Buyology - Martin Lindstrom

The last of the three business books I grabbed.  I read them in the order that I thought they would hold my interest, so this one didn't have high expectations.  

You have to get through the usual 'Why you should read this book'  hype up session in the first few chapters but after that it becomes very scientific.  Situation - Abstract - Experiment - Results.  This would be pretty boring but the experiments are somewhat interesting:

Smoking ad's and their effects
Product placement in American Idol
Subliminal messages
Superstition and religion and how these sell products
Does sex sell?

I think they also tried to make this book more interesting by having one of those gruff voiced voice over guys narrate.  I'm not sure if this was a well researched decision but I don't think it has the same punch after the normal 10 seconds.

I'm making this sound worse than it is, really it kept my attention.  I have an interest in both science and marketing so this wasn't going to be the worst read ever.  

After the hyping up the author goes into what he has been doing; investing $7m into a research campaign involving a focus group with a difference.  Instead of just discussing what they thought of a subject they are hooked up with brain scanners and put in an MRI machine.  This way showing how their brain reacts.  

The most interesting part is when they brains response contradicts what they said they felt about something.  This, Lindstom explains, is why a lot of business flop even after $$$$$ spent on market research.  See New Coke, Segway and Colgate's Kitchen Entrees. 

The 'Sex sells' chapter was a bit disturbing, thankfully I havent seen a lot of what he described, the interesting part of this was that the brain scanners showed that most of the time sex distracts away from the product rather than emphasizing it.  The main reason some of these commercials have done well in the past is because of the controversy and free publicity that comes with that.  He predicts that as companies seek out this publicity the envelope will be pushed further and further.  

Other predictions that are made in this book are that sounds and smells will play a lot bigger part in advertising and of course that Neuro-marketing (presumably headed up by Lindstrom) is the way of the future and the only way to truly see what the response to a product will be.  

See a few more details in Things that made me think.