Page 204 - Marketing the Basics 2nd

196 Marketing: the Basics
times/detection levels), functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), magnetoencephalography (MEG) and electroencephalog- raphy (EEG).
The most interesting of these to neuromarketing is fMRI scan- ning. I am sure we all have seen these on ‘ER’ or other television shows, where the patient is slid inside a machine which hums and makes various other noises. Neuromarketing is the application of the techniques of neuroscience to marketing stimuli; in layman’s terms, to see how the brain ‘lights up’ when exposed to our marketing efforts. Science has made a great deal of progress in understanding our brains. Many called the 1990s the ‘decade of the brain’ and in the last 20 years there have been more than 100,000 scientific publications on this most complex of organs.
It is early days for neuroscience, but what research has been done has stirred up a considerable amount of interest in the idea of neuromarketing. It is being touted by some as the next big thing. If marketers can use science to locate consumers’ ‘buy buttons’, then we have gotten closer to opening the black box of the consumer’s mind. The best use of neuromarketing is in predicting behaviour, spotting the advertisements that people remember, selecting the media format that works best and how what consumers actually do differs from what they tell focus groups. Other uses I have seen or read about include reactions to movie trailers, choices about auto- mobiles, the appeal of a pretty face and visceral reactions to political campaign advertising.
Neuromarketing has critics. We share some of their fears; it raises the possibility of a too-useful tool for Big Brother being one of them. Other concerns include the costs and the unpleasantness of a scan. Dr Gemma Calvert, co-founder of Neurosense Ltd., a neuromarketing consultancy, noted in The Times (London): ‘MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) is not as expensive as people think and is only slightly more expensive than the average cost of conducting focus groups...and OK, it is not pleasant, but it isn’t unpleasant either. We have never had a problem getting people into scanners; most have read about brain imaging and are really keen to have a go’.
At this point brain-scanning is being used as an adjunct to tradi- tional market research techniques, including focus groups. In the