Cristina de Balanzo & Prof. Rafal Ohme: Enrich Consumers Feedback
Thanks to Neuromarketing Science & Business Association, this is the 5th released video material of the Neuromarketing World Forum 2012 (the first one included the presentation of Professor Richard Silberstein on Messages to the long-term memory of the audience, the second one was Dr. Stephen Sands on Recording Brain Waves at the Supermarket, the third was Christophe Morin‘s presentation on Neuromarketing Ethics and the fourth one was Prof. Dr. Ale Smidts‘s presentation on The Future of Neuromarketing).
Cristina de Balanzo also presented the challenges neuromarketers face to date. She discussed the results presented in different books from the field, on whether surveys are right to use in marketing research or not (due to the errors). An example of how traditional marketing research methods can prove to be inefficient is one of the most successful commercials for Heineken (see the image above) that was first rejected by focus group results, because the more we think and consider, the further we depart from our emotions. On developing a way to enrich the quality of consumers’ feedback in early stages of creativity (before any investment is made) by integrating both focus groups (conscious responses) and neuroscience (unconscious responses), they developed BioQual tool, using biometrics (both neuroimaging and psycho-physiological signals). Their research is based on the frontal asymmetry paradigm and on the approach / avoidance motivational systems that underlie learning and affect:
- Behavioral Approach System (BAS) – Gray, 1994 – guiding behavior in response to incentives; an approach tendency towards the desired stimulus;
- Behavioral Inhibition System (BIS) – Carver & White, 1994- guiding behavior in response to threats; a withdrawal tendency from undesired stimulus (Davidson et al.).
Professor Rafal Ohme stated that there is a mismatch between what science knows and what business does. So having marketeers and scientists working together, we can understand better how people make decisions. He presented very interesting research case studies and video materials that were tested using electroencephalography (relevance – long term emotional and cognitive engagement with a message or a brand; it predicts whether an ad or idea is self-relevant to consumers and whether they identify with depicted people, situations, opinions or values), eye tracking devices (attention – identifies what visual elements draw attention and predicts their capacity to cause positive, negative or neutral emotional reactions) and galvanic skin response (activation – short term arousal, predicting whether consumers become energized by a message and eventually driven to action toward a brand or product), analyzing left / right hemisphere dominance and frontal asymmetry.
Prof. Rafal Ohme presented the results from a research he conducted in 2006 on the funny hippo dance on “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” song. You can watch in the video below the brain reactions on this material (red means that the left hemisphere activity was statistically more significant than the right one; yellow means a dominance not statistically significant; blue means right hemisphere activity was stronger – but there is no blue on for this video).
Rafal Ohme emphasized that GSR, another instrument that he uses, is a purchase behavior correlate (as literature suggests) and it measures arousal, not valence. You can watch below some examples of using it.
In order to emphasize the differences between what people say and what they think, Prof. Ohme also talked about how they tested a Heineken campaign in the early stages of creativity using BioQual Tool. The proposal included a storyline of 4 men sitting at a table, using their cell phones, and at a certain time, the waiter brings them the bier (Heineken). The qualitative prediction (focus groups and interviews) revealed negative emotions, as people considered that using the cellphone while sitting at a table with friends is not how they should behave, as this is not polite. The contradictions come with the bio prediction that revealed that people do approve the attitude of the characters in the advertisement (approach tendency). Eye tracking results showed that the participants focused their visual attention on men faces, so facial expressions would be crucial. So the final ad had their faces shot from the profile, and all the visual attention went to the bottle of bier (but the approach tendency was smaller here). So if they would have used biometric research instead of focus groups, they would have had another more engaging ad. Another biometrics experiment that examined the package design of Heineken bier found that people are not disappointed with the brand, and the qualitative results showed that the consumers actually expect more from Heineken design. Also, on deciding how to make the bottle more visible and choosing between a close-up with a bottle and a shot with the image of the waiter touching the bottle on the table having the Heineken label, eye tracking results showed that the bottle dressed with the label is more visible than the larger one (which is generic, as it has no label).
His presentation also included the evaluation of a campaign of “Chinese Extraordinary People” and the results were very interesting. They tested it in 9 countries: China, Japan, Germany, France, Holland, Italy, Slovakia, Poland and USA. They recommended that in Japan and China the promotional focus should be on celebrities, while in other countries on ordinary people who build China, and also that the final scene should be more spectacular.
It has been well established that patterns of brain activity are closely correlated with behavior and cognition (Alwitt 1985). Nunez and Srinivasan (2006) posit that electroencephalography (EEG) thus offers a “window into the mind,” because it registers variations in brainwaves produced by the cortex. The first regular EEG studies started to appear during the 1980s. In a study of advertising content using EEG, Alwitt concluded that “the results of this analysis are an encouraging first look at the relationship between ongoing events and EEG-recorded brain reactions. The topic certainly warrants future research” (Alwitt 1985, p. 216). Thus EEG research in advertising has provided empirical evidence that certain aspects of consumer cognition and emotional response to advertising messages (even below conscious awareness) can be monitored successfully in real time and analyzed. However, Olson and Ray (1985) argue that EEG responses to advertising only provide useful information if they test specific hypotheses about the processes used by viewers. Thus EEG has not been considered as a general evaluative measure of advertising effectiveness.