Over the next couple of weeks Deloitte – or rather Deloitte’s Duncan Stewart and friends – are travelling across Canada presenting the Deloitte’s TMT Predictions 2012, an exploration of future trends in technology, media and telecommunications (TMT). The tour kicked off in Toronto earlier this week and while there were many trends that were covered, a couple predictions related to marketing in particular caught my attention. Especially the ones that incorporated food and drink stories – go figure!
Online branding will grow 50% to US$20 billion as companies look to digital to stake their claim for mindshare. Measuring success of such online branding efforts is becoming more sophisticated as advertisers increasingly make use of video which should bode well for companies like Communitech’s client and Hub resident, Vidyard. Here’s a great example of online branding effort that Duncan Stewart shared with the audience.
How did you respond to that video? It certainly evokes an emotional response and makes you think.
I wonder if Chipotle Mexican Grill (CMG) – or the agency they hired - used Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) analysis to build out the story line and pick Willie Nelson as their crooner on the accompanying Coldplay track. I really have no idea if CMG did make use of fMRI in crafting that online video but it turns out that there is a trend for the use of fMRI analysis to influence product development. Apparently certain (un-named) soup companies are using this approach to design their product labels.
So how does it work?
fMRI analysis can show activity in certain regions of the brain which can in turn be correlated with specific emotions and types of thinking. Duncan Stewart shared with the audience results of a study as an example to demonstrate the insight gained by employing fMRI analysis.
Remember the Pepsi Challenge?
That’s where a blind-folded participant tasted both Pepsi and Coke and then picked the one that tasted best. Using fMRI analysis, researchers determined that yes, indeed, while tasting blind-folded, it could be seen that the part of the brain associated with taste was very active and participating in the decision. And just like with the original Challenge, Pepsi won about 60% of the time.
Guess what happened when they conducted the same test without the blindfold.
This time taste was not involved in the decision. fMRI showed that when participants were not blindfolded, the part of the brain involved was associated with memory and emotion. The participant was associating the brands in front of them with past experiences, memories etc. which in turn evoked an emotional response. And how did that impact the decision outcomes?
Coke won. By a lot.
So if we equate taste with technology, marketing and branding trumped technology in this example. By a lot.
Now this is only one example but in this case better technology (ie taste) did not win the day up against a stronger brand. I do wonder though that as more and more of these product decisions are made on-line, if companies like Communitech client and Accelerator Centre resident, Sortable, are poised to level the playing field with their decision engine that enables smart buying decisions. And as more of these decisions are being made online, maybe that also partially explains why we’ll see that big uptick in online branding spending.
In any case, a strong brand can win the day and add a lot of value to a company – by some estimates, the Coke brand is valued in the neighbourhood of $72B. Now that’s a lot of value!
Something to think about next time you order a soda with your Burrito and, more importantly, if you’re in the trenches building a tech product and company.
