Building brands & driving sales by activating mirror neurons

Mirror neurons - the neurons that trigger the same responses in our brain whether we do something ourselves or whether we observe someone else doing the same task - form the foundation of influencing decisions about what products and brands we purchase. Indeed, Future actions (i.e. purchase decisions) can be predicted from registered brain activity patterns .

Magazine advertising is fairly effective at triggering mirror neurons by visualizing other people enjoying, for example, Häagen-Dazs ice-cream.

Observing someone else enjoying delicious Häagen-Daz ice-cream will trigger the same reaction in our brain as if you had one in your own hand. This neurological response generates a desire for ice-cream that can only be satisfied by buying a real one.

Recent research shows that well executed magazine ads can be impactful enough to create a false memory of having tried a product that doesn’t even exist.

Researchers Rajagopal and Montgomery showed subjects either high imagery or low imagery versions of magazine ads for a fictitious popcorn product, Orville Redenbacher Gourmet Fresh. Other subjects were allowed to consume “samples” of the invented product which were actually a different Redenbacher popcorn.

A week later, all of the participants were surveyed to determine their attitudes toward the product and how confident they were about their opinions. Members of the group that viewed the more vivid ad were as likely to report that they had tried the product as the group that actually consumed the samples. The group that saw the low imagery ads were less likely to report they had tried the product, and had weaker, less favorable opinions about it.

Changing the brand to an unknown name, the fictitious “Pop Joy Gourmet Fresh,” reduced the false memory effect. I presume that the more ubiquitous the product and brand, the more likely these false recollections are to occur.

This study shows the power of magazine ads that incorporate vivid imagery – clearly, paper has once again shown itself to be an effective medium. These magazine ads can apparently create the impression of experiencing the product in consumer brains, and can increase positive feelings about the product.

Clearly, it’s worth taking the time to create superb images – mouth-watering, well styled closeups for food products, for example. For other products, images that emphasize the products sensual aspects – textures, scents, etc. – would likely work best, even though the sensory experience will be in the mind of the viewer.

(Sources: tdgNeuroBrand & R. Dooley)