Emotionomics: Leveraging Emotions for Business Success by Dan Hill

Author:Dan Hill [Hill, Dan]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Kogan Page
Published: 2010-10-03T04:00:00+00:00

‘Magic’ versus the risk of message-itis

An over-reliance on rational messaging won’t achieve persuasion

The Stage 4 decision phase is the launching stage to action. That is to say, it’s the point in the awareness-to-action funnel where emotions serve as evaluators and consumers use their gut-level instincts in making their purchase decisions. The bottom line here is profoundly emotional in nature: does the advertised offer’s value equation feel right to them?

In short, this is as far as advertising can go in terms of making the sale possible. From here on in, it’s a matter of the media buy, the company’s brand equity, the offer, its pricing, its distribution channel and, of course, larger marketplace factors like rival offers and how the economy is faring. Short of tracking sales against the timing of an ad campaign launch, it’s also as far as market research can go in gauging effectiveness.

But given the pressure for advertising to boost sales, it’s incumbent on agencies and their clients not to become so concerned about Stage 5 action that they undermine what the previous stage is really about. Always remember the need to leave enough breathing room within the advertising execution for subconscious, sensory-oriented processing to work its magic – joining up the imagery – while allowing emotions to play their role as evaluators.

What’s the opposite of creating space for emotional ‘magic’ to happen? Encumbering ads with rational messages in an attempt to close the sale. To persuade consumers, companies often load up their advertising with extra messages. But that’s a rational approach to what should be an emotional call-to-action. To include this reason and that one, this feature, attribute, benefit etcetera, and then some more, is asking consumers to work really hard – which is counterproductive to engaging their hearts.

It’s difficult to set up more than one or two emotionally oriented value propositions in the short space of an advertisement. Instead, giving consumers a single, striking reason to care works best. Resist temptation and forego a wave of reasons that people will be left struggling to comprehend.

In effect, the problem of message-itis is akin to the feature-itis discussed in Chapter 3. Both offer design and advertising can become so complicated that nobody wins: not the company, the agency, the designer, the engineer, the marketer – or the consumer.

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