The Buying Brain: Secrets for Selling to the Subconscious Mind

Written by A.K. Pradeep

Narrated by Hari S. Patel

What are consumers really thinking when they see websites, commercials, ads, and products?  Companies like Proctor font-family: Calibri;">  Take Pepsi, for example.  For years, blind taste tests have concluded that half of participants preferred Pepsi to Coke, but Pepsi never came close to owning half of the soft drink market share.  Enter neuroscience.  Using brain scans, Pepsi conducted the same taste test.  When participants were not told what they were drinking, the results were not surprising.  Half chose Coke, half chose Pepsi.  And the part of the brain responsible for reward lit up, validating the results.   BUT, when participants were told in advance what they were about to drink, almost all of them chose Coke.  And the part of their brains responsible for memory lit up, meaning that once people knew what they were drinking, they started thinking about what they knew and remembered about Coke and Pepsi as companies and brands, not what the drinks actually tasted like.  Consumer brains were saying that their reasons for buying Coke over Pepsi had more to do with what they thought about the brand than what the product actually tasted like.  If youre Pepsi, youd want to ramp up your branding efforts based on these results.    Other neuroscience tests related to marketing study things like what makes people choose to pay with cash over credit at point-of-purchase, or what words people pay attention to the most in ads, etc.     Written by the worlds leading neuromarketing research company, this book is a fascinating look into the minds of the consumer, and a must-read for anyone in marketing, branding, or advertising. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ascent Audio
• Release date: Jul 20, 2020
• ISBN: 9781663703712

Reviews for The Buying Brain

[chaosmogony · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I'm really not sure how to parse this book.

If Pradeep is right, then he's working in an interesting field at the intersection of traditional marketing and neuroscience, aptly named "neuromarketing". The idea is that by measuring brain activity during decision-making, say deciding to buy a car or a new product on the shelf, we can establish with some certainty what advertising and marketing methods are most effective.

The problem I had with this book is the same problem I share with the larger sweep of modern neuroscience: it becomes incredibly sure-footed on scientific quicksand. I have no problem with current trends in brain imaging and lesion studies, as these are useful for what they are. I just cannot accept that EEG and fMRI are revealing useful insights about human thought and action; at best these are correlates of cognitive function (which is why they're called "neurological correlates" instead of "neurological causes").

We don't have anything like the depth of knowledge to establish X means Y type of causation when it comes to internal states of the brain, and to think that modern-day tools can do so is to grossly misrepresent the situation. This isn't helped by the fact that the book draws on the intellectual property of a commercial venture, as it is peppered with methodologies and measures that go by cutesy names, often prefixed by "Neuro". As a result, most of the research providing the conclusions are hidden away behind the veils of intellectual property and client confidentiality.

The premise is compelling and I have no doubt that neuroscience inquiry has promise as an adjunct to sales and marketing efforts (for better or worse -- probably worse). I just cannot agree with many of its conclusions.