four years ago and that it now uses facial coding to test every TV spot it works on. In April, London ad agency Dentsu Aegis purchased Forbes Consulting Group, a neuroscience company in Massachusetts.
Skin Conductivity
And ratings giant Nielsen in May bought Innerscope Research, a neuroscience firm in Boston that’s helped companies such as Campbell Soup Co. and Yahoo! Inc. study customers via biometric tests that monitor heart rates and skin conductivity.
“There’s no question we’re seeing an uptick not only in business, but also in the diversity of clients and the number of those making bigger investments,” says Carl Marci, a neuropsychiatrist with an M.D. from Harvard who co-founded Innerscope a decade ago.
For one Innerscope project last year at Time Warner Inc.’s media lab, the company hooked participants up to facial trackers and eye scanners as they watched Conan, Dallas, Men at Work, and other TV shows. Innerscope used the devices to measure reactions to placement within the shows of brands such as Samsung, M&Ms, and Pop-Tarts. Scientists could then decipher when product placement was too obvious -- characterized by participant frowns or snickers -- or so subtle that it wasn’t even noticed.
Removing Bias
“Biometrics allows us to eliminate any bias in response, and we get a real sense of engagement,” says Howard Shimmel, chief research officer at Time Warner’s Turner Broadcasting.
Neuro-Insight, a neuromarketing firm in London, last year helped Twitter Inc. assess reactions to content by fitting people with headsets to measure brain activity while online. The researchers found that when the subjects browsed their Twitter timelines, their brains were almost as active as when they were opening physical mail—and far more engaged than when they were, say, reading websites or watching video.
Another insight of potential value to advertisers: When scrolling quickly through a timeline, users didn’t register brand icons unless they were simple and boldly colored, according to Heather Andrew, chief executive officer of Neuro-Insight.
“Those things that people don’t know how to put into words,” she says, “we can measure.”
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