Mind control: the advent of neuroscience in marketing

Brands are forever seeking more effective methods to build closer connections with the consumer, boost recognition, build loyalty and sway the purchase decision journey. Marketers have made staggering advances in their ability to analyse and understand what influences consumers, whether this be employing eye-tracking technology or using sophisticated data analytics to monitor real time consumer preferences. Yet, unexpectedly, it is neuroscience that has emerged as one of the biggest breakthroughs in marketing in decades.

The collaboration between neuroscience and marketing may seem like the stuff of science fiction; however the study of the nervous system is beginning to be used by marketers to accurately measure what the consumer is feeling. In a manner inconceivable in the past, the practice allows marketing experts to understand how the brain responds to creative stimulus and more importantly what particular emotions those ideas trigger. Consumers naturally connect to the brands and experiences that make them "feel" something. By putting neuromarketing science into practice, marketers now have the opportunity to create an emotional affinity with brands and forge effective long-term bonds with consumers.

As we increasingly draw on technology to break down the barriers of understanding our emotions, a whole world of possibility is opening up. In the future, as technology companies begin talking about mass-market gaming and smartphones that are controlled by our thoughts, there is a strong argument to suggest that brands need to be concentrating on "mind" rather than "touch" to stay ahead.

Harnessing neuroscience enables marketing experts to ensure the brand is core to inciting the desired emotions that make a lasting and positive impression on the consumer. It has been discovered that the majority of purchase decisions are made on a subconscious level. Therefore, in this fiercely competitive industry, traditional methods of analysis using merely the conscious are no longer sufficient. Neuroscience enables marketers to delve beneath the surface and understand what really makes the consumer tick.

Technology is developing at such a rapid rate that it won't be long before our biological profile will become intrinsically linked with technology in everyday life. There are already reports that biometrics will soon render passwords irrelevant, with our biological makeup being used instead to safeguard identity through retinal scans and voice files. To put this in context, there are rumours online that the impending iPhone5 will include an iris scanner for this very purpose.

This bridge between biology and technology is also emerging in the gaming industry where marketers look for inspiration to enrich experiences and build closer connections with consumers. With the launch of the Nintendo Wii in 2006, motion control became the most coveted and in-demand technology around, which was most recently capitalised by Microsoft's Kinect and Sony's Move. However, the next big craze in gaming will be brainwave technology. NeuroSky, the US company specialising in brainwave technology seems to be leading the way. Its technology has already been incorporated into toys available on the market such as the Star Wars Force Trainer, which allows users to float a ball through a tube simply by concentrating.

Another US company, Chaotic Moon Labs has developed a skateboard, the Board of Imagination, which is controlled through the users' mind by a headset. If technology such as this is already widely in use in gaming, then it is unlikely to be long before it will be integrated into other more practical aspects our everyday lives. The potential this technology offers marketers is staggering, particularly when you consider the opportunities for brands to utilise it for highly targeted and effective advertising.

With technology already in existence enabling us to control gadgets through our minds, surely this could be developed for a whole range of other means. E-commerce, for example, seems like an obvious path as does a thinking version of Siri on the iPhone 4S. Alongside this, if marketers employ neuromarketing to approach consumers in real time and then connect this with the technology with which the consumer is engaging, marketing could potentially be personalised to that individual in an instance. It would be like biological cookies. It's a highly complex theory, but not completely beyond of the realms of imagination.

Despite the plethora of opportunities it opens up, reading consumers' emotions through neuroscience and consumers controlling technology through their minds are understandably highly controversial subjects. In fact it has been recognised as such a contentious issue that the British ethics group, the Nuffield Council on Bioethics (NCB), has already launched an investigation into the ethical dilemmas and potential threats of such technology, the global market for which it says is worth £5bn and growing fast.

Despite the controversy, as neuroscience and our understanding of human DNA develops to a whole new level of usability, it is inevitable that it will become an increasingly coveted tool within the marketing industry. The ability to access consumers' inner emotions and act upon them is set to revolutionise marketing and change our relationship with advertising forever. However, this isn't like the film Minority Report; we have learned from the examples of the past and know that ethical considerations need to be placed far above any desire for commercial gain. The science needs refining, the practice controlled and its eventual implementation made entirely transparent and optional. It will be a very long time before the marketer can fully realise these requirements, but it doesn't stop the geeks in us getting excited.

Tim Hipperson is chief executive of communications company G2 Joshua

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