Predicting consumers behaviour: head, heart or herd?

Recently I worked on a project which produced some brilliant creative concepts. I mean 'add to your proudest moments list', 'mention it in any future interviews', 'makes you feel brilliant about your career and gives you goosebumps', creative. But alas the creative (in storyboard/ scamp form) got put into groups and was brutally murdered. Luckily our second favourite out of a few came top - phew!

But it kept bugging me, over and over. The clients loved it, we loved it, but consumer groups didn't. And I knew if they had seen the finished product, in thier living room amoung friends and family, they would have felt differently. Complete injustice. Could you imagine the group comments for a Sony Balls storyboard? "But what have colourful balls got to do with TVs? What about the TV makes the Colour Like No Other?!" The results of that ad? Bravia sold out in the UK and the ad was downloaded nearly 20,000 times in eight weeks.




Richard Huntingdon describes brainstorms as trojan horses of mediocrity. People who have little end responsiblity making huge suggestions on something, in a teacher/ pupil 'I must say something' fashion. To me most focus groups are the same. So the question I set out to find the answer to was how the hell do we avoid this in the future? And I think I found a few answers.

I came across this great set of videos on the APG site, which was from a talk called 'Head, heart or Herd.' Essentially they offer up four different ways to predict consumers behaviour:

1. Just ask them to describe thier emotions when viewing the ad.

This was compelling. According to this emotional test, Cadbury's Gorilla was deemed to be a success. It made a few people question the link between the creature and chocolate, but overall the majority of people didn't care and said they just loved to watch it. This same ad failed miserably on Millward Brown's indicators around message take out. But as Winston Churchill said, "However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results". Gorilla increased market share by 9%. His arguement: if you don't feel something you don't do something. And it's true. My problem is we rarely show a group a finished glossy ad. We show an underwhelming piece of stimulus.



2. The second was more of an observation than a solution. Neuroscience.

The point I took out of this was that only 20% of our brain is conscious, the remaining 80% is subconscious. And examples of this would include driving from A to B thinking the whole time about what you're doing that night, or leaving a crossword puzzle, sleeping on it, and the answer coming to you the next day. Or dreaming of improving a sports technique and waking up to find the method you dreamt works. This is your unconscious brain working, so what's to say this part wouldn't aid decision making, post seeing an ad? The reptilian brain makes the decision and frontal lobe rationalises it after all.

3. Rory Sutherland made the case for bahvioural economics, and researching that instead not the big brand stuff.

He compares brand preference to gravity. It's a potent force but it's not the only force acting on moving objects. Plus gravity is relatively weak at a long range but is pervasive. So a realistic model of what effects human behaviour, means recognising all forces that act on us. Electro magnasitsm is powerful at a short range, and this in consumer behaviour terms would be framing effects. So people can't tell the value of anything without comparing it to something else E.G £6.00 for 25 Twinnings tea bags seems pricey but 25p per cup is way below what we'd pay in a cafe. Or we're happy to pay 26p for individual espresso machine pods as it's comparative set is starbucks. "Still or sparkling?", is what stops you telling your waiter to piss off if he asks you if you'd like bottled water. Or a simple one - the AA as the 4th emergency service. Plus the sequential behaviour element, which may be not 'what will make them buy' but 'what's stopping them buying'? In New York 1-800 Mattress is successful because it get's rid of your old mattress which is what usually stops people buying them in the first place.

The final two were Herd behaviour, which is all about the visibility of products and the space between people which makes them copy eachother's behaviour and therefore create trends and/or sales. And finally looking within to find insights yourself.

The conclusion? Tell clients about other clients who have used broader techniques that traditional market research. As Mark Earles suggests, tailor the research experience around how you believe the comms will work. And finally use all of the above rather than treating them as mutually exclusive to help you build a case.