What is neuromarketing?

You want to understand why a campaign attracts attention, a package gets overlooked or a customer hesitates while choosing. Neuromarketing helps turn these questions into research. Start with the decision you want to improve, then establish which evidence you need.

Neuromarketing applies knowledge and methods from neuroscience to marketing questions about perception, experience and choice. A study may combine brain measurements with eye movements, association tasks, behaviour and questions for participants. The combination depends on the research question. Plassmann and colleagues, 2015

For your decision, what matters is the conclusion the study design supports. The measurement, its interpretation and the recommendation should form a traceable sequence.

An early Dutch academic source is Ale Smidts’s 2002 inaugural address, Kijken in het brein: Over de mogelijkheden van neuromarketing. He connected brain research with understanding customer responses and developing marketing. The document establishes this early use; it does not, by itself, prove who first used the word worldwide. Smidts, 2002

Consumer neuroscience uses neuroscientific theories and techniques to investigate how consumers process information and make decisions. Here, we use neuromarketing for applications to marketing questions. The terms overlap and are not used identically everywhere. Plassmann and colleagues, 2015

You can record three elements separately in a study:

• Measurement: what the instrument or task records.
• Interpretation: the explanation you investigate for that finding.
• Application: the change you propose to test on that basis.

We use this distinction as a practical guide to reading research results.

Methodological background: Karmarkar and Plassmann, 2015, Ferrari and Quaresima, 2012 and Greenwald and colleagues, 1998.

Eye tracking and response-time tasks do not themselves measure brain activity. State which method a report actually uses. A publication about the IAT also does not automatically validate every other test offered as implicit association research.

Interviews, questionnaires and behavioural recordings can add information about what participants say, remember, choose or do. Select the components needed to answer your question.

A useful brief starts with a specific question. For example:

• Advertising: when is the brand message presented, viewed and subsequently remembered?
• Packaging: can participants find the information they need to make a choice?
• Brand research: which attributes do you want to investigate in relation to a brand name?
• Websites: at which stage of a task do delays or dropouts occur?
• Experience research: how do responses differ between two defined moments or conditions?

These are examples of research questions, not promises that one instrument can answer them fully. Define the outcome you need in advance. A question about memory calls for a memory task; a question about purchasing requires a relevant behavioural outcome.

Use this practical sequence when preparing a research brief:

1. Name the decision. What choice should the study help you make? You might need to change an opening scene or compare two packages.
2. Define the audience and context. Who will participate, in which task and in which setting? Record who the conclusion is not intended to describe.
3. Make the question testable. Specify the comparison and the relevant outcome. Separate the primary outcome from exploratory analyses.
4. Select suitable measurements. Explain what each method contributes. Plan how you will connect signals, events and behavioural data.
5. Plan execution and quality. Determine the required sample, stimulus order, treatment of dropouts and criteria for usable data.
6. Report the reasoning. Describe findings, uncertainty and limitations. Show which recommendations follow directly and which require a further test.

These six steps provide a briefing structure. They are not a fixed measurement protocol: the details depend on the question.

In 2015, Venkatraman and colleagues studied responses to television advertisements using several methods. Their analysis found that fMRI measures added predictive information about advertising effects at market level beyond traditional measures. This specific finding does not guarantee conversions for another campaign or measurement method. Venkatraman and colleagues, 2015

When evaluating a proposal, ask: what additional information do we expect, which business decision does it support, and how will we check that? A successful example should not replace the reasoning behind your own study design.

This is a fictional example, not a report of Neurofactor research findings.

A brand is choosing between two openings for the same video. Version A shows the product early; version B begins with a story. The question is which opening helps people recognise the brand later.

Your brief could include a comparison with viewing order balanced across participants, gaze recorded for the relevant images and brand recognition measured afterwards. Add EEG only if a separate question about processing over time and a suitable analysis justify it.

Suppose one version produces more fixations on the product. Report that as a gaze finding. Examine brand recognition separately, then decide whether a follow-up test with a behavioural outcome is needed. This keeps the observation and the business decision traceable.

Neuromarketing may suit a decision for which you want to investigate the course of a response, a difference between alternatives or the relationship between measurements. State in your brief what additional value you expect and why it justifies the time and resources involved.

A straightforward usability test, set of interviews or behavioural experiment may already provide enough evidence for the decision. Start with the smallest design that can answer the question well. Add measurements when you can explain what you intend to establish with them.

Inferring one specific emotion directly from a brain response requires supporting evidence. Poldrack describes the problem of reverse inference: the same activity can occur in different processes. Poldrack, 2006

Use these questions when reviewing a report:

• Is the meaning and calculation of each score clear?
• Are gaze behaviour, comprehension, liking and purchasing treated separately?
• Are disappointing and uncertain findings visible too?
• Has a group finding quietly become a claim about an individual?
• Does the recommendation follow from the measured outcome, or is it a proposal for further research?

Murphy, Illes and Reiner discussed the protection of those involved and consumer autonomy in 2008. Murphy and colleagues, 2008

Explain in your research plan what participants will experience, how their data will be used and who will have access. Describe the limits of the conclusions and the intended application. Consent to participate does not automatically make every use of the findings responsible. The separate article on neuromarketing and ethics explores these considerations further.

Start with the decision you need to make. Select measurements that provide relevant evidence and keep findings, interpretations and applications distinguishable. This lets you assess what neuromarketing contributes to your question and where another test is needed.