Neuroscience & Contextual Creative

The debate over personalisation rages on - it’s spookie, it’s the holy grail, it’s ineffective

We have seen it work really well and we have seen it bomb. Like most things, to work well it needs to be done well.

But why? What’s the thinking behind it??

On one level why would anyone treat someone as a stranger, if they know something about them? On the other, smart use of data can tap into how the brain works. But to be effective we need to understand how the brain works. ( At a high level rather than an academic one)

Let’s start with this. Familiar?

What colour do you see? (I am pure Gold - but your mileage may vary)

A new one - really strange how the brain works

And this one? How many brown balls are there?

Well, according to the source Tweet, they are all brown. Really

The same optical effect is why oranges are sold on mesh bags?- they look more Orange.

So back to some older example. What do you see here?

A rabbit? Or a duck.

Its relatively easy to make yourself see the other animal but you have to concentrate.

Here do you see a young women? Or an old lady?

Harder to see the other option. ( Spoiler; The young girls ear becomes old lady's eye)?Once your brain has decided, it really doesn’t want to rethink.

I think we now all know these lines are the same length - but line B still looks longer.

Arrows make our brain make assumptions. Here too. Click here to watch this gif and watch the character move to follow the arrows

But again the brain is being tricked. First the character doesn’t actually move. Ever.

Secondly the arrows don’t have any influence - cover them with your fingers and you see that it is the blinking of the background, and the pulsing of the border, that change timing slightly to imply direction.

This next one isn’t an illusion. It’s a Lafayette Dynamometer; a tool that measures peoples strength as they grip it.

Think about what might cause variations in peoples strength. What you have eaten? Caffeine? A good nights sleep?

How about staring at coloured cardboard for a minute? 150 people were asked to stare at two coloured pieces of cardboard and their strength measured.

99% of these people - all but one - were stronger after looking at the blue board. So the Pink makes people weaker.

This shade of Pink has the name Drunk Tank Pink. It seems that a naval centre in the US had a problem with drunk sailors, but when the holding area was painted in this particular shade of pink, shouting and fighting virtually disappeared.

Picking up on this, Norwich Football Club painted their away dressing room a similar shade of pink.

It’s not totally reliable. The mighty Leeds United tweeted about how much they loved the colour - and thrashed Norwich 3 nil.

But Norwich did get promoted as Champions so maybe there is something in this? (And they also beat Man City at home)?

Probably the best book on how the brain works is Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman and in it he says;

"Thinking is to humans as swimming is to cats; they can do it but they'd prefer not to."?

A while ago I was invited into talk with FarmDrop. Over the days before the meeting, I saw a bus side for FarmDrop and a number of cross tracks. I even saw one of their Vans. Since the meeting?- which went nowhere - I don’t think I have seen anything of Farmdrop.

This is the brain deciding what’s interesting and what’s not. With an imminent meeting, the ads are useful. After, they’re not. What Daniel Kahnemen describes as System One and System Two are minimising the work they have to do.

Try this - watch this video and count how many times the players in white complete passes to each other.?

So 16 passes right??

But what about the Gorilla moon walking backwards? No??

Go back and watch again.

The brain is good at doing what it’s told and minimising the workload. But it does keep an eye ( and ear) out for things you are interested in.

Thinking about a new car? You notice when the right model drives past you. Considering a trip and you notice ads for flights to that place? That’s the brain working, rather than WhatsApp reading your mind

Advertising academic Robert Heath - of Low Involvement Processing fame - calls this Cocktail Party Syndrome. Try it next time you meet someone for coffee (or a cocktail) ; you talk together and the white noise of all the other conversations around you is ignored.

Until a name you know is mentioned. Or maybe your favourite song comes on the speaker, yet you have not heard any music before hand.?

I have it with football shirts or scarves. I regularly see Leeds ones but never notice any others. Because my brain know what’s of interest and what’s not.

So what has all that to do with creative and contextual ads? Facebook tell us that their average user scrolls over 90 metres every day - that’s the height of the?Statue of Liberty. And that scrolling means posts and ads are quickly viewed and the user moves on.

If we employ the logic of Cocktail Party Syndrome contextual ads hack peoples attention.?

At is most basic an ad saying it’s cold in Hackney right now gets attention as your brain registers that as true and relevant. More sophisticated approaches work too - showing a family man a SUV will work better than showing the sports model. Adding a child seat doesn’t work for the single guy, but a bike on the roof rack might.?

Relevance hacks the brain and drives greater effectiveness from contextual ads. We still have lots to learn - ads that are cast to reflect the users for example. And would adding a Leeds?Mug to the table in this Instagram ad make it work hard for Leeds fans?

The tools exist to make this type of experimentation simple and a standard.

There is no longer any excuse for advertising to treat people as strangers?- use the knowledge that data gives us to inform the creative and use neuroscience to hack attention.

We have seen this work and believe you can make your ads work harder too. Let us know how you get on - and if you need any help please shout.