Successful brands are defined by their sustainable pricing power. Consumers or customers buy them almost regardless of price. In economic terms, they’re relatively inelastic. Marketers know why consumers prefer and buy one product over another.
Everything centers on one word: Emotion. With a big E.
In Gerald Zaltman’s book, How Customers Think: Essential Insights into the Mind of the Market, the renowned Harvard professor claims 95% of purchasing decisions are emotional. He urges us that when marketing a product, it’s most effective to target the subconscious. Neuroscience has confirmed time and again that people whose brains are damaged in the area that generates emotions are incapable of making decisions. Humans are machines programmed to decide primarily on feeling, not on logic, even if they trick themselves into believing they are rational beings.
But if the fundamentals of marketing are based on emotion, what happens when major technology disruption truly kills emotion as the core driver? What happens to how we make choices if we all have our brains augmented in the coming decades? If we all naturally evolve into half man, half machine cyborgs capable of logical decisions never dreamed of before, what happens to the idea of Brands?
Will Logic (with big L) displace Emotion (with big E) as the core driver of marketing,
if that word still exists in the future?
I tend to not be a big fan of the end of stories. They are alarmist for no reason. A classic bait and switch, like these intriguing click through banners on your phone that make you regret you chased another rabbit hole. But ladies and gentlemen, dear fellow marketers, if you care not only about your job in the future, but about the future of mankind in general, I ask you to hear me out. This is a matter that truly warrants some of your scarce and valuable attention. Stop Twitter or TikTok for a moment.
Technology, and especially Artificial Intelligence (AI), is advancing at such an incredibly impactful speed that, for the first time in history, there is a distinct possibility the fundamental laws of marketing and successful brand building will be upended – forever. We aren’t talking the latest Silicon snake oil tool here. AI is possibly the ultimate movie in a long line of sequels, and then the series stops, with the equivalent of a Big Bang. Marketing as we know it may be gone. The mere idea of Brand could be relegated to the history books, or at best completely redefined. The mere idea of Marketing may succumb to the hard law of survival of the fittest, joining the destiny of the Dodo, the bird who could not fly and became extinct. In the movies, long running series that were once stopped, sometimes miraculously get resurrected in the future, because future generations see value in doing so. Maybe our Cyborg progeny will one day conclude the same? Or not.
I am no tech primitive. I grew up in a telecom innovation household. I am not scared of tech. On the contrary, I embrace it in life as it comes. As many business marketers, I leverage tech as a means to an end. As a powerful tool in the marketer’s ever expanding and changing toolbox. To date, evolution in tech impacted mostly the HOW of marketing. It also impacts the WHO of marketing, as we need to evolve constantly to stay current. We use new tools to connect Brands and people better, to create better Brand experiences, all the way to completely reinvent better Branded business models. But I admit, AI was a largely unknown area to me. Other than seeing the word pop up everywhere in future-centric seminars, I knew precious little about it, and actually cared little to know more. Until I started to realize AI may actually impact the very WHY and WHAT of marketing itself.
So I decided to dig deeper into what we know and don’t know yet in this area, and reflect on its possible impact on my beloved professional field (see full article below). But here is my conclusion (spoiler alert): I hate to admit it, but my findings are …inconclusive. Despite best research efforts, I honestly really don’t know yet how things may play out one day. Which also means there is still hope for humans, for Brands, for Emotion, …and for Marketing as we know it.
The full article here
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