'Romantic ads seduce women. Men fall for sexual innuendo'

What’s the first word recognised by most kids all over the world? No, it’s not Mum! Or Dad for that matter. “Donald – a variation of McDonald’s is the word. In fact, the word beats even the most simple (and emotional word): Mom,” says brand guru Martin Lindstrom. “True, most 18-month-old babies cannot physically articulate the word ‘McDonald’s’, but what they can do is recognise the fast-food chain’s red and yellow colours, roofline, golden arches and logo. Then they can jab their chunky little fingers at a McDonald’s from the backseat of a car,” he writes in his new book Brandwashed – Tricks Companies Use to Manipulate Our Minds and Persuade Us to Buy. Such is the power of brands. In this interview to Vivek Kaul, Lindstrom talks about the thorny issue of consumer manipulation and gives a full-frontal exposé of the wanton trickery employed by many conglomerates, iconic brands included, to squeeze money out of their loyal customers.

To what extent can companies go to create desire in consumers to get them to buy things?
There’s a fundamental difference between creating a need and activating a need. In my books, I do not believe it is possible to create a need simply because it is against our instinctual behaviour. Instead, I believe it’s all about “activating a need” – that is, a fundamental need we all have – and which can thus be fulfilled in a new way. Our basic need is to be entertained – justifying the existence of the iPod. Our fundamental need is to be stimulated – justifying the need for computer games, etcetera.

Could you explain that in a little detail?
So, when we talk about engineering needs, I think it is fair to say it is more a matter of engineering new ways of fulfilling pre-existing needs. Needs can be activated in many ways. The typical tools of persuasion would be fear, guilt, aspiration, sex, etcetera. Close to 45% of all advertising in the US today is based on fear, guilt or sex – fear of not belonging to our group, fear of losing our jobs,  fear of death or diseases, or fear of theft; guilt of being overweight, not looking good, not cooking a meal for our kids (simply because we don’t have these cooking skills any longer.) A lot of communication these days presses those buttons – like fuelling the idea of you attracting some disease, or the fear of witnessing some stranger breaking into your home.

An example of fear being used to sell us something is the hand-sanitiser. Why have we welcomed the hand-sanitiser into our lives as a cheap, everyday, utterly essential staple, even though they are not very useful? 
After the outbreak of SARS followed by swine-flu in 2003 and 2008, we’ve witnessed an amazing uptake of hand-sanitising products. What’s ironic is that none of those products – such as Purell -- actually does any better job than soap and water. However, we’ve led ourselves to believe the hand sanitiser is more effective. The companies have done an extraordinary job in building their brands on the fear created by those global viruses, indicating that we’ll be safe using these brands. Once we’ve begun using them, this habit will stay for life. The ironic side of the story, however, is that the life expectancy in Japan is decreasing for the first time in history. Why? Because the country simply has become too clean – the Japanese have weakened their immune system as a result of overuse of hand-sanitising products.

How and why has fear-mongering become a favoured tactic of the marketers? 
Because we’re all hardwired to be seduced by fear – fear is the number one soft button in our brain – it is a survival instinct. Fear is used by most insurance companies and even Colgate that claimed in one ad that they could remove the risk of cancer by the usage of their toothpaste.

You talk about how certain websites are rewiring our brains to get us hooked on the act of shopping and buying. Could you explain this in detail with an example?
Rewiring is a big word. That said, some websites indeed are designed to hook us. An example would be the countdown clock on Amazon.com which kicks in during the holiday season. It begins ticking the minute you’ve landed on the site. This gives you a sense of urgency and pushes up the dopamine levels in your brain, resulting in you acting more irrationally or emotionally. In future, we’ll see more and more sites based on gaming concepts – that is, encouraging us to participate, earn points or, in some cases, secure access to products before everyone else.

One of the interesting things that you write in Brandwashed is that “Our brand and product preferences are pretty firmly embedded in us by the age of seven… I’d even go so far to suggest that some of the cleverest manufacturers in the world are at work trying to manipulate our taste preferences even earlier than that. Much earlier. Even before we’re even born.” Is it really so?
Before I even was born, I fell victim to this very phenomena as my mom and dad danced every evening to their favourite Bossa Nova (a well-known style of Brazilian music developed and popularised in the 1950s and 1960) song. The day I was born, the record player dropped on the floor and broke in to pieces. As a result it never played again – and never played from the very day I was born. Ironically, I love Bossa Nova – and have done so from the first day I was born, my mom and dad tell me.

So what is the point you are trying to make?
Based on numerous experiments, we today know that what mothers eat and listen to during pregnancy affects their unborn babies – this is the principle some companies are tapping into.

Kopiko in the Philippines is a scary example of how far this can go. The manufacturer has for decades been known for its coffee candy. Yet, recently they entered the coffee market. Their technique to enter the market was to hand out free Kopiko coffee-infused candy to pedestrians and doctors for them to give to pregnant mothers. Today, Kopiko is one of the leading coffee brands – a position they’ve secured within only a few years.

You write that “in general, women tend to be more easily persuaded by ads that are more romantic than sexual… Men, on the other hand, respond to sexual innuendo and women in bikinis.” Can you explain this in some detail through examples?
Women prefer to be able to continue the storyline; men prefer to see the end of the storyline. Sex can play a major role in both scenarios – yet the role of sex would have to change in order to stimulate us accordingly.

What is the ultimate male fantasy? How did Unilever use it to make the Axe brand?
A man sitting in a hot-top-spa with two naked ladies on each side and popping... a bottle of champagne. Unilever, the manufacturer of Axe, discovered this based on thousands of interviews and observations of men worldwide. Realising that this fantasy indeed seems global, their Axe uses this as the foundation for all its ads.

You say that the migration of the male consumer into a traditional female arena is overturning the rules of marketing and advertising. Can you explain that through examples?
Cosmetics is a great example – until recently, men wouldn’t dare even think about buying a moisturiser. Today, it’s different. This is far from a coincidence. The world’s leading cosmetics companies have for years pushed this trend, by educating men to activate the need for beauty and cleanliness. Unilever educated the man about the liquid soap after it was found that in the US, men avoided using soap in the shower for cost-saving reasons and couldn’t cope with the idea of touching their own body in the shower – something they felt was too feminine. That led the way to justify this change – the introduction of a washing device which would separate the guys’ hands from their bodies. And P&G separated the aisles of cosmetics so that men would have one section far away from the women – ensuring that they wouldn’t be shy buying a cream.

You point out that people get addicted to brands in two stages: the routine stage and the dream stage. Could you discuss this in detail?
‘Routine’ means daily duties – that is, using the iTunes service on our iPod. Watching movies on our iPod streamed from our iTV is easy because we don’t have to think – we just plug and play, it’s a routine. The ‘dream’ stage is when a brand allows us to dream – or disappear into a dream. Let’s say that you went to Ibiza in Spain for a holiday. You had great fun, drank a lot of Red Bulls and then returned to the gray everyday life. Once you see the Red Bull brand again in your everyday life, you feel the brand helps you to escape back to this dream world, the life you had for just one week but which “kind of” can be extended by drinking a Red Bull.

How do companies activate our cravings to get us to buy food products?
In many ways. By adding bubbles (or sweat as they call it) onto the cans and bottles – the more bubbles, the more craving. Or, by playing the sound of a cola being poured into a glass with ice (the world’s fifth most craving-generating sound) or by adding many chips on the front of a snack package – the more chips there are on the cover picture, the more we believe there’s a lot in the bag, and the more craving we generate.

You write: “Peer pressure delivers a windfall for brands and companies.” Could you explain that in detail through some examples?
The entire social media space is heaven for brands as it allows to fuel peer pressure – and do it fast. Numerous studies show that this is incredibly powerful, including the $3 million study I did for my latest book Brandwashed where we realised that it only takes five people to convince 195 people to do the same. Peer pressure is everywhere, from the recent release of iPhone 5 (I feel embarrassed running around with an iPhone 4) to fashion (you simply can’t wear that tie from two years ago – it is too old-fashioned) to cigarette smoking.

What is a ‘perceived justification symbol’ or PJS?
It’s a way to convert intangible stuff into tangible stuff – to make the invisible benefit become visible. Let’s take the dishwashing tablet – it has a white, blue level and a red dot – indicating the powerful magical clean button. The reality is that it’s all the same but we get a sense of that something “black box” stuff is happening – cleaning our plates. Another example is Duracell’s power metre – which helps us to measure how much battery power there’s left in the battery. Why is this a genius idea? Because consumers fundamentally believe that batteries hanging in the store lose power – and thus by installing such a device, a PJS, we’ll be convinced otherwise.

Why does nostalgia marketing work well in uncertain economic times?
It gives us certainty, comfort and creates a framework of safety around us. Studies show that we indeed recall past memories in a more positive light than present memories – this phenomena is called Rosy Memories and is used by many brands including Pepsi’s recent Throwback – a replicate of the old Pepsi recipe and pack design to Coke’s re-play of “I want to teach the world to sing”.

Can a famous face really have that much of an impact on how we spend our money? Are we human beings that naïve?
We all need leaders around us. In today’s world, where fewer countries have royal families as leaders, where politicians are failing, celebrities becomes our leaders of our time. We’re hardwired to be seduced by such leaders even though we know they might not be real. We are like some people who knock on wood for good luck despite the fact that they very well know it has no effect.

Interviewer Kaul is a writer.
Email: vivek.kaul@gmail.com