🎯Why Everything You Know About Marketing is Wrong!
How Targeting Emotion Over Logic and Embracing the Power of Print Can Transform Your Advertising Game
Step into the mind of a mad genius. Picture a room full of marketing execs, corporate suits, and ad wizards, their minds collectively blown by a suave British gentleman wielding nothing but a PowerPoint and a devilish grin. That's what happened when Rory Sutherland, the advertising maverick from Ogilvy, took the stage at the EPIP Conference 2024. His mission? To dismantle everything you thought you knew about the human brain and show how to wield its mysterious powers to, you guessed it, sell more stuff.
The Rider and the Elephant: Your Brain’s Odd Couple
Let’s talk psychology. Not the Freud-and-his-cigar kind, but Jonathan Haidt’s elegant model of the mind. Picture a tiny rider perched precariously atop a gigantic, unpredictable elephant. Now, the rider represents your conscious, rational brain—calm, collected, logical. The elephant? That’s your unconscious mind—massive, emotional, and, let’s be honest, a little unruly.
Sutherland takes this metaphor and runs with it. In his view, traditional marketing targets the rider—persuasion via reason, facts, and figures. But here’s the catch: the rider is not in charge. Not really. It’s the elephant that calls the shots. The elephant decides whether to buy that overpriced organic toothpaste or to hit the snooze button for the fifth time. And if you can persuade the elephant, the rider will come up with all sorts of logical reasons to justify it afterward.
Embrace the Elephant: Why Logic Won’t Save You
Imagine you’re a marketer, tasked with convincing people to use more public transport. Your logical rider’s instinct might be to present stats: CO2 reduction, cost savings, health benefits. But here’s the thing—elephants don’t care about pie charts. Elephants care about how they feel.
Sutherland argues that effective advertising taps into these unconscious desires. It’s about creating emotional resonance. Want people to take the train? Make it feel luxurious. Want them to eat healthy? Make it feel indulgent. The logic will follow the emotion, not the other way around.
Print is Not Dead, It’s Just in Disguise
During his keynote, Sutherland made a bold claim that would make any digital-first marketer spit out their artisanal cold brew: print is far from dead. In fact, it’s thriving. But only if you know how to play the game.
Sutherland highlights that print has a tangible, almost magical quality that digital media lacks. It’s something you can touch, hold, feel. And guess what? Elephants love that stuff. Ever wonder why you still get a thrill flipping through a glossy magazine or why a handwritten note feels special? That’s the elephant in action, responding to sensory cues that digital just can’t replicate. The tactile experience of print—its weight, texture, even its smell—sends a signal to the elephant that says, “This matters.”
The Power of the Perceived
One of the gems from Sutherland’s talk was his emphasis on the “perceived value” over the “actual value.” Here’s where things get deliciously tricky. People often value things not for their inherent worth but for what they represent. A Starbucks coffee is just that, a cup of joe. But it’s not. It’s a lifestyle, a status symbol, an identity.
Sutherland argues that print can tap into this perception of value in ways digital often struggles to match. Think about it—digital ads can feel ephemeral, here today and gone in the next click. But a well-designed piece of print can linger, almost demanding to be noticed, felt, remembered.
In Defense of Imprecision: The Creativity Conundrum
Sutherland’s keynote wasn’t just a love letter to print; it was also a rallying cry against the over-reliance on data and precision. He points out a paradox in the advertising world: the more we try to measure and quantify creativity, the less creative we become. There’s an inherent imprecision in human psychology—a chaos the elephant thrives in—that can’t be captured in neat spreadsheets or algorithms.
This is where Sutherland shines. His argument is that the real magic happens when you embrace the messiness of human emotion and the unpredictability of the unconscious. Instead of trying to control the elephant with data reins, let it roam, explore, and get creative.
The Takeaway: How to Be an Elephant Whisperer
So, what’s a savvy entrepreneur or marketer to do with this information? Here’s the gist:
1. Target the Elephant, Not the Rider: Emotions first, logic second. Make people feel, and the rest will follow.
2. Print is Your Secret Weapon: In a world drowning in digital noise, a well-crafted piece of print can cut through, making a tangible, lasting impression.
3. Embrace the Chaos: Stop obsessing over precision. Sometimes, the best ideas come from the messiest places.
In the end, Rory Sutherland’s keynote was more than just a talk; it was a call to action to rethink how we connect with people. It’s about understanding that beneath the rational veneer, we’re all just elephants, swayed by the emotional, the tangible, and the beautifully irrational. And if you can tap into that? Well, the possibilities are as big as an elephant.
Watch the full keynote here ⬇️
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