Lets use psychology! Advertisement is based on psychology. We use words, visuals and emotional impacts in order to pursuit our audience to want, need and demand the product or service we are offering. Here are 7 ways to use psychology for making your advertisement appealing.
1. Always show faces
If your goal is to gain audience attention you should always show faces in your advertisements. People just love to see faces. Recognizing faces and guessing emotions is one of the basic social skill we all have and our brain is always unconsciously looking for faces everywhere around (just think about how many times you’ve shaped faces in the clouds above, or in your cappuccino cup in the mornings, or even at the surface of Mars). A special part of our brain is responsible only for faces recognition. No other image could activate or generate any reaction in this part of the brain. According to one neurological experiment conducted in 2005, a particular brain cell is responsible for the recognition of a particular face. The experiment is made with the famous actress Jenifer Aniston face. The brain cell called “Aniston cell” is activated only when the image of the actress is shown. No other face, neither stranger or familiar could activate the cell. The conclusion, showing faces is the perfect way to use our audience brain processes to gain attention.
2. Emotions always win
Unless you are a new generation cyborg, emotions will always drive your decisions. Emotions in others, especially those which are shown at their faces will always win our emotions. That’s a clever way to use both techniques at the same time – showing faces and generate emotions. According to experts emotions don’t differ in different cultures. Actually one of the main reasons we love to see faces so much is the unconscious need to recognize the emotion shown and respond to it accordingly. That means that we may recognize even the slightest emotion. Positive emotions are always most effective but it’s not rare to find emotions shown surprise or all type of OMG emotions.
3. Gain attention with red
The red color has a great symbolical meaning. When we are agitated are faces become red. Red is the color of romantic and love. Red is accelerating the heartbeat rate and makes the appetite stronger. Red is the most intriguing, shocking and attractive of all colors. Red is standing out and immediately grab the attention (the opposite – blue color is for calming down, relaxing, friendship and happiness; that explains why the Facebook platform is blue). Less are the advertisements which bet on red’s shocking side. Most of the advertisement specialists prefer a combination of colors, where red is only a detail used to grab the attention.
4. Make the customer part of something cool
No matter how bright personality we have, we always want to be accepted by the others and be a part of the group. There are two ways to use this social acceptance need in advertisement.
A. Social proof: people love to see advertisements which show what other people (people like them) like to do. From the moment we are born we are searching the other people approval, the proof that his or hers behavior, way of thinking and reactions are right and that he or she perfectly fits in community.
The need to be a part of the group is our lifetime need. That makes advertisements showing that using a particular product could identify you with the group are highly effective. The social proof will give the customer the feeling that your product is very OK to be used. When so many other people use the product why not suitable for using by you, yourselves. If you put in the copy the social proof that 222.869 people are already using your product your advertisement will be effective (226.869 people couldn’t be wrong at the same time in their opinion about the product, right? Bare in mind that the exact number is more reliable. 200 000 or 225 000 could easily be made up numbers.
B. Viral factor. People love to be part of something valuable, something cool that gives them the feeling of being alive. If an advertisement is able to activate those type of emotions its popularity will go straight to the top. For example the ice bucket challenge went viral and made milions of people to get totally crazy about it.
5. Use the cognitive dissonance
Everyone of us has his or hers own picture of him/herself. That picture shows us as really nice people – funny, smart, competent… Then we make something silly. Our brain starts to fight the dissonance in our inside and outside picture. We are trying to understand our own behavior or just to bury the silly deed deeper in our subconscious. The brain can’t manage the idea that we are smart but we have made something silly. The process that occurs is called cognitive dissonance. On a rational level we are aware that something is not right but we are trying to use different emotional strategies to solve the inconvenience. We think of ourselves as smart and competent but still afraid that could be silly and not very professional. Every proof for the latter provoke serious thinkin and could be a very powerful motive to be better, smarter and more experienced.
6. Use FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) or the suggestion that the product is running out
If the product is limited edition we immediately think of it as something very valuable. This is a highly effective marketing trick to be used. Make the product limited edition and it will become valuable in our customers eyes. That’s the psychology behind “exclusive offer”, “one day only” etc. And what FOMO means? An experiment conducted with 200 students in USA explains the FOMO factor. Stidents were asked to choose a cookie from one of two jars. The jars are identical. The only difference between the jars is that one of them contains 2 cookies and the other – 10. Almost all of the students took a cookie from the jar containing only 2 cookies. Despite the fact that two jars are absolutely identical, students unconsciously decided that cookie from the jar containing only two cookies is more valuable than the cookie from the jar containing 10. That trick is often used by the advertisement.
7. Use special words
The visuals are one of the most important part of every advertisement but we shouldn’t underestimate the power of the good copy. The image helps to grab the customer’s attention but the copy helps to gain new customer. Here are 5 of the most powerful words:
1. YOU: the superpower of this word – it makes you think of yourselves. If every advertisement could be customized for only one customer that would be perfect. But that is not the case. So we use the word YOU. Seeing the word customer’s brain is activated to think of his/her self.
2. FREE: customers love free products. Adding the word to your advertisement will guarantee that the advert will grab the attention. Customers have been ask to choose between a Lindt chocolate for 15 cents and some other chocolate for 1 cent. Everyone of them has chosen the Lindt chocolate. Then customers have been asked to choose between Lindt chocolate for 14 cents and the other one – for free. Everyone has chosen the free product.
3. BECAUSE: we need answers. Constantly searching for information, asking questions. That’s why BECAUSE means a lot. Here id the proof – when ask “May a use the copy machine” 60% of people included in the experiment answered with Yes. When the question was “May I use the copy machine BECAUSE I am in a hurry” 95% of people answered wirh yes.
4. NOW: the scientific proof of the effectiveness of that word is a brain scan that shows how big impact makes NOW to our mind.
5. NEW: new products are a challenge for every brand. Customers have their favorite products with proven quality but still human beings are curious. We all seekers of new emotions, new experience, we love to try new things. That’s how NEW may stimulate our curiosity towards the product. Sometimes even old brands use that new-strategy launching a “new line” from the old product.
